September 4, 2007

GOP:  Gay Old Party

Check out all thos unouted gay men who go into politics. More and more it looks like they  gravitate to the Republican side of the aisle.  Hard to tell exactly why this should be.  Could be that siding  with the GOP gives  much-needed cover to gay men who obsess about  being outed.  The GOP is more or less officially anti-gay, so  gay public servants easily mask their  sexual preferences by joining in with  all that homophobic rhetoric you hear from the GOP these days.   (Somewhat  similar  to  the gay men who used to go into the RC priesthood  to  surround themselves  with  young men and boys and fend off questions as to why they weren't married.)  

Then again, if, by any chance, a gay politician happened to be  outed, he could  simply deny he is gay, and insist he's has never been gay.  He can point to the fact that he is a Republican and has voted against gay issues, as proof of his heterosexual preferences.  

Sen. Larry Craig's performances both before the policeman who arrested him in that restroom in Minneapolis and his ranting denials before the press are cases in point.   Speaking of the press, if all else fails you can, well, blame the press.  Which Sen. Craig did.    

But as everyone knows, Sen Craig's denials,   have had precisely the opposite effect than the ones he  intended;--the more Craig denies, the more everyone is convinced (1) that he is a liar, (2) that he is a hypocrite  (3) that he is gay or at least bi.     All Craig's denials did was make him the butt of a lot of the late-night comedians.

Sen. Craig is in some distinguished or not-so-distinguished company.   Gay Republicans have a long and not well-respected  history in American politics.  There was, for example,  Roy Cohn, Joe McCarthy’s sidekick.  Cohn died of AIDS but denied his sexual preferences to the end. Fundraiser Arthur Finkelstein, an anti-gay ranter finally  married his partner in a same sex ceremony. Terry Dolan, a GOP activist in the 70s also died of AIDS and also denied his sexual preferences even though it was well known that he pursued an active sex life in Washington during the 1970s.  Then there was Rep. Ed Schrock who had to leave public office when he was outed.  Last one of all, that ends this strange history is, of course, Rep. Mark Foley, a man who led the pack in denouncing same-sex marriage for years,  while all the time chasing  around young boys by e-mail--on  government time, no less.

Seems to me it's about time the GOP came to terms with it's homophobia and hypocrisy about sexual preferences.  This will mean dropping the support of the religious right. 

Which is something the GOP probably won't  do.

Ironic.  The more homophobic the GOP, the more unouted gays are attracted to it.  Which only increases the possibility of more gay-sex scandals. 

And on it goes.