Author: Andrew Sullivan

It has become routine for many conservatives opposed to civil marriage for gays to say that they are not homophobic as such, that their arguments are about the need to preserve marriage rather than rooted in hostility to gay people. I do not have a window into people’s souls, so I cannot judge these protestations. My view is that people should not be viewed as bigots unless proven otherwise. But there’s the rub. Take the Heritage Foundation, a critical institution in Washington conservatism. Their research database on the family includes several research papers by one Paul Cameron, a man who is to gay studies what Holocaust deniers are to historians of Nazi Germany. To check out who Cameron is, and what his methodologies are, read this piece and this one by yours truly. Money quote:

Over the years [Cameron] has also argued that gay men are responsible for up to one half of all child abuse cases (despite making up maybe two percent of the population), that they are ten to 20 times more likely to molest children than heterosexuals, and that fully half of all sex murderers are homosexuals. One of Cameron’s “studies” included 41 gay men out of a total sample of 4,340 adults. Another was based on interviews with 34 serial killers. One of his “pamphlets” is illustrated by a photograph of an adult male arm dragging a small boy into a public restroom.

If we rightly ask the left to disown someone like Ted Rall, then why should the right be allowed to propagate the poison of Cameron and expect to be given the benefit of the doubt on homophobia?

The other insistence by those opposed to equal marriage rights is that they are not averse to private contracts that might amount to some sort of civil unions. “See?” – they say. “We don’t hate gays. We just love marriage!” Yet in Virginia, a law was just passed that explicitly denies the validity of any such contracts, voids civil unions of any kind, under any name, and may eventually be struck down by the Supreme Court for the radicalism of its attempt to prevent even private legal arrangements to protect such things as hospital visitation. This was a Republican-sponsored measure, and exposes the lie that the Republican party is tolerant of gays but draws the line at marriage. Have you heard Stanley Kurtz or Maggie Gallagher oppose this law? Have you heard a single conservative commentator worry about it? Recall that Kurtz is aware of five same-sex marriages in a remote region of Norway but is apparently unaware of what has just happened in Virginia.

Most of it is in the rapidly growing left-wing part of the blogosphere, which is encouraging, to say the least. Here’s one, another, another, and another. Thanks for tracking them down. My favorite quote:

Rall’s wrong. He doesn’t understand how patriotism works, or how a democratic nation goes to war. Wrong or right, we decided, as a nation, to go to war. We had a public debate. The Congress authorized it. The President ordered it. In short, through democratic processes the country called, and those who answered that call are patriots, not saps. Whether the call was correct or not doesn’t matter. What matters is that when their country called, they answered, and they deserve our respect and appreciation for that reason.

The difference between liberalism and the hateful far left. Thank God for it.

I have to say that the treatment given by Editor and Publisher to the contretemps over Ted Rall is really instructive. I’ve found the publication to be excellent at times – innovative and thorough and often news-breaking. And then you read their stories about Rall. Take the latest. It is, in essence, an attack on Bill O’Reilly. Or the original one, where, again, Rall is regarded as the victim of a smear, rather than the perpetrator of an obscenity. Money quote:

When E&P called Rall, he had only received one message about the cartoon. But, as the interview went on, the messages started pouring in. A few were positive, but most were vicious. As Rall opened each e-mail for the first time, he quoted briefly from each one. “You make me sick”; “lies and distortions”; “move to France”; “I pity you”; “disgusting”; “sad and pathetic”; “f— you, you coward bastard”; “I will s–t on your grave”; “horrendous”; “rot in hell”; “freak”; “I hope you’re killed by an Arab terrorist attack”; “people died to publish the b.s. you do.”

E&P also implies that the only reason for the outpouring of outrage was that Drudge had whipped up conservative ire – as if only conservatives would be appalled by Rall’s bile against a fallen soldier on the day of his memorial service. Dave Astor, who wrote the pieces, is doing his job, of course. His readership – because it is primarily media establishment types – skews left. Same with leftist, Jim Romenesko, whose media site is highly successful because it reflects and caters to the left-liberalism of its readers. But these people would still insist they’re not biased! They are about as credible in that respect as Fox News.

A fascinating and civil same-sex marriage debate with the author of the superb new book, “Gay Marriage: Why It’s Good for Gays, Good for Straights, and Good for America,” Jonathan Rauch.

Bio-chemical warfare from Islamist terrorists is, to my mind, inevitable. More evidence here.

“Your comments in the dish today claiming that Salon and other supposedly nonpartisan publications are no less blindly leftwing than the Weekly Standard is blindly rightwing happened to get posted just after I’d read Fred Barnes’ article “A Democratic Senate?” on weeklystandard.com. Reading Barnes’ article, I was struck by the fact that I couldn’t imagine a leftwing magazine publishing anything that sunny and fair about the political opposition’s strong slate of candidates. If there were a chance that a Democratic-controlled Senate was about to switch to the Republicans, snide essays about the moronic and evil Republican candidates (and the ignorant Midwestern electorate) would have flooded the usual venues. This is no doubt one of the reasons I and other gay and quasi-leftish thinkers still vote Republican quite often: the mainstream left is the domain of the braindead and those who argue in bad faith. Goofy arguments by conservative authors against gay marriage might disguise this somewhat, but it’s true.’ – more feedback on the Letters Page.

The sane person subbing for Eric Alterman has the following to say:

(I pause here to mention that cartoonist Ted Rall – who is to the American Left what goats are to ballet – has inflamed folks with a cartoon covering much the same ground that Gonzalez did, and has far less of an excuse for arrant nonsense than should be granted the latter.)

Good for him. Still no mention I can find on Salon, which has, alas, descended into pure, rank partisanship without even a fig-leaf of reason or even-handedness any more. That doesn’t make them any worse than, say, National Review Online or the Weekly Standard, but it sure doesn’t make them any better. Nada on Tapped. But here’s one more. A little terse, but it exists!

“The more I learn about Pat Tillman and his family, and the more I think about the conversations lefties need to be having with thoughtful conservatives, the more pathetic Rall’s cartoon becomes. To him, taking the time to productively raise the issue of a soldier’s responsibility is apparently the same thing as “letting volunteer soldiers off the hook.” Whatever you say, Ted. Just one last question: When did you become such an idiot?” – principled, lefty blogger, Todd Morgan. If you find more serious, sane left-liberal or liberal condemnations of Rall, please send them in. I’m eager to show that the left can be as stringent with its own haters as it should be.

“This is no different than what happens at the skull and bones initiation and we’re going to ruin people’s lives over it and we’re going to hamper our military effort, and then we are going to really hammer them because they had a good time. You know, these people are being fired at every day. I’m talking about people having a good time, these people, you ever heard of emotional release? You of heard of need to blow some steam off?” – Rush Limbaugh, yesterday. (Hat tip: Wonkette.)