Invitation Rescinded. A follow-up to the item
below on Bill Simon's mismanaged attempt to placate religious
conservatives. The
AP also reports that Simon was axed from a list of planned
speakers at a gay GOP fund-raiser scheduled for later this week.
The Republican Unity
Coalition event starring Mary Cheney -- the lesbian daughter of
Vice President Dick Cheney -- is expected to raise $1 million for
"Big Tent" Republican candidates for the House and Senate who are
viewed as supportive of gay inclusion. Said an RUC
statement:
It is hugely disappointing to us to see Bill Simon bow under the pressure of a small fringe group who evidently yanked his chain hard the first time he reached out to us and to all voters in the middle, where elections are won.
I don't know the details, or if Simon signaled an unwillingness
to personally attend. If the RUC folks gave him the boot (as the
press accounts seem to suggest), they may have felt that a strong
response, with some political pain, is the only way to ensure that
conservative candidates don't think the religious right is the only
constituency they need be concerned about. But in general, making
Simon stand up and defend his positions in front of a gay-friendly
audience, if he were willing to do so, would otherwise seem like a
good thing.
--Stephen H. Miller