I've been writing about the changing political climate on the right as efforts to roll back the fiscal insanity take precedence over social issues and crowd out the religious right-driven by average people coming together to protest and work for change, often in opposition to the party hack machine. That's an extremely positive development. The libertarian Cato Institute's David Boaz shares that assessment in this blog post, but adds the qualifier that "out in the real world, where real Republicans live, the picture isn't as promising."
A case in point: the disappointing result from last Tuesday's GOP congressional primary in the DC suburbs of northern Virginia (Arlington/Alexandria), where Matthew Berry, a libertarian-leaning fiscal conservative who is openly gay, narrowly lost to Patrick Murray, backed by the local GOP machine. Boaz writes:
Republican activist Rick Sincere tells me that "in the last few days before the election, I received numerous emails from the Murray campaign that included subtle reminders that Matthew is gay and supports an end to DADT. [Murray] also, in a Monday email, took a quotation from Matthew out of context to make it look like he supports a federally enforced repeal of Virginia's anti-marriage law. In other words, Murray played the anti-gay card."
Still, there's reason for optimism about the future:
Blogger RedNoVa made similar observations, adding, "If you were at the Matthew Berry party last night, you would notice that the average age in the room was about 30. Young people were everywhere. The future of our party was there. Murray's campaign crowd was older, and full of party purists."
Boaz also notes chillingly anti-gay rhetoric in a western Tennessee GOP congressional primary, and sums up, "With Republicans like that, it's no wonder that many moderates, centrists, and libertarians still aren't sure they want to vote Republican, even with Democrats running up the deficit and extending federal control over health care, education, automobile companies, newspapers, and more."
Added: From the Log Cabin of Northern Virginia newsletter:
Matthew Berry, the first openly gay man and member of Log Cabin to run for the Republican nomination for the 8th Congressional District, was defeated in the primary on June 8 by Patrick Murray after Murray repeatedly raised the issue of Matthew's sexual orientation and his positions on specific gay issues in emails to supporters just prior to the election.
In the final days of the campaign, Murray attacked Berry for his support of marriage equality and repeal of DADT, which just recently passed Congress. He also falsely claimed that Berry had labeled himself a "liberal progressive" and then called him a RINO to boot, a charge that mystified Berry's many libertarian supporters as well as the many conservative activists and Virginia bloggers who endorsed Berry.
The 8th District is currently represented by Democrat Jim Moran, who has a long history of scandal and corruption during his years in public office. Given the politics and cultural makeup of the 8th District, however, few political observers believe Murray has any chance of unseating Cong. Moran. Many believe Berry's defeat in the primary will unfortunately kill any chance of extending the Republican Party's reach in the 8th District beyond its narrow conservative base.
More. From the Washington Times, Fiscal focus splits GOP factions on social issues. Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels, a likely contender for the GOP presidential nod in 2012, says that given the dire economic situation being created by out-of-control deficit spending, the next president "would have to call a truce on the so-called social issues. ... We're going to just have to agree to get along for a little while." Sensible, of course, but enough to trigger the wrath of the Family Research Council (and, as commenter Carl points out, Mike Huckabee).
There is a battle going on for the soul of the GOP, and it matters greatly to gay people who wins.
Furthermore. I should note that while Gov. Daniels called for a true over "social issues," the Family Research Council and Huckabee responded with appeals to ramp up the fight over abortion. Even here, they're downplaying (for now, at least) gay issues, and that's significant, too.
14 Comments for “Bumps Along the Way”
posted by Carl on
“”If you were at the Matthew Berry party last night, you would notice that the average age in the room was about 30. Young people were everywhere. The future of our party was there.”
I wonder how many of them voted for McDonnell and Cuccinelli…
posted by dc on
“If there was a homosexual, we took care of him.” It is not shocking that people in the US military would condone violence against gays. If you are in the US military you rape women, you kill people, you destroy people’s lives–all in the name of the interests of this country. So, violence against gays, whatever. It means nothing when every aspect of what you do is shrouded in violence and a lack of respect for human life. They take care of the gays just like they take care of those arabs, right?
posted by Debrah on
Thought someone might want to read Conservatives for Kagan at The Atlantic from Stuart Taylor.
posted by Aaron on
@Stephen Miller: The Murray campaign did not play the “gay-card” nor were they backed by the local GOP machine. In fact, nearly all of Berry’s endorsements came from local GOP party leadership and the National Republican Congressional Committee. If anything, it’s Berry’s seemingly self-hating position on his own sexuality that you should be concerned about instead of casting Murray as an “anti-gay” stereotype. Berry has said publicly that “I’m not a gay Republican, I’m just a Republican who happens to be gay.” As if it’s a debilitating circumstance.
Sure, Matthew out-raised the Murray campaign in terms of dollars, but most of the money came from outside of the District he was running in. Have any of you seen videos of Matthew? Have you seen the way he debates and carries himself in front of a crowd? He’s a horrible politician and has no presence whatsoever. His grasp on the issues was about as firm as a Ctrl + C of Bob McDonnell’s website. He was out-gunned by the Murray campaign in terms of volunteers, strategy and substance.
