Are Gays the new Nader?

from the Progressive review Blog 11.6.04;

HANK CHAPOT - When San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom issued marriage licenses to queer couples last winter, I suggested to a bunch of gay friends that Newsom was running interference for the Massachusetts Court, the Democrat party and especially John Kerry. I based my opinion on the fact that Newsom reported he'd had lots of phone conversations before he acted, and one was with Terry McCauliffe, chair of the DNC. That was a red flag that suggested Newsom, who had nothing to lose and achieved mid-level sainthood for his actions, was more calculating than saintly.

Newsom admitted as much on the local NPR chat show yesterday. When a caller blamed him for Kerry's loss because the marriage issue was too far out front for the Democrat party and offended America, Newsom said "I took the sting out of the issue for the Massachusetts court and for a candidate named John Kerry." The same caller said to Newsom "We can't blame Nader this time, so, I blame you." In the past three days, the punditocracy, the media and the Democrats, including Diane Feinstein, have all said the "values voter" defeated Kerry. That's code for people stampeded by the Republicans against gay civil rights in the guise of gay marriage.

Regardless of what you think about the issue or the timing of the gay marriage debate, it is once again obvious that the Democrat party will not take responsibility for its own defeat, even after a decade of failures, and will cast blame outside its own house. They've settled on a scapegoat; this time it's the homos who had the temerity to ask for a little inclusion.




9:29 AM   3 comments




3 Comments:


At 4:51 PM, Anonymous said...



Look in the mirror. You have nothing to blame except the Democrats' own spinelessness. Kerry didn't even fight for Ohio, the same way Gore (who won Florida) abandoned his supporters who won in 2000. You had a majority of the population against the war in Iraq, yet all you could do was scapegoat principled voters who supported Nader. Next time try focusing on your strongest opponent, instead of the weakest. You don't deserve my vote unless you'll fight for it: before, during, and after election day.


At 6:56 PM, Anonymous said...



I second and third what the first poster said. Democrats need to look at there own party and quit trying to blame thier own internal problems on others.


At 12:17 AM, Anonymous said...



Be more sensitive to feelings of bigots?

Since the great Hate Election(s) of 2004, many persons have been advising us "San Francisco liberals" (code for queers and our allies) to understand and placate the bigots who voted for hate amendments, and who boosted Bush into a second term.

Like, we should become more sensitive to their "cultural"
(code for fundi-fanatic) concerns?

Like, we should stop mocking their obsolete backwardness?

Should African-Americans, in the Sixties and Seventies,
have been more sensitive to the bigots who brutally attacked them, from Birmingham to Boston?

To promote understanding, should black and brown and native citizens have postponed their struggles for freedom and equal rights?

Well, if others wish to reach out and make dialog with fundi bigots, that's nice. I don't object.

But I have nothing to say to fascists, beyond this prophesy:

"Your great-grandchildren won't approve and won't respect what you did in 2004."

-- Carl Cole,
alive and queer in San Francisco,
November 9, 2004
......................................
PLEASE REPOST.