Yes, and at least twice as effective; Homebrew doubtless pisses off a few (or more) conservatives. You go pissing off people of both major political stripes and those of us who have no fond taste for either party … some of which people (from each of those three groups) still manage to like you but are struggling with it these days.
Only … 67 days left until the election?
The fact of the matter is that the reason she wasn’t on that stage, whether it was her choice or not, was almost certainly that she was gay. The convention featured many anti-gay people on stage, even a self-proclaimed proud homophobe. By all normal proceedure, Mary should have trotted up on stage with the rest and not have had it be an issue.
But there’s a reason Cheney’s wife responds to things like Keyes with “it doesn’t deserve comment” instead of outright “he’s wrong.” And that reason is not likely because she actually thinks Keyes comments are so vile that they deserve no response. It’s because giving any sort of response, in either direction, would be politically and personally dangerous. Both of them have displayed a longtime pattern of carefully couched avoidance of the actual subject of homosexuality. Is it socially dangerous? Can such relationships be part of a good society? Cheney has little problem discussing other social issues at great length. There are certainly many other behaviors and relationships that Cheney DOES think the government should regulate and control. So why is homosexuality different? It’s a question I don’t doubt there are many good, honest answers to, but what is HIS answer to it? Why does the subject always change before we get to that point?
Know what, Pun? I’m like the Amish girl, shrugging her shoulders and chanting, “I don’t care! I don’t care!” I mean, you go on these binges from time to time, where you swoop in out of nowhere (like here, for example), drop your load, and swoop back out, never to be heard from again until the next swoop. You abandon the thread rather than admit any mistake. So, the last time we met, you were already a day late and a dollar short when you declared that you were “still trying to figure out how the bleeding fuck Bush is a liberal”. Rather than examine the responses you’re given, you choose to accumulate your mistakes, pile them on top of one another, and then accost me and tell me how you are struggling to like me. That’s just a decision you have to make for yourself, just like the decision to ignore responses and skim threads. Don’t come to me blackmailing me with this “I won’t like you if you don’t shut up” bullshit.
I don’t think she can “have it” be an issue, can she? I mean, I don’t see her here posting “fact of the matter” stuff about what is “almost certain”. Just because something is an issue with you doesn’t mean it is an issue with everyone.
It might also be because it was not Cheney’s wife who was asked for comment, but Mary’s sister. And what she said was that she wouldnt dignify it with a comment: “I guess I’m surprised, frankly, that you would even repeat the quote, and I’m not going to dignify it with a comment”. It is a universally understood signal that the quote in question is so vile that any comment would lend it undeserved credibility.
I have a deep admiration for Dick Cheney and sympathy for the difficult position that he finds himself in with respect to his role in the government, his party and his family. Unlike most of us here, he is a person of great accomplishments and has earned great respect amongst his peers.
Many of us have grown up with homophobia. And some of us have had to confront our homophobia in full blown adulthood when the revelation that a loved one is gay is revealed. Some of us react with revulsion leading to rejection, some of react with embarrassment leading to denial, and some of react by attempting to understand and accept. Dick Cheney is of the latter persuasion.
Dick Cheney’s heart and soul remains with the overall temper of the Republican party. Like Schwartznegger, McCain, Juliani, etc. he’s had to accept the fact that his views on one particular issue is not accepted by the majority. But Cheney is a team player and you won’t find him sacrificing his important role as vice-president for one social issue by acting and speaking in a manner that will only alienate his colleagues and not advance the particular agenda.
His relationship with his openly gay daughter speaks volumes. His daughter’s political support is extremely telling. This man is advancing the cause of gays amongst conservatives by his very actions. He treads the thin line maintaining political support while anguishing the homophobes who like him but have trouble with his position and his relationship with his daughter.
You may have disagreement with Cheney on a variety of issues, but I would say that Cheney will have done more to advance the cause of gays by virtue of how he’s reacted to his daughter’s homosexuality than anything I’ve seen or heard amongst the major politicians in the US today.
