PATRICK BUCHANAN HAS done the nearly impossible; he's made Donald Trump look good.
In the likely face-off between right-wing populist Buchanan and playboy/real-estate mogul Trump for the Reform Party's presidential nomination, "The Donald" doesn't seem so sleazy. On "Meet the Press," Trump blasted Buchanan, saying "He's an anti-semite. ... He doesn't like the blacks, he doesn't like the gays." For his part, when asked about gays in the military, Trump responded unequivocally: "It would not disturb me." Not bad, considering the reluctance of most candidates to stand up and defend equal rights for gays.
And what of his opponent? Let's take a trip down memory lane with the best of the worst of Buchanan's commentaries on the perverts who dwell among us.
"Homosexual groups are attempting to mainstream Satanism," Buchanan wrote in 1990. "Our promiscuous homosexuals appear literally hell-bent on Satanism and suicide."
Buchanan condemned then New York Mayor David Dinkins for his "insult" to Catholics by "prancing with sodomites" during the city's 1991 St. Patrick's Day parade.
In another column he helpfully explained, "To discriminate is to choose. ... And prejudice simply means prejudgment. Not all prejudgments are rooted in ignorance; most are rooted in the inherited wisdom of the race. A visceral recoil from homosexuality is the natural reaction of a healthy society wishing to preserve itself." Sieg Heil!
Buchanan has urged a "thrashing" be given to gay rights groups. "Homosexuality," he wrote, "is not a civil right. Its rise almost always is accompanied, as in the Weimar Republic, with a decay of society and a collapse of its basic cinder block, the family."
AIDS, it goes without saying, was viewed by Buchanan as a godsend -- literally. He famously declared, "The poor homosexuals, they have declared war upon nature, and now nature is extracting awful retribution." After all, "homosexuality involves sexual acts most men consider not only immoral, but filthy." The conclusion is obvious: "A prejudice against males who engage in sodomy with one another represents a normal and natural bias in favor of sound morality."
Sinking even lower, on TV's "The McLaughlin Group" Buchanan opined, "What the origin of all of these AIDS cases is, if you go back to it, is homosexuality. From the homosexuals, you get the blood supply tainted," which brings the scourge to innocent children and babies. But of course.
While running for president in 1992, Buchanan aired a TV ad featuring fuzzy footage of half-clad black gay men dancing in studded leather outfits -- images lifted from the late film maker Marlon Riggs' documentary "Tongues Untied." The ad attacked NEA funding of art that "glorified homosexuality, exploited children, and perverted the image of Jesus Christ." That same year, asked by CNN if he stood by his remarks about gays, Buchanan not only said yes, he elaborated on the subject, labeling homosexuality as "morally wrong," "socially ruinous," and "medically destructive."
Buchanan's columns employed the terms "sodomite" "perverted sex," and even "pederast proletariat," and suggested that gays are more likely to sexually abuse children than heterosexuals. "How, conceivably, can a sexual practice, condemned through the ages, that leads to such suffering and death, be a positive good?" he pondered.
What all such statements share in common is a desire to inflame popular prejudice against gay people. And yet the news media, while here and there noting that Buchanan opposes "gay rights" or that he's been criticized by gay groups, have never held him truly accountable for his bile. Buchanan's anti-gay venom, when mentioned at all by the media, is usually referred to only after noting his critical comments about Jews and blacks - comments that consist of references to pro-Israel lobbying by Jewish groups, or assertions of black over-dependence on welfare - mild stuff, often stated through innuendo, compared with his direct, unmitigated anti-gay vitriol.
The media's failure to call Buchanan on his anti-gay bigotry to the same extent, say, as it made David Duke anathema for his racism, reflects a wider cultural ambivalence about homosexuality. As a nation, we've reached consensus that racism is wrong, but gayness is still held to be subject to debate. That's why there were no media denunciations of George W. Bush when he stated his support for the Texas sodomy law, which criminalizes consensual same-sex relations. But then again, there were no editorial page denunciations eight years ago when candidate Bill Clinton refused to condemn the Arkansas sodomy statute -- a statue he supported as his state's attorney general and later as governor, despite protest from Arkansas gay groups.
Democrat Bill Bradley is generally viewed as the most pro-gay candidate currently running for president. Yet Bradley can declare at a Human Rights Campaign dinner that "Where justice is concerned, no half-measures are acceptable," and at the same time say that he favors domestic partnership measures but opposes recognition of gay marriage. Just which "half-measures" are the ones that Bradley objects to?
All in all, I'd be a fool to claim that gays haven't made progress in terms of obtaining a degree of political support, especially within the Democratic party (although this gain has been more rhetorical than most gay Democrats are willing to admit). And even among Republicans, few politicos sink to the lower depths of homo-hatred exemplified by the Pat Buchanan quotes given above. And yes, even Buchanan himself has been somewhat quieter on his gay antipathy than in years past, although he in no way recants anything he's said. But the day when anti-gay zealotry is held to the same standard as other forms of bigotry is still to come.