Log Cabin, Karl Rove and Gay Marriage
Just over two months ago, I noted how Log Cabin’s reaction to the Massachusetts’ legislature’s decision to block a referendum on gay marriage echoed those of the other gay groups. Log Cabin seems so eager to be liked by the national gay groups that I have dubbed them Sally Field Republicans.
Last week, with the president announcing the retirement of Karl Rove, we saw this once again. Log Cabin’s leadership criticized this Republican political strategist’s record in terms nearly identical to those of the leaders of left-wing gay organizations.
Human Rights Campaign (HRC) President Joe Solmonese told the Washington Blade:
Karl Rove perfected the political strategy of distort and divide and too often the lives of gay Americans were used as fodder for that strategy. . . . . Rove earned his legacy as a hero of the anti-equality, anti-gay right wing, and will forever be remembered for that.
Echoing Solmonese’s remarks, Log Cabin president Patrick Sammon said:
It’s disappointing and unfortunate that Karl Rove pursued the strategy he did in 2004. . . . He went down that course and divided the country and it was a mistake, and I think history will judge him harshly because of it.
While the latter’s rhetoric wasn’t nearly as mean-spirited as those of the HRC chief, his reaction was nearly identical.
It seems sometimes that the leaders of gay organizations, just like their counterparts in the Democratic party and liberal punditry, blame all manner of ills on Rove (when they’re not blaming them on his soon-to-be former boss). Were it not for his diabolical machinations, they claim, the marriage initiatives would not have appeared on state ballots in 2004.
Yet, while there is some evidence that Rove was not averse to using the initiatives (once on state ballots) to drive evangelical turnout (even if that doesn’t seem to have increased the president’s margin in 2004), there is no evidence he was responsible for putting these pernicious proposals on state ballots.
It’s absurd to blame Rove for using this issue to divide the country. It was not Rove who created the division, but those who would use the courts to decide an issue without giving the people a say in the matter.
Those who pin the blame on Rove for spearheading these initiatives ignore the reality of the grass-roots efforts to put them on state ballots — and the margins by which they passed, even Oregon and Michigan, margins which, in 2004, exceeded the president’s own margin of victory in every state where they appeared on the ballot.
No, Rove did not use gay marriage to divide the country. The issue was already dividing the country. To be sure, we can (and should) criticize him for exploiting that division. And fault the president and other leading politicians for failing to promote a strategy to heal the divisions, addressing both the need to recognize same-sex unions as well as the concerns of the opponents of gay marriage.
AndI fault Log Cabin for not understanding why the very issue of gay marriage divides the country and for repeating the left-wing mantras about Karl Rove, exaggerating his role in the issue as if it were his primary focus in the 2004 campaign. (I just don’t think that Rove spent too much time on the gay marriage issue, except to acknowledge that it was one issue which fired up evangelicals who tend to turn out in large numbers for the GOP.)
It says something about Log Cabin that they would buy into these mantras about one of the most successful Republican strategists of the past twenty years. As if they don’t appreciate his efforts to help build the GOP.
While the results of the 2006 election indicate that Rove, in Michael Barone’s words, “failed to create the enduring Republican majority he hoped for,” he was not entirely responsible. Congressional Republicans became complacent in 2005 and 2006 and largely abandoned the small government principles which helped them gain the majority in 1994 and secure it in subsequent elections. Karl Rove played a key part in helping the GOP hold its majority in the first elections of this century.
Let us hope that even while faulting Rove for his (limited) involvement in the passage of the marriage initiatives in 2004 Log Cabin’s leaders will at least acknowledge, as does Barone, his accomplishments. For his strategy did deliver Republican majorities against a hostile media and an energized Democratic base.
Republicans should be grateful to Rove for helping us keep our majorities for as long as we did. But, I wonder if we we can blame that savvy strategist for their failure to use that electoral success to govern like conservatives.
- B. Daniel Blatt (GayPatriotWest@aol.com)
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OT but since the homo-hating mullahs in Iran are a frequent topic here, perhaps you’d all like to take some action to save a gay Iranians life.
Comment by Ian S — August 21, 2007 @ 8:11 pm - August 21, 2007
I refer to it as the ‘Mary Todd Lincoln Brigade’. When Bill Weld became Governor of Massachusetts there was a patronage parade of gay Democrats that hustled their asses (literally) over to the GOP as add-water’nstir Republicans and became Log Carabinieri. About ten percent are still GOP. It was purely mercenary. So, now they’re people pleasing.
