Obama "had thought about and considered gayness, but ultimately had decided that a same-sex relationship would be less challenging and demanding than developing one with the opposite sex."

That's a paraphrase of something Obama supposedly wrote — "somewhat elusively to his first intimate girlfriend" — that appears in a book by David J. Garrow that comes out next month "Rising Star: The Making of Barack Obama." Garrow is, I think, a trustworthy writer. I know him mostly from "Liberty and Sexuality: The Right to Privacy and the Making of Roe v. Wade," a book I read carefully when it came out and assigned in a seminar I taught on the right of privacy.

I'd like to see the text of the original letter, but just going on the paraphrase, it sounds humorous, especially if he used the word "gayness," but especially with this idea — expressed to his girlfriend — that he wanted to do the "challenging" thing and develop a relationship with a person of the opposite sex. Speaking of "challenging," he's presenting a challenging viewpoint to his girlfriend, stirring up conversation.

Is it, in fact, easier to be gay, because you only have to figure out how to get along with and be companionable to somebody who is like you or who, at least, you can have the illusion is pretty much like you? Certainly, the same-sex partner has a body like yours, and you might feel that you know your way around the territory and can predict how things will feel from the inside.

And then there's the question whether a person should want that kind of ease or whether it's better to take on the challenge of understanding the body and mind of a human creature who is so different from you. I'm just saying this is a good topic of conversation to bring up in a letter to your girlfriend. There's a lot that could be said here!

Now, of course, it's conventional to say that sexual orientation is not a choice, but:

1. These are still great conversation topics. You can easily make a hypothetical that excludes the problem that it's not a choice. Just say: Assume you had the choice, would it be better to be gay because it's easier (and is it easier?), or would it be better to be straight because it's more of a challenge (and is it more of a challenge)? (You can also tweak the hypothetical to remove complications about discrimination or other externally imposed difficulties to being gay.)

2. The not-a-choice orientation could be bisexual. If you are — not by choice — bisexual, you do have a choice whether to take an opposite sex or a same-sex partner.

3. A person with a homosexual orientation could choose to form a relationship with an opposite-sex partner for social and reproductive reasons and could take on the problem of lack of sexual interest in his partner. (I'm sure plenty of heterosexual individuals have opposite-sex marriage partners to whom they feel no sexual attraction.) Talk about challenges! That's a challenge. I'm seeing some commentators encountering Garrow's paraphrase as a contradiction to the proposition that homosexuality is a permanent and unchangeable characteristic. But I don't see a necessary contradiction.