GayPatriot

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Andrew Sullivan–Appeasing those Who Once Reviled Him?

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After Jonah Goldberg first wondered on National Review Online’s the Corner about a quote that Andrew Sullivan featured as the “quote of the day” on his blog, he and Ramesh Ponnuru have had an interesting exchange on Andrew’s political identity and attitude. The quote from Glenn Greenwald includes this line:

Now, in order to be considered a “liberal,” only one thing is required – a failure to pledge blind loyalty to George W. Bush. The minute one criticizes him is the minute that one becomes a “liberal,” regardless of the ground on which the criticism is based.

Jonah defies either of them (Greenwald or Sullivan) “to attempt to demonstrate this assertion factually.” By this standard, I’m a liberal since I think the president was wrong to back the FMA, has not done enough to hold the line on federal spending and has failed to follow the Gipper’s vision of federalism. This quote is thus a silly assertion. Every conservative blogs and editorial page I read regularly has criticized the president at least once, most having done so on numerous occasions.

Despite such criticisms, Jonah observes that no one of “any substance or prominence on the Right” has labeled such conservative voices liberal. Indeed, Jonah finds that the opposite to Greenwald’s claim is “far closer to the truth. So long as you hate Bush or attack him, you’re basically ok in the eyes of liberals.” Jonah offers more thoughts here while Ramesh questions Andrew’s conservative credentials in the 1990s. Jonah then notes “the perplexing drift of [Andrew’s] rhetoric and his thinking over the last few years, at least as evidenced in his blog.” Ramesh contends Andrews “tries to have it every which way” and offers additional thoughts here. Finally, Ramesh notes that Andrew took issue with him, with the latter claiming to have “risked something for my conservative ideals–friends and some colleagues, estrangement from the gay establishment, and even my job. . ..”

Andrew does raise a valid point. We gay conservatives know all too well the consequences of coming out politically to our gay peers. We have lost dates, not been invited to parties and often insulted to our faces. Perhaps Andrew grew tired of the “shunning” that occurs when a gay man identifies himself as conservative. And given what he experienced in the 1990s, he would have good reason. Just search the gay media from the early 1990s until 2004 for references to Andrew Sullivan and you’ll find an extremely large number to be negative, with some screeds anticipating the kind of unhinged rhetoric the angry left today spews forth regularly (and which Michelle Malkin highlights in her book). That’s just what he’s endured in print. I’ve heard stories of things he experienced in person, the least of which is having drinks thrown on him.

It seems, however, that since 02/24/04 (the day the president announced his support for the Federal Marriage Amendment) Andrew has been bending over backwards to appease those who once reviled him. Even though I agree with Andrew that the president was wrong to support that bill, I resumed supporting him (after writing in Rudy Giuliani for President in the California primary) because John Kerry never impressed me as being capable of leading the War on Terror — while straying even farther than President Bush from the vision of Ronald Reagan.

Were Andrew to have held true to conservative ideals in 2004, he would have, as did many conservatives not entirely happy with President Bush, recognized that one cannot support a presidential candidate’s ever policy and likely backed the incumbent (despite his differences with him on a number of issues). Given the angry attitude of many gays, particularly the gay establishment, toward President Bush, Andrew’s support for this “demon” of the gay left would have been a sign of conservative integrity.

His perplexing politics in 2004, however, do not show much commitment to conservative principles. While claiming to be a fan of Ronald Reagan, Andrew endorsed for president that year a man who had called the Gipper’s administration an era of “moral darkness.”

Jonah was right to question Andrew’s use of the Greenwald quotation. It shows how eager this one-time conservative is to label Bush-supporters as blind followers of the president. At the same time, it seems that Andrew has become ever eager to join a crowd which finds fault with the president’s every action. He accuses us of being blind followers; he is increasingly becoming a blind opponent. As I’ve written before, I once enjoyed Andrew’s blog because (at least when I read it) he offered both praise and criticism of the president. Now he’s short on the praise and long on the criticism.

Now, whenever I check out Andrew’s blog, he seems to be, albeit with greater eloquence and wit than most, parroting the latest talking points of the DailyKos. It’s too bad because as perhaps the first gay conservative to gain prominence, he was a pioneer who made the path easier for many, including your humble bloggers here. He once showed great courage in articulating his beliefs in environments hostile to his ideas. He offered a unique point of view, often with profound insight into the issues of the day. And he endured unwarranted slights from those unwilling to argue with his positions.

It’s too bad that his latest rhetoric increasingly resembles that of those who once slighted him so unfairly.

-Dan (AKA GayPatriotWest): GayPatriotWest@aol.com

UPDATE: Glenn Reynolds (AKA Instapundit) has a great post with a variety of perspectives on the Greenwald/Sullivan claim that “Bush-loyalty is the ne plus ultra of the right.”

