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Saturday, Nov 21, 2009
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Who's right about John McCain?
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| Who's right about John McCain? | |
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by Chris Crain -
SGN Contributing Writer The general election isn't even a month old and already two leading Gay political organizations are fighting over whether Republican presidential nominee John McCain is a friend or foe to Gay and Lesbian voters. The Human Rights Campaign was first to attack, issuing a report last week claiming McCain represented "four more years" of anti-Gay hostility in the White House. Much in the HRC report is not new, but it's nonetheless striking to see compiled in one place the Arizona senator's long and consistent record of opposition to absolutely any form of Gay civil rights: o Opposes employment protections o Opposes hate crime legislation o Supports "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" o Opposes Gay marriage and supports the Defense of Marriage Act o Favors state constitutional amendments banning marriage, civil unions and domestic partnerships at any level of government, as well as recognition of any of these from other states. o Favors state constitutional amendments that would ban public entities - local governments, agencies, public universities and hospitals, etc., from providing health insurance and other benefits to the domestic partners of their workers, students, etc. o Opposes adoption by Gay couples o Supports the ban on HIV-positive immigrants and backed a Jesse Helms measure blocking HIV prevention aimed at Gay men o Supports the nomination of strict constructionist judges who reject "judicial activism," which is essentially anything that limits the elected branches' ability to trample on Gays. That is a very daunting and very damning list, pretty much matching bullet for bullet George W. Bush and most conservative Republicans. In fact, candidate Bush in 2000 had not yet come out against employment protection and hate crime laws; that only happened last year when the White House issued veto threats on both bills. McCain's policy positions certainly belie the "party maverick" reputation he has cultivated over the years, mostly based upon government reform and not social issues - about which he cares little and thus cedes entirely to those in his party who care a lot. McCain is even backsliding on the one and only Gay issue on which he has stood up to Christian conservatives: the Federal Marriage Amendment. Back in 2004, McCain voted against the FMA, calling it "antithetical in every way to the core philosophy of Republicans" - not because it was discriminatory, mind you, but because it violated "states' rights" - that is, the recognized authority of states to decide questions relating to marriage. (States' rights, as any history student can tell you, is a rather malleable "core principle." This week it protects progressive states who want to marry Gays, but last week it protected bigoted states that wanted to keep their Jim Crow laws or other "peculiar institutions.") Now McCain has even walked away from this "core philosophy of Republicans." Pandering for conservative votes in the early primary state of New Hampshire, McCain said he would support a federal amendment banning .Gay marriage if DOMA is struck down, a second state supreme court strikes down hetero-only marriage laws, or "a large majority of Americans come to perceive that their communities' values are being ignored and other standards concerning marriage are being imposed on them against their will." That's the kind of fair-weather "friendship" that only a Gay Republican could love. The HRC report on McCain ignores, of course, his close relationship with the Log Cabin Republicans. The Gay GOP group, in response, slammed the HRC report as an unfair representation of McCain's "open door" to Log Cabin and his "record of inclusion." Keep in mind that McCain's Log Cabin coziness is mostly ancient history, dating back to the Republican presidential primary in 2000, when the Gay GOP group sided with McCain against Bush. That was an entirely different John McCain, of course. The Arizona senator has since gone from calling out "agents of intolerance" like Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson to kissing their rings and coddling their evangelical supporters. Log Cabin's Scott Tucker is claiming otherwise, publicly insisting McCain "won the GOP nomination with no help (and with outright hostility) from many so-called 'social conservatives.'" Tucker conveniently ignores McCain's evangelical fence-mending - aka ass-kissing - not to mention the obvious current reality: However McCain got here, he has no prayer of winning the White House without the enthusiastic support of those very same "so-called 'social conservatives.'" In the end, he will be every bit as indebted to them as if he were Mike Huckabee himself. Log Cabin may be right that McCain doesn't care much about social issues like Gay rights, but neither did George W. Bush and we know how that turned out. The important thing is that both men have a record of opposition to any form of Gay civil rights and a demonstrated willingness to pander to the right. The leadership of Log Cabin should rethink things before its too late, and demand something more than a token concession from McCain in exchange for - perish the thought - endorsing this man for president. Chris Crain is former editor of the Washington Blade and five other Gay publications and now edits GayNewsWatch.com. He can be reached via his blog at www.citizencrain.com |
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