IGF CultureWatch

On the heels of Frank Kameny’s passing, another gay pioneer is gone. Paul Varnell was a columnist, thinker, and founder of the Independent Gay Forum.

I never met Paul, but we spoke pretty often back when he was editing the IGF website. I always found him exceptionally thoughtful and decent. It seemed as if there was nothing that didn’t interest him, nothing he didn’t know something about. And his columns (most of which first ran in the Chicago Free Press) were an IGF anchor. Here’s one example, one of many, of how his gentle, firm voice could summon moral reflection more effectively than outrage could have done.

Paul never got national attention, and probably wouldn’t have wanted it (in fact, probably would have despised it), but in his quiet way he was a pioneer and leader among those who made the world safe to be non-leftist and gay…partly through the power of his logic, partly through the gentleness of his touch.

Goodbye, Paul. You were a good man and you made a difference.

On the passing of our friend and former IGF editor and contributing author Paul Varnell, here’s one of his colulmns many recall fondly: A Valentine’s Story.

More. An example of how Paul will be missed. When Sarah Schulman wrote recently in the New York Times (“Israel and ‘Pinkwashing’”) to condemn gays who support Israel, which she characterized as “the tendency among some white gay people to privilege their racial and religious identity,” it would be good to have heard Paul’s voice, as in this 2002 column “Israel, Palestine, and Gays.”

Furthermore. A tribute by Chicago Sun-Times columnist Neil Steinberg, which includes this quote from Paul:

“This suggests,” Varnell continued, “that what would work best for us is an approach that emphasizes sharing our common humanity rather than attacking the mainstream and portraying ourselves as an aggrieved, victimized and petulant minority. It is, after all, the homophobes who are the sad, isolated, troubled little clot of obscurantists.”

More still. Remembrances by journalist Rex Wockner.

And here is the Chicago Tribune’s obit.

Longtime IGF contributor Paul Varnell has died.

Paul was an early mentor for me, and I’ve missed his contributions in the years he has been ill. He will be missed.

 

I’ve mostly refrained from commenting on the presidential race because it’s all too depressing, reflecting the political pathologies of our time. And neither party seems able to offer a way forward.

I won’t be voting for Obama, and I doubt I will vote for the GOP candidate. First, the Democrats. They’ve hitched themselves to a narcissistic, messianic leftwing community organizer/academic lawyer with no experience or knowledge of how the private sector generates wealth for society as a whole, and who rigidly adheres to the political ideology that raising taxes on “the rich” (including many small business owners) and expanding the bureaucratic regulatory state by leaps and bounds will lead to economic growth, or if not exactly growth, at least “fairness,” which is more important anyway.

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An animated Yule-time look at the Obama presidency thus far that’s not even parody—it’s all too true.
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The likely Republican choice is coming down to Romney or Gingrich, one bland and one grandiose, pandering to the social conservatives in their base by pledging to deny us basic equality under the law.

The Democrats are stuck with Obama but the GOP has the opportunity to pick a socially moderate fiscal conservative with a proven record in prudent governance and foreign policy. That would be Jon Huntsman, who sits with 1% in the polls among Republicans. Not going to happen.

The other major GOP contender who at least opposes the anti-gay Federal Marriage Amendment (and who voted to repeal “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell”), Ron Paul, garners around 8 percent but likely would be less electable in the general election than Huntsman because his libertarian views on government—and especially foreign policy—seem out of the mainstream.

So there you have it. The next four years will likely see further polarization, without the bipartisan consensus necessary to trim the entitlement programs that are sinking us in astronomical debt, and will do so if not reformed regardless of any tax increases on “the rich.” The GOP isn’t likely to summon the will to make these cuts on its own, and the Democrats would rather demagogue (“Mediscare”) their way back to congressional power.

Politics is inherently corrupting since it is predicated on power and compulsion. That’s why limited government was so dear to the founders. We’ve lost our way, and may wander in the darkness for a long time to come.

More. In the comments, reader Tom Scharbach is more optimistic, noting: “Stephen, you can take some comfort in the fact that the presidential candidates most closely allied with the far-right religious conservatives (Bachmann, Perry, Santorum) — the true believers — aren’t doing all that well in the contest. …” He also writes:

It is going to take a while for the Republican Party to break loose of the death-grip of religious conservatives. The death-grip was thirty years in the making, and it will take time to undo it. But it will happen, eventually, because the county is changing rapidly. It won’t be too many years before opposition to “equal means equal” becomes a political liability, and that will break the death-grip.