This is no different than the idea that criticizing Obama is racist. Apparently gay Republican candidates are a protected class as well. Look, politics is a full-contact sport. Matthew could’ve been the nominee to run against 10 term incumbent, Jim Moran, a drunken, wife-beating gambler who would’ve roasted Berry alive.
posted by Bobby on
“If you are in the US military you rape women, you kill people, you destroy people’s lives–all in the name of the interests of this country.”
—You also liberate people from dictators, stop genocide, free people, but I guess that’s not important to you.
posted by Throbert McGee on
Please, the preferred military terminology is them AY-rabs.
posted by Throbert McGee on
I’m a USMC brat and I can well remember the many nights when Dad would bring home a necklace made of dried gook ears, or sometimes the polished shinbones of sand-niggers. Mom and my sister and I would make little figurines out of them with pipecleaners and plastic wiggle-eyes to sell at the church Craft Fair, while Dad and his Marine buddies would get liquored up and go off-base raping the local women (which Mom didn’t mind because she knew that men just sometimes need the feel of the slanted vaginas that Oriental ladies have).
Ah, good times…
posted by Carl on
Aaron, I’ve heard a number of people say what you said and I’m sure it’s true — it’s too bad that Murray helped to muddy the waters by running those gay-baiting ads. But then, that may be something which gets negative attention here, but probably isn’t going to get negative attention with the VAGOP, especially considering their state government these days.
“Sensible, of course, but enough to trigger the wrath of the Family Research Council. ”
A lot more than just the FRC.
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/right-now/2010/06/huckabee_fundraises_against_mi.html
posted by Debrah on
Throbert–
You’re getting naughtier by the moment!
The (11:58 PM) is brutal, baby. I’m dying.
You do realize there are a few readers who might take you seriously—by design—don’t you?
Also, please exercise a bit of political correctness when the spirit moves.
It’s “Asian”, not “Oriental”.
LIS!
By the way, this is something you and Bobby might find interesting.
posted by Jorge on
If you are in the US military you rape women, you kill people, you destroy people’s lives–all in the name of the interests of this country.
Hey, who let Barbara Streisand into the site?
There is a word for people like you: it’s called BIGOTED.
posted by Throbert McGee on
Thanks for that link, Debrah — although the comments were more interesting than the rather idiotic article.
The writer completely glosses over the not-trivial point that the CDC study he refers to was conducted exclusively among MSMs who were already HIV+. In other words, guys who by definition had a personal history of being rather lackadaisical about the most elementary safer-sex protocols — or else they wouldn’t be HIV+.
It seems to me that if you’re going to cite a study that’s making generalizations about the psychology of certain MSMs (e.g., that some of them are purportedly self-loathing) it’s relevant to mention that ALL of the men studied are seemingly borderline-retarded when it comes to the simple question of “How Not To Get HIV.”
(The author DID make passing note that the study he referred to was based on a small sample size — though he neglected to say that it was “fewer than 300 small” — but only if you actually followed the link he provided would you know that the study included HIV+ men only. And his link goes only to an abstract that tells the reader nothing about how the HIV+ men were selected for the study — for example, were they all drawn from patients at free clinics in the Atlanta metro region? Who knows?)
posted by Debrah on
“The writer completely glosses over the not-trivial point that the CDC study he refers to was conducted exclusively among MSMs who were already HIV+. In other words, guys who by definition had a personal history of being rather lackadaisical about the most elementary safer-sex protocols — or else they wouldn’t be HIV+.”
*************************************
Thank you, Throbert.
You’ve just provided yet another example as to why you are such a valuable asset of the commentariat on any particular forum.
You dismiss with the antimacassar niceties (aka) BULLSH!T and get to the core of the issue.
So much with which the general public are assaulted from HRC loudmouths as well as academic, insular, and effeminate cowards who hide behind the walls of publicly-funded structures, and gay “activists” in the media, do more harm than good.
None of the most significant points that you have made would ever be illuminated with regard to such reports.
I do, however, like the guy’s work, overall.
posted by Tom on
Well, maybe. In the long run, it will help if the GOP catches on to the changes we’ve created in our culture, even if it is a day late and a dollar short.
But it seems to me that “the battle going on for the soul of the GOP” is more important to the GOP than it is to gays and lesbians, since we’ve been making good progress in the face of opposition from the GOP, and it is the GOP that is increasingly out of step with the country as a whole on GLBT issues, not those of us who have been fighting for equality.
I disagree with the premise that gays and lesbians were given what we’ve earned by the Democrats or by gay-supportive politicians. We pushed them into sensibility; nothing was given to us. And that is the way it will be in the future, too.
It seems to me that Stephen’s premise, oft-stated, that gays and lesbians will never achieve equality until the GOP comes around is, at core, backwards.
I think that what is happening is precisely the opposite — we are achieving equality, little by slowly, by bringing ordinary Americans around to our side, and as we do so, the GOP is finding it politically inconvenient to ride the “Faggot! Faggot!” bandwagon they’ve been on for the last fifteen years.
I’m reminded of the Dixiecrats after the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Even the worst of them — Lester Maddox, George Wallace, Strom Thurmond and Jesse Helms — got off the “Never!” bandwagon by the mid-1970’s, when it became clear that it was tough to win elections solely on race resistance.
posted by Craig2 on
The Economist has this to add…
“What’s Wrong With America’s Right”:
http://www.economist.com/node/16321546
“The Risks of Hell No”:
http://www.economist.com/node/16317345