A Stitch in Haste

So I'm contemplating this post by Christian Grantham, whom I'm becoming increasingly fond of (intellectually speaking, of course).

And then I got to thinking...how to reconcile the gay Republican paradox? Are there a Million Gays for Bush, or so few that they could "fit in a closet"?

So I came up with an idea.

A basic rule of New York City living (and perhaps living anywhere) is that you never fail to leave a tip, even when you are totally displeased with the quality of service. The reason: if you leave without tipping, it will be presumed that you simply forgot rather than reflect any intent by you to "make a statement." You're always supposed to leave a penny, or a quarter, or a note scrawled on a napkin.

I think that's what gay Republicans should do: Immediately whip it out (the checkbook, that is), and write a check to the Republican National Committee...

...for one dollar.

Maybe add a little note with your check: "Dear Republican Leader: You have intentionally marginalized me, so I am intentionally marginalizing you. Enjoy your mandate." [Include Carville-esque McGreevey pun at your own risk.]

A million such one-dollar checks would say something. It would say quite a lot.

And of course there's no reason gay Democrats couldn't do the same thing for the leaders in their party who are perfectly willing to see gays discriminated against, just so long as it doesn't happen via a constitutional amendment.

Heck, I'd do it myself, but I was a never a Republican or a Democrat to begin with (I'd just as soon be marginalized as an independent rather than as a party member, thank you very much).

As the New York State Lottery motto goes: "All you need is a dollar and a dream..."

POST SCRIPT: If you don't understand the headline, then it's because you never saw "Reservoir Dogs."

Related Posts:
On Gays and the Two-Party System
A Million Gays for Bush?
A Stitch in Haste Withholds Presidential Endorsement

Jerry Falwell on "Meet the Press" regarding Marc Cherry, the creator of Desperate Housewives:

"If he's a gay Republican, then the first thing he should do is join the Democratic Party."

As I have blogged previously:

[T]he Republican Party is starting to look less like a political party and more like a coalition government. And coalition governments have a tendency to fall apart.

It's one thing to lose segments of your coalition -- it's another to publicly call for their withdrawing from it. It has another name: hubris.

In any case, I await responses from the gay Republican groups and bloggers. I expect to be waiting a long time.

And I have also blogged previously: "A pox on both your parties."

Related Posts:
Coalition of the Silent and Annoying (and Hell-Bound)?
On Gays and the Two-Party System

Good op-ed piece about self-loathing gay Republicans:

What's different this year is that it's not just the right-wing Republicans doing the bashing. The latest news is that the most gay-friendly of Republicans, former New York City mayor Rudy Giuliani, is campaigning for arch-homophobes Senator Rick Santorum and Iowa's gubernatorial candidate Jim Nussle. In fact, the few non-right wing Republicans left in the party are all out on the campaign trail, avidly supporting the most extreme anti-gay rhetoric of their fellow party members.

So once more, in response to the new gay bashing, comes the old question: Why would any gay man or woman belong to a party that has stated, over and over, as clearly as can be, without equivocation, that he or she is not welcome?

No response yet from Republican National Committee Chairman Ken "That's Not an Appropriate Question" Mehlman.

"There's going to be a lot of people watching to see if the voters can look at my record and say, 'He's doing a good job.'" "Or, will they look at my personal life and say, 'I can't support him because of that.' If that's how they're going to vote, I may be out of a job."

--Paul Koering, a Republican State Senator in Minnesota facing a primary challenge and who openly announced his sexual orientation a few days after being the sole Republican legislator to cast a procedural vote against that state's bigot amendment. (Koering says he never hid his sexual orientation; he just never declared it so openly before.)

Is Koering being purged by the GOP?

"People of high moral values and integrity must rally and support candidates who will work to bring ethics, morals and family values back into government," [primary opponent Kevin] Goedker's father, Gene, his campaign treasurer, wrote in a fundraising letter.

More:

“This is about whether voters can trust Senator Koering. Can they trust him to keep the homosexual agenda out of our schools? Can they trust him to defend the definition of marriage?

So, apparently, if you're gay — even if you're Republican and gay — you are, at least by innuendo, opposed to "ethics, morals and family values." And who is foolish enough to believe that a homosexual can be trusted in the conservatives' War on Gays? Certainly not the conservatives. They get what many gays simply do not: You are just not welcome in the GOP.

Stated differently: To Republicans, "gay" always comes first and always trumps every other consideration. It is a litmus test, even more so than abortion or gun control ever was.

Of course, Koering might actually win the primary, and re-election. But one wonders whether the challenge would ever have been sanctioned by party leaders had Koering not been gay. Is every — any — straight Republican who voted against a bigot amendment recently now facing a serious primary challenge? (The surprisingly gay-centric primary contest involving Rhode Island Senator Lincoln Chafee is the only one that comes to mind.)

My position is unchanged: Being an active gay Republican is prima facie evidence of self-loathing. How much more bigotry must the Republican Party throw in your face before you will get the message?

More thoughts from Pam's House Blend.

UPDATE: Koering won by a rather slim 55-45 margin.

A blogbuddy of mine, PJS of NOW a Warning???, has written a response to my recent post in which I reiterate my view that it is now prima facie evidence of self-loathing for a gay to be an active Republican. In the spirit of open discussion, I am, with his consent, making it a guest-post of its own:

After trying to assemble an explanation that would fit in a single blog post, and failing, I took a step back and realized that my position is actually pretty simple.

The historic and core principles of the Republican Party, as I studied them in my (relatively recent) formative political years, ring true for me and are worth sticking around and fighting for. I don't believe in high-tailing it out of my own party just because Jerry Fallwell's bigger than me and "he says so."

Ideas are worth fighting for, and I am a rock-ribbed, Goldwaterian Reaganite. I was a Republican before I ever heard of Karl Rove, and I was a Republican before George W. Bush was elected President. (Incidentally, my parents were union Democrats.)

I'm not going to excuse myself entirely from the American political process by wandering into a third party that busies itself with pot legalization and pet ownership issues while the world hangs in the balance. (I refer to specific campaign points I've found when I've considered supporting local Libertarian candidates.)

A reasonable person could also ask me why not just be a "conservative Democrat", but when I look at core principles of collectivism vs. individualism, socialism vs. free markets, defense vs. appeasement, I'd rather remain a thorn in the side of my true political home.

Single issue voters suck.

Makes sense to me, except perhaps for the fact that today's Republican Party is not just "Jerry Falwell, Karl Rove and George W. Bush." The "Goldwaterian Reaganite" principles of the Republican Party of decades past — limited government, fiscal restraint, federalism as a division of responsible lawmaking rather than a duplication of irresponsible lawmaking, etc., are, quite frankly, dead — with no evidence, none whatsoever, that they are coming back any time soon. "Big-tent" Republicanism does not exist today, if it ever truly did.

As for gay Republicans in particular, how exactly are you going to effect change when you are so openly and unapologetically opposed, not just by the Red State Rednecks, but also by your own leadership? What, exactly, have the Log Cabin Republicans achieved in the past six or more years? By my scorecard, exactly zero. What message does staying in the party send except, "Yeah, sure, shit all over me — I don't mind. Just lower my taxes and try to fix Social Security. (And, while we're on the subject, we'll also overlook all that "No Child Left Behind" and "Medicare Part D" and "Gonzales v. Raich" and "Bridge to Nowhere" and "warrantless wiretapping" stuff.)."

Meanwhile, any regular reader of my blog knows that I feel disappointment at best, and mocking contempt at worst, of the Big-L Libertarian Party. So PJ and I are in total agreement there. But I would propose an alternative strategy to "The Republican Party is the least worst alternative..." — namely that "The best way to fight the two-party system is by not being a part of it..." Stated differently, what is so terrible about being an independent?

Many small-l libertarians, and disaffected Republicans, are finally starting to ask a question not posited for quite a while: Is the best strategy now simply to vote "gridlock for the sake of gridlock"? I haven't voted for a Democrat since Daniel Patrick Moynihan. Maybe that will change this November or in 2008 (unlikely given the Democrats who will be presented to me — people like Eliot Spitzer, Andrew Cuomo and, ugh, Hillary Clinton).

It's one thing to grab your ball and stomp off the playground in a huff. But when the playground has a stockade fence around it, and is populated by bullies, and is contaminated with toxic waste, isn't it time to think about finding a new playground — or just playing in your own backyard instead?

UPDATE: Welcome Republic of T. and DailyKos readers!

"There are just going to be some days when it's hard to be a gay Republican."
--A Gay Republican

Some more choice passages from the article:

Brian Bennett, a gay Republican political consultant ... was a longtime chief of staff to former Representative Robert K. Dornan, Republican of California, who regularly referred to gays as "Sodomites."

There are just going to be some days when it's hard to be a gay Republican...

Even though the G.O.P. fashions itself as "the party of Lincoln" and a promoter of tolerance, it is perceived as hostile by many gay men and lesbians.

"Perceived?" I think the reporter needs a new dictionary, because "perceived" is not quite the word he's looking for.

"You learn to compartmentalize really well," said one Republican strategist who, like many gay Republicans interviewed for this article, would talk only anonymously for fear of adversely affecting his career.

There are just going to be some days when it's hard to be a gay Republican. (Of course, "compartmentalization" is also not the correct word — everyone "compartmentalizes." The correct term is "become schizophrenic" (alternatively, "self-loathe" works too).

In contrast to what many view as the right's increasingly antigay rhetoric, members of both parties say there has been a growing tolerance for gays and lesbians within the Republican ranks. "There's been a change from 20 years ago when people used to be hyperconscious of staying in the closet," said Steve Elmendorf, an openly gay Democratic strategist who worked for former Representative Richard A. Gephardt, Democrat of Missouri. "Now there's more of an evolution to a 'don't ask, don't tell' rule."

Huh? Gay Republicans have gone from having to stay in the closet to, um, having to stay in the closet? That's what 20 years of "working from within" has gotten them?

One gay Republican campaign strategist said he feared that conservatives would "play to the base" and redouble their efforts to vilify homosexuals. "It's one of the places the party goes when it's in trouble," he said. "A lot of us are holding our breath to see how this plays out."

There are just going to be some days when it's hard to be a gay Republican.

More thoughts from Pam's House Blend.

Part One of my two-part prediction has come to pass:

Republican National Committee Chairman Ken Mehlman, whose party lost both chambers of Congress in the midterm elections, will step down from his post when his two-year term ends in January, GOP officials said Thursday.
...
The officials said Mehlman made the decision not to run for a second term more than a month or two ago — well before the election.

Just like President Bush's decision regarding Donald Rumsfeld?

The timing of the announcement is interesting, coming not only right after the election, but also right after comedian Bill Maher suggested on Larry King Live that he has proof of Mehlman's homosexuality and intended to out him (and other high-profile Republicans) on Maher's HBO show.

In any event, Part Two of my prediction is, of course, Rick Santorum. Stay tuned.

In response to this video:

Here is a self-standing comment I have been marking territory with on other blogs (one example here)

The best thing that could happen to a GOP candidate's chances of winning the nomination is to be attacked by LCR.

And none of this changes the fact that gay Republicans are, by defintion, self-loathing.

(Full Disclosure: I am not a Democrat.)

Discuss.