IGF CultureWatch

Blogger Tim Hulsey's My Stupid Dog site takes a look at a fundraiser for the Charlottesville, Vir., AIDS/HIV Services Group (ASG) that turned into an anti-GOP hate fest. Hulsey notes:

There was one joke claiming that Bush and an al-Qaida terrorist were alike, because each one "takes flying lessons and works to destroy the country." (You see, Bush was a member of the Texas Air National Guard, which makes him practically the same as the folks who flew those planes into the World Trade Center. Get it?)

And he comments:

[W]hen a nonprofit charity with tax-exempt status and a generous share of public money sponsors explicitly partisan political invective, I have a very big problem. ...

Over the past three years, Congress has increased public funds for organizations like ASG by nearly thirty percent. Meanwhile, Virginia's [GOP controlled] legislature retained and expanded drug subsidies during hard economic times, and even expanded its own funding for AIDS prevention efforts. Thanks largely to these massive infusions of public money, ASG has managed to expand over the past two years -- renting larger offices, starting a new family-housing plan, and serving more clients over a larger area than ever before.

In short, Republican legislators helped make AIDS/HIV Services Group the social-service organization it is today. Last night, while their backs were turned, they finally received their reward.

And it's all par for the course. But remind me, which is supposed to be the Party of Hate?

A recent letter posted in our mailbag is "appalled by the political fence-riding of certain of your contributors with respect to the deep and important differences between Kerry and Bush on issues of gay equality." Check it out (I penned a short response as well).

More Recent Postings
10/17/04 - 10/23/04

New York Times' Headline: Bush Says His Party Is Wrong to Oppose Gay Civil Unions:

President Bush said in an interview this past weekend that he disagreed with the Republican Party platform opposing civil unions of same-sex couples and that the matter should be left up to the states.

As instapundit and others point out, this appears to contradict the position of the failed, Bush-backed Federal Marriage Amendment (unless you believe, as Bush does, that the amendment would only prevent judges from imposing civil unions, which is not how some of the FMA's own backers saw it).

Recent revelations and critiques of the Log Cabin Republicans are coming not from gay lefties, but from gay conservatives. Among the charges, as described by the Washington Blade: Leader Patrick Guerriero has crossed over from a nonendorsement of Bush to actively attacking the president and aiding Kerry; that the national office vindictively expelled the Palm Beach chapter after it voted 15-0 to endorse Bush; and, most damning, that Guerriero's lieutenant, political director and chief media contact Christopher Barron, has been a long-time volunteer operative for John Edwards and submitted a written testimonial praising Edwards on a web site at the time Edwards announced his candidacy for president in 2003.

Gay Patriot broke the Barron story, complete with documentation, and Boi from Troi has posted a response from LCR. (which, if it's on LCR's own web site, I can't find).

Log Cabin counters that the Palm Beach chapter violated club rules against local clubs making national endorsements, and says Guerriero's TV appearances and press interviews have targeted Bush on his support for the marriage amendment. Less convincing is the defense of Barron, which LCR seems not to understand is a Big Deal.

For LCR to succeed, it needs to be seen fully as a Republican player, even if it can't endorse the party's presidential nominee this go round. Barron is a gift to social conservatives who think LCR never belonged in the party and say it ought to be bid good riddance. That Barron's position was filled, apparently, without a public search also calls into question how LCR's board and management are operating.

If Bush does win (about which I'm still doubtful), who will have access to his White House? Certainly not the highly partisan Human Rights Campaign and National Gay & Lesbian Task Force, both Democratic Party fronts that have burned their bridges to even GOP moderates. And, alas, not LCR, unless perhaps Barron makes way for a less-blemished Republican (or a better defense is forthcoming), and Guerriero becomes less concerned about winning Cheryl Jacques' and Matt Foreman's approval.

How about talking about the need for vigilance in Iraq, personal social security accounts and market-based health care reform, Patrick, as well as tort reform and standing up to the trial lawyers' lobby. If these aren't in your vocabulary, and aren't being emphasized in your public appearances and press interviews, then something really is seriously amiss at LCR.

The Human Rights Campaign's new congressional scorecard is out. On the plus side, unlike in some previous years the scores haven't been larded up to include abortion and affirmative action votes. But it looks like both John Kerry and John Edwards are scored half credit on the Federal Marriage Amendment vote, even though they failed to show up and vote against the amendment. So apparently you can miss the actual vote but still got a passing mark. I wish my high school had been so lenient when it came to key exams!

Addendum: Despite the half-credit on the FMA (and on a hate crimes measure he apparently missed), Kerry still scores "100" from HRC. Must be the new math.

Just released: the report of the Anglican Church's commission appointed by the archbishop of Canterbury to try to make peace in the worldwide communion (which includes U.S. Episcopalians) after the New Hampshire diocese elected a gay man to be its bishop and the Canadian church starting blessing same-sex unions. From the BBC's account:

The report called for a moratorium on the consecration of gay candidates. It demanded an explanation from the Anglican Church in the U.S., known as Episcopalian, about "how a person living in a same gender union may be considered eligible to lead the flock of Christ". ...

