Box Turtle Ben

For those arriving late (jeebus, it's been six years), an explanation of the nom de tortue. Once upon a time our pal Ben was a speechwriter for John Cornyn. A reporter given an advanced copy of a Cornyn speech highlighted a line about box turtle nuptials, which apparently Cornyn had the good sense not to deliver. A source at the time of Ben's little plagiarism problem told me Ben wrote that speech, though I don't think I've ever confirmed that definitively. However, it was a line lifted from a Red State commenter one of his own commenters, so...

It does not affect your daily life very much if your neighbor marries a box turtle. But that does not mean it is right. . . . Now you must raise your children up in a world where that union of man and box turtle is on the same legal footing as man and wife.