I’m sure the $100K/year job with his campaign helps that bitter pill go down, too. Or the appointment (later resigned) to the Republican Unity Coalition leadership. The RUC was formed because the Log Cabin Republicans were getting just a little too uppity.
I’m not sure I agree with everything you have said here, grienspace, but let me compliment you on a brilliant and nuanced analysis of a man facing a major antinomy and dealing with the dilemmas as best he can.
Oh good grief. Why wasn’t she on that stage? Vertigo? It’s an issue because she’s dyke and religious conservatives would freak. Are you really suggesting that it’s NOT an issue for Republicans at that convention? Why were so many prominent homophobes featured, or was it repeated over and over that gay unions threaten normal families without actually coming out and saying it?
Touche, but it’s exact the same dance, same pattern. Both Cheneys expound at length on other social issues. Cheney stakes out positions as to how the government should interefere. Yet on an issue that happens to personally affect his family, he gets granted a special exemption both from the moral conventions of his party and from having to explain his justification for the exemption. Would that other could magically grant themselves such an exemption free from criticism or explanation.
As I made perfectly obvious, I understand the signal. In fact, my criticism rested on it. It’s ALSO a means to sound like you are disagreeing with something without actually coming out and stating any direct, quotable disagreement. “So, do you know Jesus, Peter?” “I’m, frankly, surprised you would ask me that! I’m not even going to dignify it with a comment.”
I apologize, Lib, for not having seen that. I will save my question to you on the difference, as you see it (that comment not meant to insult but to say to you that while anyone else might well be able to give me an answer, I’m interested in your perspective since you’re the one who made the distinction), between a vanilla liberal and a Rawlsian liberal for a time when general board activity is not so divisive. I can’t promise I’ll remember.
As for my inactivity following that post, I can only tell you that I do not check back on every thread to which I post (one particular in Cafe Society being a rather glaring exception:-D). I meant to check it at least once, but we both know about wishes and horses.
I’m sorry that’s how you see things. I don’t, but perhaps a recognition of impasse is best for now. At a future date, I hope we will again come to a place similar to where we have been in the past. May God go with you.
Apology accepted. Let us leave old things behind.
And with you. I came into this thread seeking no enmity, but merely to defend a woman whose mind no one can read.
You don’t know and can’t know. End of story.
Bach’s Minuet in G is the exact same dance and pattern as the Toys’ A Lover’s Concerto. So what?
That makes no sense, but it would be a perfect answer to the question, “Do you think Jesus is a selfish hedonist?”. Especially since Liz Cheney was described as “appalled” by the question. You’re trawling for shrimp in a bathtub.
Is Mary Cheney still working for the Bush campaign, like she was in 2000? If she isn’t, that would lead me to suspect that it was as much her decision not to be on stage as anyone else’s.
I’m sure that, like any good father, he just wanted to spare her the embarassment of being booed offstage by the bigots and imbeciles whose hate he hopes to inflame as a means for personal political gain.
Sorry, but in the universe we live in, we are allowed to draw assumptions about fairly conspicuous abscences. If Mary Cheney wasn’t on the stage (without or without her partner) because she’s a dyke at a convention whose featured dignitaries included homophobes who assert that gays want to kill our children and fighting gay marriage is akin to fighting Nazism, then why wasn’t she on the stage? You can yell about her reasons being personal all you want: what other personal reasons could there possibly have been?
So avoiding my point whenever necessary. The Cheney’s do not ever directly address the issue of homosexuality as a social issue directly. This is habitual and abberant.
Uh, sure it does. Allows Peter to avoid the question without actually having to deny anything outright and get called on it. Peter too could act “appalled” that anyone asked him the question. He could even be sincerely appalled that anyone would suggest that he DIDN’T know Jesus. But the fact of the matter is that he would be able to avoid actually confessing to knowing Jesus. In a situation in which someone is basically presenting a major test of loyalty and friendship, he avoids the question, avoids saying that he knows and believes in Jesus’ mission. Some friend he is.
You are avoiding the point again. The point is that it allows a seeming denial without the actual disagreement which would be incredibly explosive and dangerous. It leaves utterly ambiguous the meaning of the reaction. It prevents one from actually having to address the substance of the attack. The reality is, Keyes is far more clear and consistent about his views on homosexuality than the Cheneys are. Keyes’ views may be wrong IMHO, but they are clear and they make sense. Cheney’s view on homosexuality, whatever it is, is a completely unexplained digression from all his other conservative social views. He normally is quite willing to discuss the impact of certain social behaviors on society. Yet, suddenly, without explanation, homosexuality is exampted from such discussion. Suddenly, the only matter on the table is a matter of legal jurisdiction and an unexplained abberance from the normal willingness of the government to regulate private conduct. But what is the social impact of homosexuality? Are relationships like Mary’s a worthwhile part of society? Can they be part of a good society?
The Cheneys refuse to address or answer such questions, because arguing against that view would ultimately mean arguing against much of their base. Heck, most of the radio preachers out here in the heartland fault Keyes only for lack of discretion, not truth. Keyes’s statements are, in fact, the perfectly logical end of the core set of values and truths that lie behind the very traditional ideal of marriage that the Bush admin and even Cheney regularly defends (the only substantive difference is that Cheney thinks the decision is best made on the state level).
Sorry, but when a party you are a member of features open anti-gay bigots, when that party, whenever the topic of gay marriage comes up, is instructed by talking points to smoothly begin talking about the sad breakdown of the inner-city family (thus blaming homos for that, without coming out and saying it), you don’t get to beg off questions about homosexual partnerships. Especially if you are completely unwilling to extend such “get-out-of-jail-without-explanation” cards to other social issues.
For someone that ripped into Obama for not directly answering a question about Democratic money (jogging the memory he said it was a problem, just as Liz acted insulted by Keyes, but didn’t actually respond as to whether the logic behind the question was sound), this defense is a little hard to believe.
What aggravates me about this whole thing is that if Dick Cheney didn’t have a gay daughter, he’d be pounding the drum in favor of the DOMA as hard as anyone. No, I don’t know this for sure, since there’s no way to, but I feel pretty confident in asserting that the only reason Cheney has deviated even slightly from the party line about this one is personal, not out of some deep well of compassion for and understanding about gays. This is the same phenomenon we see about drugs: people who abuse drugs are bad and should go to prison… except Rush Limbaugh. It’s always different if it’s one of yours.
I don’t know about you guys, but if I was gay and my dad was the VP, I’d want him to come right out and say, “Gay people should have the same rights under the law as straight people. They should be able to enter into civil unions just like anyone else.” Anything less than that is hedging, avoiding, or downplaying, and I’d like to think my father wouldn’t do any of those things on an issue that was so important to me. Clearly Mary can’t expect the same from her parents, and that speaks volumes to me about Cheney’s attitude and the motivation behind the way he talks about homosexuality and public policy.
Maybe grienspace is right and Cheney has advanced the cause of gays, but I don’t know. His support of them has been half-assed at best, and only motivated by personal, familial interests, not some overarching concern for equality for gays. I think that shows and is regarded accordingly. Why don’t the Republicans realize that many people have gay family members, and it tends to make it hard to wholeheartedly support legislation that treats then like second class citizens? Why is only the Republicans who have close family members bother to think this way?
So much for compassionate conservatism.
Sure, you’re allowed to, but a modal possibility is not a deontic obligation. Your assumption is pretty ridiculous, not just because you are privvy to nothing by which to draw a reasonable assumption as I already said, but because your assumption does not reconcile with the fact that both she and her partner did appear on stage in 2000. Your assumption is also vague. You haven’t specified whether she was forbidden to appear or decided not to appear, either way because of her lesbianism. And inasmuch as her father had already expressed unequivocally both his love and support for her as well as his belief that free people ought to be allowed form whatever relationships they please, your theory that he would then deliberately exclude her from his celebration is patently ridiculous. The Cheneys are anything but stupid — Mary has an MBA — and know very well that assumptions could be drawn either way. If you weren’t here bashing them for her not going on stage, you would be here bashing them for making a show out of her presence. In the universe we live in, you are allowed to draw assumptions about fairly conspicuous displays of disingenuousness, and you probably would.
That’s simply not true. “Lynne and I have a gay daughter, so it’s an issue that our family is very familiar with. With respect to the question of relationships, my general view is that freedom means freedom for everybody. People ought to be free to enter into any kind of relationship they want to.”
But that is not analogous to the situation with Liz. Liz was not presented a “major test of loyalty and friendship” — it is her sister for God’s sake. She was presented a quote by a psycho nutjob, which she declined to dignify with a response. The analogy I gave you was better, in which Peter is asked whether Jesus is a selfish hedonist, not whether he knows Jesus. It’s been common knowledge for years that the Cheney clan is very tight-knit. Your attempt to paint Liz as ashamed of Mary is utterly laughable. It is time for you to admit you are wrong.
You know, it is strange that people are insistent on defining this as an all-or-nothing situation. It is quite possible, that like some good conservative Christians I know – and in accord with their public stance – the senior Cheneys may believe that homosexual activity is sinful – and that that belief affects them themselves, not something they feel forced to press on all other people by compulsion of law, including their beloved daughter.
Likewise, we have a few members here who are fairly quiet and reticent – if gay, they are quietly “out” on the boards and to selected friends and/or family, but it’s their personal nature not to make a major issue of it. (That in no way is intended to cast aspersions on the more assertive activists – simply defining what they personally feel comfortable doing, with no intent to put value judgment on it.) Mary is (a) formerly liaison between Coors and the GBLT community, (b) seemingly a fairly quiet person, © loving daughter of a man with a conservative voter base, (d) allegedly his personal campaign manager – I’ve been told this, and am checking into its truth, and (e) faced with the opposite face of the same antinomy as her father – being more outspoken about her personal stance will hurt him politically. So she stays behind the scenes for the most part.
(BTW, I personally think Lynne was engaged in a bit of stonewalling when she “refused to dignify that question” – but things have mellowed out quite a lot more in the last four years.)
A follow-up to the previous post, relative to Mary’s role:
The Seattle Post-Intelligencer says:
(I’ve quoted the entire article, since I feel that every element of it has important things to say to the issue under debate here. Moderators may feel it necessary to snip it, though I was unable to pin down a copyright notice that would preclude the use of the above under fair use in the context of this discussion.)
What the fuck is this “modal possibility is not a deontic obligation” shit? It doesn’t make your ridiculous griping any saner to change “it’s possible, but you don’t know for sure” into “modal possibility is not a deontic obligation.”
It’s perfectly reasonable. To win, Bush needs his gay bashing base far far more this year than last. Why do you think legally unecessary gay marriage bans are going on as many battleground state ballots as possible (and all the big pushes for these are, indeed, only in battleground states)? This is a major issue this year to a degree that it never was last year.
Indeed, but now I’d like you to track down some of the coverage of that event so you can see why this is a moot point.
Geez, you would think given that I said it could be either…
This is nonsense. Cheney has said that people should be free from the government breaking up their relationships: a laughably non-entity rejection of something to abhorrent to ever happen anyway, though how this sqaures with fighting to save the Texas sodomy law is not clear. He has stated that he loves his daughter. But as we all know, love and a willingness to defend homosexuality or treat it as if it were normal are not at all the same thing. The latter is what is at question here.
Ah, I see: so speculating about what you don’t know is allowed only for Liberal!
Happily, I think there are better explanations for your behavior.
Fisk this quote. Cheney is saying, basically, that the government shouldn’t forcibly break apart gay couples: defending free association. But this is not exactly an amazing or exceptional position. I doubt there’s almost ANYONE including his boss, who thinks that right should be taken away from gay couples. And while bland, it’s also vague and contradictory: there are plenty of free associations and behaviors that Cheney et al DO want the government to regulate: including gay sex.
And geez, hows “Jean and I have a gay son, so it’s an issue that our family is very familiar with” for a ringing endorsement of the normalcy of homosexuality or of their loving partnership! An “issue we are familiar with!” God forbid I would ever, ever say something like that about my son.
Keyes’ position is wrong, and Keyes may be a psycho nutjob, but his position is basically a sane and logical conclusion drawn from the traditional values positions that make up the key part of Bush and Cheney’s base: as I said, most think that Keyes was foolish for giving red meat to the queers by attacking the VPs daughter, but they don’t disagree with him.
It would be one thing if this were a one-time refusal to deal with a nutjob. But it is, in fact, just one example in a long pattern of evading the issue. Do Cheney or Liz or Lynne think homosexuality and homosexual relationships are bad for society, or not? Do they think it is a selfish sexual rejection of the natural order or not? The most Cheney has been willing to say is that the government should not crack down on gay relationships and that they love their daughter (how about her partner, who ostensibly would, in normal circumstances, be part of that close-knit family?). Golly gee, how generous: they’re against a 1984 regime government enforced heterosexuality, whoop-dee-do. They support federalism in this case. But, just as you demanded of Obama: why won’t they address the core issue that keeps coming up? Is homosexuality a good or a bad or even a neutral thing for society? If they won’t dignify Keyes with a response, why are they willing to dignify a man who says that gays are out to kill our children, or a woman that says gay marriage is as bad as Nazism by inviting and applauding them at their own convention and choosing people like them to lead them in the national anthem and prayers?
The situation is the same: you are asked a question to which either answer would either be a lie or very very dangerous politically/legally. So you decline to discuss the matter. Whether the outrage at being asked the question is or is not sincere is irrelevant. It’s a cagey move nonetheless. Again, if it had been a one-time thing, I’d have nothing to go on. But it’s a habitual avoidance, one that is hard to see as being anything but calculating.
I didn’t paint her as ashamed of Mary. I painted her as politically savvy, as the entire close-knit family is on this issue. I hope that the Cheney clan is indeed approving of Mary’s partnership and homosexuals in general. But they’ve gone to great lengths to avoid making any clear statements directly about this “issue they are familiar with.”
Were that so many other people had such leeway to avoid the issues facing their families.
So, it’s sinful, but it’s wrong and an affront for anyone to point it out? Would that this applied to other sins! And the question is: why? Why some sins regulating some not? There are, obviously, good answers to that question… but avoiding having to come down and explain and argue on either side of those answers is apparently beyond the Cheney clan.
Now, I certainly think that this IS probably the Cheney position. But it still avoids the issue: the issue that gay people ACTUALLY have to deal with in their lives. No one is talking about enforcing anti-homosexuality laws (well, except when it includes gay sex: can someone point me to Cheney’s stance on hsi boss’ anti-sodomy law support?): what we are talking about is whether homosexuality is dangerous or not to traditional marriage and society. That’s the debate at hand: a debate that the Cheney’s seem to take their relationship to a gay person as permission to beg off from engaging in, even though they help set the policies stemming from it. Is Mary Cheney relationship helping to destroy society, or not? This is precisely what the Republican party is struggling with. At least publically it seems to support the idea that it is: that’s what the wink wink segues from the gay marriage issue to the breakdown on inner city families is all about.
Mary Cheney may want to avoid the limelight. I don’t, as homosexual activists do, fault her for that personally: no one is required by law to face all the bullshit that might entail. But that bullshit is there because she’s gay in a party that embraces the moral and social condemnation of gays, and mostly embraces the legal condemnation as well. It’s utterly laughable to suggest that her homosexuality isn’t a big glaring obvious reason why she would wants to avoid the limelight. It’s an issue she is familar with, after all.