There’s some interesting back and forth at not gay friendly National Review Online on why young conservatives seem much more proud to be pro-life than to be anti same-sex marriage. Here’s the third or so take: Re: Life vs. Marriage.

A statistical study (yes, someone did the research) says that same-sex marriages are way overrepresented on the New York Times “Weddings” page. Well, not as overrepresented as marriages among Ivy League grads and elite lawyers! Of course, it will still take a few years to make up for the total exclusion during the entire 20th century.

Roll Call suggests that a gay Republican legislator might actually defeat an incumbent Democratic congressman in Massachusetts. Congressional candidate Richard Tisei is a fiscal conservative who says his political philosophy is “the government should be off your back, out of your wallet and away from your bedroom.” Sounds good to me.

Revised November 29, 2011

Sorry, but I’m not about to join the chorus singing the praises for Mass. Rep. Barney Frank on his announced retirement from the House. Yes, he was one of the earliest openly gay members of Congress (Rep. Gerry Studds actually was the first, and Frank’s coming out was tainted by scandal over his boyfriend working as a prostitute from their apartment).

On the plus side, Frank championed gay rights legislation that never passed, such as the Employee Non-Discrimination Act, and opposed, unsuccessfully, the Defense of Marriage Act and Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell, both signed into law by President Bill Clinton, whom he avidly supported.

But gay rights don’t exist in a vacuum, as our friends on the left tirelessly remind us. And Frank, in my view, has been one of the all time worst legislators in U.S. history. During the housing bubble that eventually brought us to the worst economic downturn since the Great Depression, Frank tireless opposed efforts to require more sensible capital reserve requirements for federally created Democratic housing fiefdoms Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Opposing stronger regulation of these government sponsored enterprises (while trying to ramp up the red tape on private financial firms), he famously intoned in 2003, “These two entities — Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac — are not facing any kind of financial crisis. The more people exaggerate these problems, the more pressure there is on these companies, the less we will see in terms of affordable housing.”

When they blew up due to lack of sufficient capital (couldn’t see that coming?), Frank blamed the political opposition. He also championed legislation forcing banks to make subprime housing loans to those whose lack of income and assets should have disqualified them (the Community Reinvestment Act), and who later would be among those with homes they couldn’t afford and mortgages they couldn’t pay (who could have guessed?). Frank said critics of the bill and its effects were motivated by racism.

The result was the bank bailouts that taxpayers funded. And if that wasn’t enough damage, Frank capped his career with the Dodd-Frank regulatory behemoth that is helping to strangle business investment.

Barney, good riddance. Don’t let the congressional door slam you on the way out.

More. An argument has been made that if Clinton had not signed the Defense of Marriage Act, Congress would have sent to the states (which would have ratified) the much worse Federal Marriage Amendment. Maybe. But I think history shows that trying to appease an enemy by surrendering some rights and liberties only makes the enemy, having tasted victory, hungry for more. If instead of boasting about signing DOMA Clinton had used some political capital to make the case for letting states decide the issue, an argument with some conservative resonance, things might have turned out very differently.

The Washington Post looks at the status of gay federal employees, noting that because of the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) their partners are prohibited from receiving spousal health benefits that are increasingly common in the private sector.

One day DOMA will go the way of all pernicious things, but this is one more example of how government trails the private sector in all manner of innovations. In this case, it’s because of anti-gay Republicans who pushed for DOMA and complicit Democrats, such as Bill Clinton, who signed it and then bragged about having done so in his southern campaign ads. In other instances, innovation in the government sector is stymied by fealty to public sector unions and their hidebound rules. And innovation throughout the economy is curtailed by the government’s arcane legislation and voluminous regulation, and by the crony capitalism fueled by K Street lobbyists that misdirects capital for political payback.

Altogether, it’s why bigger government isn’t the answer to what ails America.

The Washington Blade’s Kevin Naff reflects on the Penn State/Jery Sandusky child sexual abuse scandal and how some anti-gay groups are trotting out their gay = pedophile propaganda. But what’s striking is the absence of a homophobic backlash, which we would certainly have seen in years past.

More. The social conservatives give it the old try.