Politics & Public Opinion

Mission Creep

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The Human Rights Campaign is promoting legislation requiring employers to provide paid sick leave to employees. HRC, in doing so, takes note that some employees without paid sick leave are LGBTQ.

The issue with HRC pursing a broadly progressive agenda is that when it fundraises among Republicans, it presents itself as a group focused on LGBTQ-rights advocacy. Yes, the Log Cabin Republicans support a broadly conservative GOP-driven agenda. They’ve got the name “Republican” upfront, and their mission is as much about lobbying support for Republicans as it is about lobbying Republican support for LGBTQ legal equality. The same was true, in reverse, with the now-defunct Stonewall Democrats.

But HRC was founded with a nonpartisan mission and for many years held to that in its congressional endorsements and fundraising (before it started supporting presidential candidates). If that had remained true, the Stonewall Democrats wouldn’t have been rendered redundant, and HRC would not have turned into an adjunct of the Democratic party.

More. From Equality California:

“Enacting gun safety reforms [sic] at the federal level is a top priority for Equality California. LGBTQ people and our allies are often the targets of bias-motivated gun violence.”

And since no LGBTQ people or allies use guns to defend themselves from hate crimes, no problem there.

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If Trump Is for It, the LGBTQ Left Is Against It

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Challenging the Elites

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Like other progressive movements, LGBTQ activism has wedded itself to the cultural and financial elites. Recall the Hillary Clinton’s “basket of deplorables” comment was delivered at a gala LGBTQ fundraiser in Manhattan featuring Barbra Streisand. The fundraiser reportedly brought in around $6 million, with ticket prices ranging from $1,200 to $250,000, with many paying $50,000, according to reports, which at the time I wrote about here.

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Hate Is Not a Virtue Because You’re a Progressive

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I hope that sharing power in a divided government will make Democrats less likely to continue inciting mob hatred of anyone who dares commit the heresy of disagreeing publicly with progressive and identitarian dogmas. But I’m not hopeful.

Via Tucker Carlson:

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The LGBT Vote

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This seems like it’s in keeping with most recent elections. What’s always surprising is that if you read the LGBT media, or even just mainstream media, you couldn’t be blamed for thinking gay people were 99.9% big-government liberal-left progressives.

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Both Sides Lost

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Megan McArdle writes:

If the left had been a little less visibly eager to condemn Kavanaugh before the trial — and if images of enraged protesters beating on the doors of the Supreme Court had not dominated our televisions —Democrats might have managed to knock the Republican Senate majority down, or perhaps even to shift it to a narrow blue wedge blocking Trump’s nominees. Instead, the Republican [Senate] majority has grown. It will be functionally impossible to remove Trump from office and even more difficult than it already was to stop a steady flow of conservatives into the vacancies on the courts.

I saw few people, however, entertaining such unpleasant thoughts on election night. Partisans seemed focused on the bright side: Democrats happily anticipating their House investigations, Republicans savoring their future judicial appointments. But eventually, these joys are likely to pall in the sight of the opposition’s ongoing victories, and partisans’ attentions will turn to what might have been, if they’d been a little more focused on practical politics and a little less focused on instant, evanescent victories in the culture war.

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HRC’s ‘Partisan Political Propaganda’

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Brad Polumbo writes: “Apparently, holding conservative views on abortion and immigration now makes you an anti-gay bigot in the HRC’s estimation.” Actually, this is nothing new for HRC. As Polumbo notes, “The organization’s ratings are basically just partisan progressive propaganda.”

More. Originally, the (then) Human Rights Campaign Fund focused on congressional races, supporting Democrats and Republicans who favored legal equality for gays and lesbians. Now, HRC finds reasons not to endorse gay-supportive and openly gay Republicans, such as if the aren’t pro-abortion or don’t toe the line on other progressive-left issues. That would be OK if they branded themselves as what they are—the LGBTQ outreach arm of the Democratic party. Instead, they claim to represent the whole LGBTQ community, and raise funds based on that claim.

Furthermore. One of the most disingenuous HRC press releases ever: Trump-Pence Admin Reportedly Planning to Erase Non-Discrimination Protections for LGBTQ People Across Federal Agencies. What’s actually being considered: not extending the meaning of “sex” discrimination in existing federal laws and regulations to include discrimination against people for being transgender. I’d actually favor covering transgender people under “sex” discrimination” but it arguably is a stretch, and there is a strong conservative argument for not creating new law by redefining words in current law. What’s not about to happen is what HRC is scare-mongering about.

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