Comments

  1. By publishing the Greenwald quote, Andrianna Sullington gets a two-fer: Playing up his own martyr complex (“Oh, look at me. Look at what I have to endure in the name of my principles“) and back-handing people who question whether a guy who endorsed John Kerry in 2004, supports massive tax-increases, supports court control of social institutions, makes support for liberating Iraq contingent on the president’s support of same-sex marriage, publishes flamingly obvious anti-Bush Moby emails on his blog, thinks the Catholic Church should endorse a lifestyle of multiple partners and “circuit parties,” and thinks making terrorists uncomfortable in any way equates to “torture” can really be called a conservative.

    I used to exchange emails with Andrianna, but I stopped reading his blog a long time ago. I can’t remember the date, but I remember the day quite well. He put a link to DailyKos in the Daily Dish saying “check out this interview with Wonkette.” It was the exact same day Kos posted his infamous “Screw ‘Em!” post (referring to dead Americans butchered by insurgents). I was so horrified that Sully never commented on what Kos said that I never went back to his blog after that.

    But the guy still has entertainment value. Andrew Sullivan jokes have become a staple at my blog.

  2. Also, as I recall it, those of us who criticized Bush’s pick of Harriet Miers for SCOTUS weren’t called liberals, we were called fanatical right-wing fascists. But, I guess that doesn’t fit in too well with the “blind loyalty to Bush” canard Sully and the left are pushing.

  3. Oh, and one more thing.

    It seems, however, that since 02/24/04 … Andrew has been bending over backwards to appease those who once reviled him.

    Some of us really didn’t need that particular imagery before breakfast.

  7. That’s great… “We Are All Liberals Now” 🙂

    In my case, I actually was a fairly big liberal (by most normal people’s standards) until just a few years ago, but I was supposed to have gone over to the Dark Side! Nice to wake up this morning and find I haven’t! I really criticize Bush, so I’M A LIBERAL, YEE-HAW!!! 🙂

    Hint of the Day for Jeremy: Nothing makes an attempted zinger fall flat like your having to qualify or apologize for it 2 lines later.

  8. Wait, Andrew Sullivan is REAL?

    You gotta be kidding?

    I thought he was just a foil for some great puns and slams at VdaK’s site. He actually lives? He’s been lampooned into such a buffoon, what a hoot that guy must be at a party… I wanna go to the next one just to watch!

    Andrew Sullivan IS real; God, this world never fails to amaze.

  9. Nothing makes an attempted zinger fall flat like your having to qualify or apologize for it 2 lines later.

    Zing!

    And, yes, Matt. There is a St. Andrew of Our Lady of Perpetual Hissy Fits. The only person cited by name in my blog’s disclaimer.

  11. Glenn Greenwald includes this line:

    Now, in order to be considered a “liberal,” only one thing is required – a failure to pledge blind loyalty to George W. Bush. The minute one criticizes him is the minute that one becomes a “liberal,” regardless of the ground on which the criticism is based.

    Golly, I thought for sure Greenwald had Gay Patriot in mind when writing that. It’s everyones’ ad hominem de jure.

  13. I used to read Andrew but like rightwingprof above realized long ago that Andrew was a UK/European conservative. Which is the same as saying he is a Democrat. A couple more years of Bush and Andrew will become a true socialist.
    DKK

  14. And for an Andrew drinking game, you’d chug a beer every time he accuses somebody else of homophobia or “having issues around gay men”.

    Ooops, you might get alcohol poisoning.

  16. Jeremy, if you wish to reduce my disagreements with Andrew to jealousy, you clearly have not read my post. He and I have entirely different writing styles, so I don’t presume to compare my writing to his. Even in that post, where I am critical of Andrew, I acknowledge his gifts as a writer. And have praised those skills previously on this blog.

  17. He and I have entirely different writing styles

    That’s true, GPW. Your writing style seems entirely devoid of over-the-top emotionalism and self-righteous preening. Obviously, you’ll never compete with Andrianna Sullington.

  21. Andrew is a terrible loss. He did gay righties a huge service for a long time and took pretty nasty heat for it. I will especially remember his debate with uberqueer Richard Goldstein at the New School a few years ago. He wiped the floor with him. I went thru a period of feeling very angry at Sullivan after he jumped ship and threw his support to Kerry. Whereas I once read him avidly, in his post-Kerry-for-prez mold of perseverating hysterical moralism (all too reminiscent of the MSM), I find him unreadable. As pissed off as I am at him, and remain so, basically he makes me sad.

  22. #22 – Yes – They’ve changed the definition now – If you tell the truth about somebody, and it reflects poorly on them, it’s not their fault for having done bad things… it’s your fault for “smearing”.

    I wonder if it ultimately comes out of the Left’s version of “self-esteem”, where if you tell the truth about somebody, and it reflects badly on them, you just committed the crime against that person of injuring their alleged self-esteem.

  24. But he used the word “hysterical”.

    That, according to Andrew, in and of itself marks EssEm (and others of us who think Andrew is too hysterical) as homophobes.

    Since we ourselves are gay, that would make us… (drum roll)… self-hating homophobes! Go Andrew!