NPR.org, October 10, 2006 · It now appears there have been three Mark Foley landmines waiting to explode beneath the feet of congressional Republicans.
The first was the aggressive behavior of the six-term veteran Foley, who resigned from Congress Sept. 29 when the raw nature of his interest in congressional pages became public. Foley actually shocked Washington, and that's not easy to do in our time.
Bad as it was, that was just the first explosion.
The second came when people realized how much had been known about Foley's attention to pages and pursuit of former pages. It seems that at a minimum, several members of Congress and its staff were aware of the problem.
This second explosion was more damaging than the first. It created the impression that the Republican leaders in the House were more concerned with political damage than with protecting the pages. Polls show most Americans now believe this.
As for the third landmine, it's still lying un-detonated, just below the surface on Capitol Hill. And it has the potential to cause the most far-reaching damage of all.
This untouched landmine is the fact that quite a few of the people who are essential to running the House are gay, and many of them are keeping it a secret. This includes some members and many staff. And it most definitely includes Republicans.
In fact, because Hill gays who are Democrats are more likely to be out -- having less to fear in terms of reprisal -- the closeted gays are more likely as a rule to be Republican.
All this is ho-hum to many denizens of Washington. The presence of gays among the congressional members and staff is old news, if rarely discussed in public. In practical terms, most on the Hill have gotten over it, including many of the most conservative Republicans in both chambers.
But can the same be said for some of the Republican Party's most ardent supporters? Spokesmen for several organizations of social conservatives, frequently lumped together as "the Christian right," have been in the media since the Foley story broke, expressing their dismay. Stunned by the idea of men preying on pages, they seem disquieted, too, by the stories identifying various key staff figures as openly gay.
This is not a good report if you're an activist leader who regularly tells your constituency the Republicans are the good guys, the defenders of biblical morality and the knights of straight sexual traditions. Could it be the GOP opposes gay marriage and domestic partner legislation but looks the other way when it comes to the behavior of its own?
That question was implicit in what was said by Tony Perkins, the head of the Family Research Council, who wondered whether the Foley affair was not the byproduct of "too much tolerance and diversity."
The Republican Party has striven to have it both ways. They want to champion traditional mores and oppose the normalization of gay life, the mainstreaming of domestic partners and "Will and Grace." Yet they regularly elevate gays to key positions in their campaigns and in all three branches of the government, with the tacit understanding that these individuals will keep their private lives to themselves.
There are also occasions when the same party that presses for a ban on gay marriage by constitutional amendment appoints acknowledged gays to important jobs in the executive branch. Witness this week's installation of a new ambassador for HIV-AIDS policy, a gay man whose male partner attended the ceremony along with First Lady Laura Bush and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice.
This may all be politics as usual for the more urbane Republicans, but surely it is not a casual matter to all.
Perkins and some of his confreres have formed a coalition called the Arlington Group. It has made known its unhappiness with the current Republican leadership over l'affair Foley and over other issues as well. How much, they are asking, has this Congress, elected with the help of our ground troops, really done for traditional morality?
As the Foley investigation goes forward, we will hear some say the Republican apparatus harbors a kind of gay mafia, a network of both open and secretive gays who use their power to protect one other -- and perhaps to thwart the traditional values agenda.
Some conservatives who think this way may find themselves making common cause with liberal gays (strange bedfellows, anyone?). The latter sub-group is always threatening to expose the hypocrisy of conservative gays -- especially those who keep their orientation private while serving members given to gay bashing. It is rumored that lists are already circulating which name the names of those whose presence in high places displeases.
The implication of such lists is: Prepare for a housecleaning. Any such purge would be dispiriting and destructive for the institution of Congress, a throwback to the loyalty oaths and other excesses of the McCarthy period. But there may be other, still more portentous consequences.
Some activists in the GOP see Foley as their opportunity to discredit the "big tent" philosophy cited by GOP leaders -- and a chance to read gays out of the party once and for all. But if they do, they may initiate an even larger schism in the party between traditionalists and libertarians, between those who prioritize "moral values" and those who prefer to talk about the economy and defense.