The report also urged the 50 bishops who attended the ordination of Gene Robinson last November as Bishop of New Hampshire to apologize for their actions, but adds that they should not be expelled.

The BBC also relates that "Conservatives, particularly in the African sections of the church, were outraged over the ordination and several broke ties with the U.S. [church]. Many are still demanding the suspension of the U.S. church." It appears that multiculturalism may mean bowing to African homophobia.

It should be noted that in his response Frank Griswold, presiding bishop and primate of the Episcopal Church, USA, appears to be standing firm. He writes:

I am obliged to affirm the presence and positive contribution of gay and lesbian persons to every aspect of the life of our church and in all orders of ministry. Other Provinces are also blessed by the lives and ministry of homosexual persons. I regret that there are places within our Communion where it is unsafe for them to speak out of the truth of who they are.

Which doesn't quite sound like the apology the homophobes are demanding. Then again, perhaps schism is preferable to "communion" with righteous bigotry.

Via the New York Observer. For a hearty laugh, check it out.

New York Times columnist William Safire, a libertarian-leaning conservative who opposed the marriage amendment, says reiterating Mary Cheney's homosexuality was a sleazy attempt by the Kerry camp to dismay Bush supporters who are against same-sex marriage. He writes in The Lowest Blow:

The memoir about the Kerry-Edwards campaign that will be the best seller will reveal the debate rehearsal aimed at focusing national attention on the fact that Vice President Cheney has a daughter who is a lesbian.

A "political memo" piece in the Times observes, "It is not clear whether this is a passing dust-up, as Mr. Kerry's advisers said in dismissing these latest polls, or the kind of event that could prove consequential in a race in which voters' allegiance to Mr. Kerry is anything but deep." And conservative columnist Robert Novak argues in Mistake Could Be Costly for Kerry that "It's hard to believe that in the closing weeks of a campaign where great issues are debated, the sexuality of the vice president's daughter could be determinant."

I doubt it, and I still see the election as Kerry's. But what a surprisingly turn of events it would be if "Marygate" did turn the election!

William Rubenstein, former head of the ACLU's lesbian and gay rights project, doesn't think the Democrats were gay baiting by telling voters Mary Cheney is a lesbian. Still, he finds the tactic disquieting. In a New York Times op-ed he writes, "The best spin for the Democrats is that they're using Mary Cheney to paint their opponents as hypocrites.... This is a valid point - but neither Mr. Kerry nor Mr. Edwards made it." And, "By simply mentioning her name without explaining her relevance, however, the Democrats are also treating Mary Cheney unfairly, reducing her to a non sequitur."

Is Sen. Specter Anti-Gay?

That's the charge leveled by one letter now posted in our mailbag, along with my response.

More Recent Postings
10/10/04 - 10/16/04

Washington Blade editor Chris Crain has penned an indictment of gay Democratic activists, charging "The partisan gay groups really ought to switch names. Log Cabin Republicans have acted like Stonewall rioters, and Stonewall Dems are living in Uncle Tom's Cabin."

How so? "From the day the president announced his support for an amendment, Log Cabin's leaders have thrown almost all their energy into thwarting the leader of their own party...." LCR head Patrick Guerriero "accepted dozens of invitations to appear on national television criticizing the president and the GOP leadership in Congress." Meanwhile:

When John Kerry came out in support of an amendment to the Massachusetts Constitution that would overturn marriage equality in the one state where it exists, the Stonewall Dems were stone cold silent. When 20% of the Democrats in the U.S. House voted in favor of the federal marriage amendment, the Stonewall Dems were stone cold silent.

As for the Human Rights Campaigns' Cheryl Jacques, she was quick to slam Dick Cheney's debate answers but "what Jacques failed to see, through her partisan-colored glasses, was that John Edwards was every bit as neglectful in his response [to an AIDS question], spending his entire answer talking about unrelated issues and health care in general."

How about the National Gay & Lesbian Task Force? "Matt Foreman, its leader, vowed to the New York Times that gay groups would never back a candidate who supports writing anti-gay discrimination into a constitution -- state or federal." But when John Kerry did exactly that, soon after "the Task Force was lauding the Democratic nominees as 'the most gay-supportive presidential ticket in American history.' "

Concludes Crain:

The gay rights movement is easily the most compliant political lobby in this country. Our opponents readily criticize their own allies when they cross their interests or don't push their agenda. Gay groups smile and say, "We understand. Of course supporting our rights is too unpopular to justify politically." ...

There will always be an excuse why now is not the time to fulfill our promise of equality. It will never be politically expedient. And politicians will never do what they have not been lobbied to do.

--Stephen H. Miller