Comment by Shawmut — August 21, 2007 @ 9:29 pm - August 21, 2007
I’d heard that too Shawmut–and from a number of sources.
Comment by GayPatriotWest — August 21, 2007 @ 9:46 pm - August 21, 2007
[...] Original post by GayPatriotWest [...]
Pingback by Politics: 2008 HQ » Blog Archive » Log Cabin, Karl Rove and Gay Marriage — August 21, 2007 @ 10:04 pm - August 21, 2007
Say Dan, did you get your Lobsters & Leaves email from LC?
I got news for you. I could go there by myself cheaper than $800 and probably do more.
Comment by ThatGayConservative — August 22, 2007 @ 3:58 am - August 22, 2007
…sorry, it just bears repeating
Comment by Will (American Elephant) — August 22, 2007 @ 4:47 am - August 22, 2007
So you’re saying the ends justify the means and it’s ok to “exploit” gay marriage so long as it gives us a temporary majority at the cost of long term real success as a party. Only when we acknowledge that the outcome (total acceptance of gays) is a foregone conclusion will we get the Party to abandon the losing strategy of gay bashing. Looks like Sammon has the right logn term strategy while you come across as the worst of apologists, a sin as great as the one you accuse Sammon of.
Comment by Questioning — August 22, 2007 @ 11:00 am - August 22, 2007
Only when we acknowledge that the outcome (total acceptance of gays) is a foregone conclusion will we get the Party to abandon the losing strategy of gay bashing.
The total acceptance of gays is a foregone conclusion? How is this conclusion to be accomplished — by the magic of legislation? How is this acceptance to be enforced if the conclusion isn’t quite total enough? Is resistance to gay marriage an example of ‘gay-bashing’ by definition, specifically your definition? Further, is a party’s winning strategy to simply promote any social trend from any quarter, particularly if we can describe disagreement with it as ‘bashing’? In your view, are the advantages of (ostensible) Republican policies such as free markets, strong defense, etc. dwarfed by your gay litany, thus rendering any exploitation of resistance to it (real or imagined) tantamount to Cardinal Sin?
Comment by HardHobbit — August 22, 2007 @ 11:51 am - August 22, 2007
I got the LCR invite to Leaves & Lobsters. $800 includes three nights of booze, two nights of food, a boat trip and lunch in Kennebunkport, and three nights lodging… tax included. You might be able to do marginally better by yourself, but you would be by yourself! I’d rather hang out with other people, and so what if that costs me an extra hundred dollars. besides, they clearly called it a fundraiser.
Comment by Texan70 — August 22, 2007 @ 12:03 pm - August 22, 2007
So you’re saying the ends justify the means and it’s ok to “exploit” gay marriage so long as it gives us a temporary majority at the cost of long term real success as a party.
Why not? HRC and the DNC did.
I no longer tolerate lectures from Democrat gays over this. Period.
Comment by North Dallas Thirty — August 22, 2007 @ 1:20 pm - August 22, 2007
I’m for civil marriage for same-sex couples because I’m for equality!
Comment by Paul — August 22, 2007 @ 1:58 pm - August 22, 2007
OT: Nutroots Declare War on Moderate Democrats. This should be good news for the GOP, if the Nutroots manage to damage enough moderate Democrats in purple-red congressional districts.
Comment by V the K — August 22, 2007 @ 3:26 pm - August 22, 2007
V, it says “We’ve been working to identify the group of conservative Democrats in the House who are holding back progressives from being able to effectively govern.”
…Too… many…. jokes… arriving in head… at once…
Comment by ILoveCapitalism — August 22, 2007 @ 4:13 pm - August 22, 2007
No, Questioning, I never said it was okay to exploit gay marriage for creating a temporary majority. And given the intransigence of social conservative whose support is essential to GOP success in the current climate, I don’t think total acceptance of gays will be a winning strategy for the party.
I merely think that a libertarian approach is the best strategy — not only politically, but also socially. It won’t piss off the far right and will let the marketplace do what it has been doing, with private businesses becoming increasing gay-friendly.