Hardliners on either side of that divide may want such a clash to come. But big splits have meant big defeats for the GOP in the past, most recently in 1992. It would be disastrous timing to have a similar schism in 2006 -- or in 2008.
Ron Elving co-hosts It's All Politics, a weekly podcast, with NPR Political Editor Ken Rudin.
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Gay republicans
Moderator: Moderators
Gay republicans
Post #1Will this have a major impact on the religious right? Do you care that gay republicans are hiding themselves? What does this say about democrats when their political gays do not feel the wrath of their consituency and thus do not feel the need to hide?
Post #21
I haven't been able to track down who else Bill Maher was referring to in this Larry King live stint, but I did find this.
White House says Condi 'showing due deference':
She recognized as 'mother-in-law' the mom of appointee's 'gay' partner
This has an October 21st date.
Here is one response:
White House says Condi 'showing due deference':
She recognized as 'mother-in-law' the mom of appointee's 'gay' partner
This has an October 21st date.
Condoleeza Rice said/ wrote: Thank you. Thank you very much. I am truly honored and delighted to have the opportunity to swear in Mark Dybul as our next Global AIDS Coordinator. I am pleased to do that in the presence of Mark's parents, Claire and Richard; his partner, Jason; and his mother-in-law, Marilyn. You have wonderful family to support you, Mark, and I know that's always important to us. Welcome.
Here is one response:
The use of the "mother-in-law" term normally reserved for legally married heterosexual families rankled Peter Sprigg, vice president for policy at the Family Research Council, who called Rice's comments "profoundly offensive," according to Agape Press.
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice swears in Ambassador Mark Dybul (White House photo)
The secretary's remarks, he said, fly in the face of the Bush administration's endorsement of a federal marriage protection amendment.
"We have to face the fact that putting a homosexual in charge of AIDS policy is a bit like putting the fox in charge of the henhouse," said Sprigg. "But even beyond that, the deferential treatment that was given not only to him but his partner and his partner's family by the Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is very distressing."
Post #22
Mary Cheney's impending motherhood seems a noteworthy event to add to this thread, and is sure to add to the debate.
Focus on the Family had this to say:
Focus on the Family had this to say:
Can the Mary Cheney's of the world and the James Dobson's of the world coexist in the same political party for long?“Mary Cheney’s pregnancy raises the question of what’s best for children,” said Carrie Gordon Earll, the group’s director of issues analysis. “Just because it’s possible to conceive a child outside of the relationship of a married mother and father doesn’t mean it’s the best for the child.”
Post #23
Can the Mary Cheney's of the world and the James Dobson's of the world coexist in the same political party for long?
Good question. I think the far right religious wing will speak out about her with typical condescending hypocritical moral high ground fervor and then try to hush it all up ASAP in an attempt to keep the squeaky clean, churchly image (fantasy ) of the republican party intact as much as possible. In the long run I don't think it will work. Instead, this issue will join a long line of issues in the republican party that are eroding from within so it is no longer the solid unwavering force it has been in recent history. Global warming and fiscal responsibility issues are having the same impact. The more time the wacky right spends on trying to drum up public support by verbally or emotionally beating up gays, (while hiding their own) the more time they spend on flag burning amendments and Terri Shivo tube feeding interventions the less credibility they have and the more fragmented the party will become.
We have just witnessed the closing of the least effective congress in the history of the United States presiding over the biggest foreign policy disaster in recorded history. The Right Wing simply has nothing to talk about - and thus they blather on about gays raising babies.......as the ice caps melt and 55 more people are dead in Baghdad this morning.
Post #25
Anything that brings down the GOP is Ok with me, as long as it doesn't bring down the rest of us with them.
Unfortunately, GW is King right now and he believes Armageddon is near. Let us hope he will be impeached before he decides to push the button to help God get things moving....on advice of his most trusted Christian friend Pastor John Haggie.....
:2gun:
