Mike Rogers — the gay activist blogger on an “outing” mission that I referred to last week — is starting to make some bigger waves… and his target yesterday was Idaho Senator Larry Craig:
Mike Rogers, who calls himself “the nation’s leading gay activist blogger” has just finished a nationally-broadcast interview on the Ed Schultz Radio Show in which he alleges that Idaho Republican Senator Larry Craig has engaged in same-sex sexual activity.
Senator Craig’s office flatly rejected the claims. “The Senator says this story is absolutely ridiculous – almost laughable,” said press secretary Sid Smith. “It has no basis in fact.”
I’m already on record with my disgust at this invasive, vicious campaign; nothing new to see here, really, for Polimom. I did find some amusement, though, in the reaction from some conservatives. Captain Ed, for instance, says:
Once again, the Left shows its obsession with sexuality, but it’s really more than that. The Left obsesses over identity politics in all forms, and that obsession comes out in pathological terms. Rogers reveals this in his blog post, demanding that gay staffers on the Hill identify their orientation publicly, or else he will do it for them. Sexual identity is everything to him, and the concept of sexual privacy has no value to him at all. He wants to humiliate gays who prefer to keep their sexual activity private, forcing them to wear the virtual pink triangle against their will to experience obloquy and castigation.
The Left shows its obsession? You mean all this bizarre Amendment-mania that has come from the Right has been about something besides sex?
Then there’s La Shawn Barber, who doesn’t like the “outing” approach, and wishes everybody would keep their sex lives private… but says she understands politically-motivated outers:
But here is where I depart with fellow conservative bloggers: If a person speaks out against laws, policies, lifestyles, etc., that you support and you find out he is doing the thing he speaks against, shouldn’t you expose them as a hypocrite? I suppose the equivalent for me would be a “closeted” Christian lawmaker pushing for IRS investigations of churches and Christian non-profit organizations, or criticizing the “religious right” as nuts.
Ummm…. there may very well be quite a number of “closeted” Christians who warm a pew every Sunday while pushing back against the Religious Right’s agenda on Monday. However, exposing them (so to speak) isn’t received in quite the same way. (Isn’t that sorta what David Kuo’s book did?)
Pew-warmers just aren’t particularly sexy (in or out of the closet), and sex sells in politics. It may not win voters (and in many cases turns them off), but it always gets the headlines.
Thanks to years (decades?) of the RR trying to recast everything other than man-woman missionary-position marriage-sanctioned sex as the work of the devil, America has become a nation obsessed with a very unhealthy desire to look into everybody else’s closets (or under their covers). They collectively point and gasp, even as they voraciously lap up every titillating detail.
Welcome to the future.
* * * * *
Others blogging:
Glenn Greenwald
The Moderate Voice
Joe. My. God.
Yes, Polimom – surprising as it may seem, the ‘bizarre Amendment’ (I presume you are talking about that “marriage is only between one man and one woman” proposal) actually was about something other than sex. It was about attempting to prevent a small group of inDUHviduals (that would be what the VRWC calls “activist judges) from (re)defining an institution that has been in place far longer than the Republic (that would be the USofA.) Agree with the premise or not, that is one of the factors that was driving that effort (another more than likely was a knee-jerk reaction to a specific set of trigger events – but our gummint is real good at knee-jerk reactions.)
Contrast this with someone threatening to “out” others, to reveal aspects of their lives they would prefer remain private, possibly because they are afraid of embarassment/persecution/whatever. When I was in the USAF, the “justification” for keeping homosexuals out was that they were subject to blackmail and thus represented “security risks”. Well, threatening to expose someone’s private little secret if they don’t do what you want sure sounds like extortion to me!
Is that about sex(uality)? More likely than not, the connection is tenuous at best, and you could substitute some other hot-button issue and it would make no difference as to the level of outrage/amusement/whatever.
~EdT.
Ed — There are many conservatives who, like you, see the homosexuality issues in terms of constitutionality, judicial and legislative roles, etc. That would be the rational residue of what used to be a conservative party that focused on less government.
That allows for a much different dialogue, too. But the mobilization of the Republican “base” has been very much rooted in s-e-x.
I wonder, though, whether judges would have been ruling on it at all, had there not been legislation that was in violation of someone’s rights?
One would hope not! However, given our direction toward deciding everything in the courts, I wouldn’t be surprised (at least it’s better than settling issues with duelling pistols at 50 paces.)
~EdT.
You know, the “deciding it all in the courts” thing is really a bogus complaint.
For example: in Massachusetts, there’s ongoing debate about whether to amend the state constitution to ban same sex marriage. The courts found that under the state’s constitution, the marriage laws are discriminatory. They forced the issue. BUt ultimately it’s the people of that state who will decide.
Sometimes, issues need to be forced.
As for Craig? I tried to write about it and just couldn’t come up with anything I thought was worth saying. I’m suspicious of Rogers’ motives and techniques, but I have no real problem with someone’s hypocrisy being exposed.
But the thing is, while Craig has an anti-gay voting record, he is not some major right-wing ideologue. I don’t like his votes but he’s hardly running around stirring up bigotry.
And by not actually presenting his evidence, I think Rogers made himself look silly. I haven’t the faintest idea if any of it is true. Thus, I think it’s a non-story.