Comment by GayPatriotWest — August 22, 2007 @ 4:30 pm - August 22, 2007
No, the problem is that a party that does not believe in government can not effectively run the government. Putting a Republican in charge of the government is like choosing a vegan to be CEO of Ruth’s Chris Steakhouse.
Comment by Chase — August 23, 2007 @ 12:24 am - August 23, 2007
The idea that disagreeing with gay-leftist orthodoxy is “exploitation” or “gay-bashing” is both ignorant and Stalinist: “You disagree with me, therefore your motives are nefarious.”
The reason gay marriage has been on the ballot is pure and simple: a large majority of Americans think marriage is a very important institution and care passionately about it–and a handful of activists are abusing the courts to try to force unwanted changes to it down their throats.
That most Republicans agree with the majority of Americans is neither “exploitative” nor “gay-bashing”–it’s probable.
Comment by Will (American Elephant) — August 23, 2007 @ 12:32 am - August 23, 2007
So using the courts to receive justice and equality is a bad thing? I have never understood why people think that someone elses marriage is a matter for the ballot or even public debate. What people do not understand is that when we put issues, such as marriage, on the ballot it opens the doors to putting anything on the ballot. Why not put religious freedom or gas prices on the ballot?
Comment by Matthew — August 23, 2007 @ 6:41 am - August 23, 2007
Well Matthew, because religious freedoms are guaranteed in the Constitution, but the Constitution is silent on marriage. We could put gas prices on the ballot, and then we could have a vigorous and educational public debate on the matter.
Rule by judicial fiat silences public debate. Marriage is not a fundamental human right, it is a social construct. So, defining marriage in a free society should be a matter of public consensus, not judicial dictate.
Comment by V the K — August 23, 2007 @ 9:33 am - August 23, 2007
First – Because we are winning the war of opinion, we are destined to win the battle. The polls and life exprience show people are moving to our side. Which I agree comes from the free market. But the point is to now point out to the Party that they are on the wrong side of the issue so they should simply shut up about it, not that I am saying they should become advocates. That is tactical strategy to win elections again.
Second – Marriage ended up on the ballot because people do what they normally do when faced with something new and seemingly scary. They freaked. Now, they have become more used to the idea and things are changing slowly. The last round of ballot measures either won with fewer yes votes or were defeated such as AZ. The nature of being conservative is NOT that we don’t get there, but that it takes longer to adjust to ensure that we don’t lose the best of our values and traditions. But that means we engage people to talk about this for the good of everyone, including social conservatives, not sit back and do nothing because it may piss them off. They came to OUR party after they were disappointed with Jimmy Carter. They fought and kicked and screamed to get us to accept their morale activism when we were content to leave that to the churches. They were hardly shy about it and so neither should we be. I’m not afraid to talk to them about these issues, why are you? The point is to talk about these issues as conservatives, not to not talk about them at all because it seems to be the same thing HRC is doing. It’s the HOW, not the WHAT.
Comment by Questioning — August 23, 2007 @ 10:51 am - August 23, 2007
“But the point is to now point out to the Party that they are on the wrong side of the issue so they should simply shut up about it…”
“But that means we engage people to talk about this for the good of everyone, including social conservatives, not sit back and do nothing…”
No response necessary.
Comment by HardHobbit — August 23, 2007 @ 11:29 am - August 23, 2007
Meaning… talk to conservatives in “private” to help explain the issues to them but have the party platform and candidate speeches silent about them if necessary in public for those who are already on our side such as the independents for purposes of elections. I can see why this task is so hard when people are being intentionally or unintentionally so obtuse on things like this…
Comment by Questioning — August 23, 2007 @ 12:46 pm - August 23, 2007
Shorter version: The homos should just leave the country so Rove and friends can live tax free.
Comment by sean — August 24, 2007 @ 3:26 am - August 24, 2007
I’ve gotten first hand information from those who have heard Rove speak at conservative gatherings, that he was pushing people to make the gay marriage issue a big issue in 2004 – this is part of his record, and Log Cabin is absolutely right about this – the record is despicable.
Comment by Eva Young — August 25, 2007 @ 9:37 pm - August 25, 2007
NDT, Hillary Rosen is a low bar. Thanks for the tip on her contribution to Harold Ford. After he lost, I sent him a note telling him I was happy he lost.
Comment by Eva Young — August 25, 2007 @ 9:42 pm - August 25, 2007