“Nothing Personal, Just Policy”: Let Me Guess, Mitt Romney Has Gay Friends
George W. Bush has gay friends. So does Sarah Palin. Amazingly, so does Rick Santorum. And let me guess: soon Mitt Romney will, too.
Every Republican politician seems to have at least one gay friend these days. That’s not too difficult: even if you tried, it would be hard to live and work in America without meeting at least one openly gay person you can get along with. But for a right-wing politician having gay friends, shall we say, has benefits. These unnamed, unseen gay friends send a message that an anti-gay politician isn’t a hater. I mean, how can you hate your friends? It’s just policy, nothing personal.
Of course, the problem is that it is personal. Having gay friends doesn’t absolve one of anti-gay prejudice any more than loving one’s wife and daughters absolves one of defunding Planned Parenthood. Even if you’d be happy to have gay people over to dinner, that doesn’t give you a pass to deny them fundamental rights.
The “gay friends” defense is weak, but popular. And Mitt Romney, scrambling to clarify his position on equal rights after President Obama’s endorsement of marriage equality, must be considering it right about now.
Romney has always been careful to stipulate that his various and elusive anti-gay policies have nothing to do with any personal anti-gay animus. This strategy was clear in a 2006 speech to the right-wing Family Research Council, recently unearthed by PFAW’s Right Wing Watch. In it, taking homophobia to a whole new level, the candidate declares that “the price of same-sex marriage is paid by the children” and amazingly asserts that marriage equality is the result of “spreading secular religion and its substitute values.” He then offers a spoon full a sugar with a call for an “outpouring of respect and tolerance for all people” and laughably encourages his listeners to “vigorously protest discrimination and bigotry.”
When President Obama announced last week that he supports marriage equality, Romney responded by repeating his opposition to not only marriage equality but also to civil unions. He then insisted that same-sex couples have the “right” to “have a loving relationship, or even to adopt a child.” The next day, he changed his mind about the adoption part. The day after that, he delivered a commencement address to Liberty University, which bans openly gay students and is allied with some of the most vile anti-gay rhetoric in the Religious Right today.
But none of this wavering matches Romney’s recent, brief hiring of an openly gay staffer, foreign policy spokesman Richard Grenell. A Republican adviser told the New York Times after Grenell was forced out of Romney’s campaign, “It’s not that the campaign cared whether Ric Grenell was gay. They believed this was a nonissue. But they didn’t want to confront the religious right.” Increasingly, when it comes to choosing between basic dignity and futile attempts to appease the far right, the mainstream GOP has been choosing the far right.
Unfortunately for Romney, the Religious Right, the object of his caving, isn’t buying his frantic attempts to pander. The most outspoken critic of Romney’s decision to hire Grenell quickly, the American Family Association’s Bryan Fischer, became the most outspoken critic of the decision to fire him. “How is he going to stand up to North Korea if he can be pushed around by a yokel like me?” Fischer demanded.
It has to give at least some Republicans pause that the far right has become so extreme, and Republican leaders have become so subservient to their demands, that it is now not even possible to have any gay people work for a GOP campaign.
But soon Mitt Romney will tell us that he has gay friends.
By: MIchael B. Keegan, The Huffington Post, may 15, 2012
“Right Wing Opportunists”: Anti-Mormon Attacks Aren’t Coming From the Left
Utah Sen. Orrin Hatch made headlines yesterday when he claimed that Democrats will “smear” Mitt Romney for his Mormon faith during the general election.
Hatch’s claim is ridiculous. In fact, it is right-wing politicians and pundits who keep on “warning” us that Democrats will attack Romney’s faith — and then use those “warnings” as opportunities to slam Mormonism themselves.
The American Family Association’s Bryan Fischer, like others on the Religious Right, has continually attacked Mormons, even going so far as to say their faith shouldn’t be protected by the First Amendment and claiming that a Mormon president would threaten the “spiritual health” of the nation. But Fischer warned in a column yesterday that the “the out-of-the-mainstream media” will attack “every unusual thing Mormons have ever believed or done” — helpfully listing a litany of things he deems “unusual” about Mormonism.
The Southern Baptist Convention’s Richard Land has likewise claimed that progressives will make Romney’s faith a campaign issue — while he himself insists that Mormonism is “technically… a cult.”
The Christian Broadcasting Network’s David Brody used the same tactic this week when he posted a video of a Ron Paul supporter grilling Romney on quotes from Mormon scripture — and then claiming that Democrats and liberals will be the ones to attack Romney’s faith.
The Values Voter Summit, the Religious Right’s marquee event, fell apart last year after the pastor who introduced Gov. Rick Perry repeated his claims that Mormonism is a “cult” that worships a “false god.”
