IGF CultureWatch

Mark Twain said that, if there is a heaven, it’s apt to be mighty crowded with hypocrites. Writing in the L.A. Times on social conservatives who go after gays because they’re easier targets than divorce and single parenthood, David Boaz shows why Twain was right.

Frank Kameny laid the groundwork for the gay rights movement. Now it’s time for us to help him.

In the San Diego Gay & Lesbian News, a progressive outfit called Courage Campaign states:

This weekend in Rancho Mirage, Calif., the Koch brothers—key funders of California’s anti-environment Prop 23 as well as the Tea Party, Heritage Foundation, Cato Institute, and countless other right-wing organizations—will meet behind closed doors with other conservative power brokers. There, these billionaires and their elected officials will strategize on how to impose their right-wing agenda on the rest of us.

Would that “right wing agenda” of the Cato Institute include its amicus brief in Lawrence that Justice Kennedy cited in his opinion overturning state sodomy laws (note: he didn’t cite the briefs from NGLTF or HRC), or the Cato Institute’s efforts backing the suit to overturn California’s anti-gay marriage Prop. 8?

Ah, well here’s some good news to be filed under Things Change: Gay Marine’s husband surprised at respect shown by Naval Academy.

The new iman of the so-called Ground Zero mosque and Islamic cultural center, Abdallah Adhami, advocates retribution for those who leave the faith, reports the New York Post. He advised that those who preach about apostasy should at least be jailed, as “Many [Islamic] jurists have said they have to be killed.”

That led Jordan Sekulow, a lawyer at the Pat Robertson-founded American Center for Law and Justice, to question why the mosque project would choose a leader who advocates retribution for those who leave the faith. He remarked, “To be in the United States of America and to tell former Muslims to ‘keep your mouth shut’ is against the Constitution.” The Robertson-affiliated center is suing to stop the Islamic center and mosque from being built.

The iman also addressed the issue of homosexuality, holding forth that “An enormously overwhelming percentage of people struggle with homosexual feeling because of some form of violent emotional or sexual abuse at some point in their life.”

That led Fred Sainz, a spokesman for the Human Rights Campaign, to respond that “When a religious leader of his standing opens up his mouth and spews this kind of ignorance and hateful statements, it does put his greater judgment into question.”

I believe that those who have legally secured ownership to property should be able to build a religious center, no matter how intolerant they are—whether Iman Abdallah Adhami or Pat Robertson. But that is different from celebrating such a center (when it is of the Islamic variety, of course) as a tribute to “diversity” and the multiculturalism of the Big Apple, as some have done.

The Washington Post reports on still small but none the less important gay inroads within the conservative world, while the New York Times looks at the CPAC flap.

Wishful thinking or green shoots?

The Cato Institute’s David Boaz on what he would have liked to have heard from the president: big spending cuts and repeal of DOMA.

I don’t know if either of these ads will make it to network television, much less the Super Bowl; but I know that I, for one, will be eating more Doritos.

The Cato Institute’s David Boaz analyzes recent polls to shed some light on whether Tea Party activists are truly libertarian-minded or (as liberals and their media never tire of claiming) in fact dangerous and reactionary social conservatives. He blogs:It’s disappointing to hear that New Mexico Tea Partiers booed Gary Johnson’s support for legalizing marijuana. And it’s true that a new poll shows Tea Partiers pretty strongly against marriage equality. But the poll does show them just a smidgen more supportive than either conservatives or Republicans. And other polls … have shown somewhat more support among self-identified Tea Party supporters, or a clear division between libertarian-minded and culturally conservative Tea Partiers. In general, Tea Party activists — organizers and people who attend events — seem somewhat more libertarian than people who simply tell pollsters they consider themselves to be members or supporters of the Tea Party movement.

Tea Party groups have declined invitations to criticize federal court rulings on gay marriage. They have studiously avoided taking positions on social issues, even when social conservatives stomp their feet and demand that the Tea Party start talking about abortion and gay marriage.

I have said before that “The tea party is not a libertarian movement, but (at this point at least) it is a libertarian force in American politics. It’s organizing Americans to come out in the streets, confront politicians, and vote on the issues of spending, deficits, debt, the size and scope of government, and the constitutional limits on government. That’s a good thing. And if many of the tea partiers do hold socially conservative views (not all of them do), then it’s a good thing for the American political system and for American freedom to keep them focused on shrinking the size and cost of the federal government.”

As part of his campaign to out-Romney Mitt Romney in the right-wing-pandering department, Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty wants to reinstate the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” ban on openly gay service in the military.

According to the GAO, it turns out the ban cost almost $200 million over fiscal 2004-2009, or an average of $53,000 per discharged service member. And that’s just five years. As we know, discrimination is expensive. From PoliticsDaily:

Some 39 percent of the dismissed service members “held critical occupations, such as infantryman and security forces,” the GAO said. That percentage included 23 experts who held skills in an important foreign language, “such as Arabic or Spanish.”

This is the same Pawlenty who demands federal spending cuts and opposes raising the debt limit (i.e., deficit financing).

Shall we ask the Governor, then, just which program he’d cut (Medicare? school lunches? the defense budget?) to reinstate discrimination in the armed forces? Or perhaps he’d prefer to raise taxes? He could call it the Safe Showers Surtax.

Ah…but rhetoric is free.

From National Journal:

For months, the family values wing of the Republican Party has been protesting the inclusion of GOProud, a right-wing gay group, at this year’s Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC). You won’t hear any protesting, however, from conservative media mogul Andrew Breitbart.

“We’re going to have a big ol’ gay party,” he said on a radio show Wednesday. Breitbart says gays deserve a place within the Republican Party and he’s been “offended” by efforts to exclude them. Therefore, he’s throwing an 80’s-themed gay party to welcome them on board.

Say what you will about Breitbart or conservative firebrand Ann Coulter, who headlined a GOProud fundraiser in New York last fall—a transgression for which she was roundly denounced by social conservatives. Breitbart and Coulter are not supporters of gay legal equality (marriage, military, etc.) to be sure. But just the fact that they are willing to alienate themselves from the religious right by welcoming gay conservatives into the party’s tent is a sign that power is shifting away from the social conservative bloc.

On another political note: Jim Messina, a deputy White House chief of staff, will spearhead the Obama re-election campaign.

Will he accuse the GOP candidate of being gay, which is what Messina did when he worked for Sen. Max Baucus?