Meanwhile, one of the most powerful Democrats in the country, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, hasn’t been held back by any progressive backlash to his Mormon faith.
Romney is receiving attacks on his faith. But, as much as the right-wing media is trying to spin it otherwise, those attacks are not coming from progressives.
By: Michael B. Keegan, The Huffington Post, April 5, 2012
“Beyond The Fanatical Fringe”: What Rick Santorum’s America Would Look Like?
Rick Santorum, the culture warrior who lost his Senate seat in 2006, is polling within striking distance of Mitt Romneyin Michigan and Arizona, where Republican primaries will be held Tuesday. His unabashed use of his traditionalist faith in politicking and policymaking has been gaining popularity. What ifhe wins the nomination — and then the White House?What would life look like in Santorum’s America? How religious would his presidency be? Here, the author imagines what President Santorum would tell his key constituency — religious conservatives — as he ran for reelection four years from now.
Thank you. Thank you very much for that kind introduction. As Tony mentioned, I am the only sitting president to address the Values Voter Summit, something I have done each year since I took office in 2013. I’m here today, and have been to every Values Voter Summit, because I, like you, am a values voter.
Four years ago, liberal elites said I couldn’t win. They said I talked about my faith and about social issues too much. Some even called me a bigot. They said someone like me, someone whose views were so “extreme” on matters of life, marriage and family, could not win the presidency. Well, we proved them wrong.
Because of our values, we never gave up, and under my administration we have finally defunded Planned Parenthood. No longer will your tax dollars support that abortion mill or any programs that indoctrinate young girls to be sexual libertines — programs that say, “Here’s a pill, go ahead, have fun, it’s all about pleasure.” We said no — the government cannot force us to use our tax dollars to support unnatural acts. Now that money goes to pregnancy care centers, which help mothers rather than telling them to abort their babies.
One of my first acts as president was the creation of the Presidential Commission on Religious Liberty. Since its inception in early March 2013, the commission has investigated 249 instances of infringement of Americans’ religious freedom. Its quarterly public hearings, led by Chairman Maggie Gallagher and streamed live on the commission’s Web site, have served to educate Americans about the daily oppression of our faith, in the name of tolerance, by government and individuals.
Because of the brave stands religious leaders took across the country, we stopped the Obama birth control and morning-after abortion pill mandate in its tracks. Gone. We drew a line in the sand and created a conscience exemption for religious business owners and institutions to opt out of Obamacare entirely, thanks be to God. It’s because of our values that we came close — this close! — to repealing that abominable experiment in government playing God altogether. You — we — stand in the gap, reminding Americans that our rights come from natural law, not from the government.
We have accomplished much, but there is still much to do. We have gathered support for the Dignity of the Preborn Person Act, which, if passed, would recognize in civil law what we know to be true as a matter of God’s law: that every human life, at every stage, deserves protection. This bill ensures that each life, from the moment of conception, is entitled to the rights guaranteed by the 14th Amendment to the Constitution. When that bill becomes law, unborn persons will no longer be denied their personhood, their God-given rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.
To promote families, the foundation of our society and our economy, my administration has taken several steps: We have increased funding to the Healthy Marriage Initiative and the responsible-fatherhood project through the Department of Health and Human Services. We’ve reinstated funding for abstinence-education programs. We’ve broken down barriers left in place by my predecessor to faith-based organizations receiving funding under these programs. My Justice Department, unlike that of my predecessor, is dedicated to defending the Defense of Marriage Act in court, and my solicitor general will do so vigorously when the current challenge reaches the Supreme Court of the United States.
To unleash the innovations that make America great, we continue to push for repeal of the laws and regulations that stifle economic growth: Obamacare, Dodd-Frank financial reform, the Sarbanes-Oxley accounting rules. Lifting the yoke of all those regulations, along with securing our borders from illegal immigration, will both create and protect jobs for America’s workers. We’ve eliminated my predecessor’s boondoggles at the EPA and Department of Energy — promoting “green” energy and “green” jobs — and instead are tapping into the great natural resources we already know exist: oil, natural gas, coal and nuclear energy. We’ve gotten rid of wasteful, endless bureaucratic study of global warming and have placed America on the road to energy independence, freeing us from relying on sources of energy from America’s enemies.
We fight many battles here at home, but there are other battles, too, against Islamic extremists who have their sights on America, on Israel and on Western civilization — Christendom itself. I rejected my predecessor’s dangerous appeasement policy and launched our air campaign against Iran’s nuclear sites, which will continue until we ensure that this existential threat to Israel and America is annihilated.
These battles overseas are just one front in the fight against Islamic radicalism. Nothing short of the Judeo-Christian foundation of our nation is at risk. That’s why I support the Defend the American Constitution Act, which would bar federal courts from acknowledging or relying on sharia law.
Friends, when I was first elected four years ago, the very core of what makes our nation great — our faith — was under assault. While the economy was unraveling under the weight of regulations and oppressive government mandates, that election wasn’t about the economy. It was about something far more fundamental than job creation and tax rates — although those things are of course important. What changed the course of the campaign and made Barack Obama a one-term president was that voters saw through the haze of feel-good Christianity and realized that we teetered on the brink. The government of the New Deal, Great Society and Obamacare was on the verge of implementing its final offensive against our most fundamental freedoms. It had become abundantly clear that if we did not stand up for our faith, we would end up sitting in the back of the bus.
After nearly four years in office, we are going in the right direction, but there is still much work to do. We must keep the White House and the House of Representatives and, crucially, regain control of the Senate, which we won in 2012 but lost in 2014. If you want Supreme Court justices who are constitutionalists, who believe that the abomination of same-sex “marriage” must be stopped before it destroys us, who believe that the “right to privacy” and “separation of church and state” were pulled out of thin air by activist judges, we need a filibuster-proof majority in the Senate.
When you vote this November, remember you are not just voting for Rick Santorum, but for the Senate and House as well. You can and you must vote your faith — or risk losing America as we know it.
By: Sarah Posner, The Washington Post, February 24, 2012
Of “Phony Theology”: The Conservative Intra-Christian War
As Adele Stan noted in this space yesterday, Rick Santorum reached a new summit Saturday in his efforts to paint the president and “liberals” generally as secularist enemies of Christianity. In a speech at a luncheon sponsored by the Ohio Christian Alliance (successor to the Ohio branch of the Christian Coalition), Santorum used an interesting phrase to describe Obama’s belief-system:
Obama’s agenda is “not about you. It’s not about your quality of life. It’s not about your jobs. It’s about some phony ideal. Some phony theology. Oh, not a theology based on the Bible. A different theology,” Santorum told supporters of the conservative Tea Party movement at a Columbus hotel.
Some observers immediately connected these comments to the widespread myth among Obama-haters that the president is actually a Muslim.
Thus, when Santorum, under questioning about these remarks, said “If the president says he’s a Christian, he’s a Christian,” it probably looked to some as though he was backing down a bit from the thrust of his attacks.
I don’t think so.
As I noted in a post last week that has drawn some fire from conservative bloggers, Santorum is on record identifying with the fairly common fundamentalist belief (shared by some “traditionalist” Catholics and even by secular commentators) that mainline or “liberal” Protestants have largely abandoned Christianity for man-made idols. To use Santorum’s own phrase for Obama, many conservative Christians think mainliners maintain a theology that is “not a theology based on the Bible,” but on the nefarious beliefs of such neo-pagans as the “radical environmentalists” who don’t understand God gave dominion over nature to man for his enjoyment and exploitation.
In other words, Santorum’s dog-whistle is aimed not so much at people who ignorantly believe Obama is a secret Muslim, but at people who look at Episcopalians and Presbyterians and Methodists and Congregationalists (Obama’s own denominational background) and see infidels who don’t understand that “true” Christianity requires hard-core opposition to abortion and same-sex marriage, or for that matter, environmentalism, feminism, and other departures from nineteenth century American mores. Indeed, in the 2008 Ave Maria University speech I wrote about the other day, Santorum described mainline Protestants as people who had, sadly, gone over to the enemy camp in a “spiritual war” between God and Satan.
As a Roman Catholic, of course, Rick Santorum doesn’t follow a theology that is based strictly on the Bible, either, but on centuries of (selectively applied) Church teachings that happen to coincide with those of conservative evangelical Protestants. Catholic “traditionalists” are engaged in their own parallel war with “liberal Catholics” whom they accuse of “betraying” their Church by supporting legalized contraception and/or abortion or same-sex marriage or the ordination of women.
The political alliance of Protestant fundamentalists and Catholic “traditionalists” has become a familiar part of the landscape in this country, odd as it may seem to old-timers who remember the conservative Protestant hostility to JFK’s presidential candidacy on grounds that no Catholic could conscientiously support strict separation of church and state (a position conservative evangelicals have themselves now emphatically abandoned.) But it’s important to understand that all the thundering about “secularism” we hear from the religio-political Right these days represents in no small part an intra-Christian civil war by conservatives on those in every faith tradition who do not accept their elevation of “traditional” cultural values to the level of religious absolutes.
By: Ed Kilgore, Contributing Writer, Washington Monthly Political Animal, February 20, 2012
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