Florida Agenda

CLIFF DUNN

Last week, this publication printed a paid political advertisement that had been provided by the Broward County chapter of the Log Cabin Republicans. The half page black and white ad depicted the late U.S. Ambassador Christopher Stevens, as his body was carried out of the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi, Libya, in which he had died moments earlier. The national coverage on the advertisement has, correctly, focused almost entirely on the Broward LCR’s actions, and the consequences it is likely to face from its national chartering organization.

Since I had no involvement in the ad’s creation, or participation in deciding whether the ad ran, I do not want to put words into the mouths (by way of explaining what they were thinking) of either the Broward LCR chapter or of their national organization. Speaking for the latter, the Log Cabin Republicans’ national executive director, R. Clarke Cooper, has already responded in eloquent language about his organization’s outrage (see this issue’s Florida Agenda “POLITICAL DESK,” Page 11) concerning the depiction of a fallen American diplomat who died in the service of his country (regardless of the specific details of that death, both of which remain matters of national sensitivity and security), and of the use of that image to garner cheap, fear- and hate-inspired political support.

Nor will I impart my own personal feelings concerning the use of Ambassador Stevens’ portrayal in such straits, or of how such a portrayal distresses men and women of goodwill, gay and straight, Muslim and Christian, Jew and atheist, and gives aid and comfort to all enemies of decency and goodness. That sentiment must be one which is expressed individually, and I will not engage in the same tactics as did the members of the Broward LCRs who were responsible for the ad, in the interest of assuaging my own moral outrage. That would be irresponsible of me as a journalist, a keeper of our most sacred secular commandment, the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.

By now, I have heard from members of the press—gay and straight, legitimate and tabloid—concerning the righteous anger and disdain that has been directed both at the Broward Log Cabin Republicans and the ad’s grotesque depiction of a fallen American who died of unnatural causes. There has likewise been concern about the decision to run the ad, in light of reports that it was declined in other publications.

I cannot speak to the reasoning behind those publications’ decision not to run the ad, other than to accept at face value their own explanations, and try to give you a window into our reasoning, one which informs our commitment to serving as a community-wide instrument to disseminate information and opinions—not all of them popular, and in this extreme case, one which tries the very fabric and tolerance of that very relevant concept, free speech and open-access to a community journal.

As I told the very capable national LGBT journalist Bil Browning of the Bilerico Project, the balance between censorship and sensitivity has more far reaching implications for the press than it does for a person sitting in your own living room. Was the Agenda free to censor a message we found repugnant? I can think of no legal constraint preventing it. But in advertising ourselves as a community publication, we have an obligation to serve the entire community.

When a lobbyist provides financial incentives to a lawmaker, he is legally buying access under a system that is as old as our Republic. That same access is afforded to both pro-life and anti-gun groups alike. It is a part of an open dialog that is likewise as old as our Republic—as is the suppression of free speech during times of national distress, which in our nation dates from the Alien and Sedition Acts of the 18th Century to the Patriot Act of the 21st.

As a journalist, my first responsibility must always be to err on the side of free speech and expression, so long as it doesn’t contradict the law.

Along with the Bill of Rights, I would offer an older, more fundamental imperative that was in play here: the Golden Rule, which demands that the same treatment be afforded the “good” among us as the “bad.” This was the point behind the admonishment, “I’d give the Devil [the] benefit of law, for my own safety’s sake,” in the 1960 play “A Man for All Seasons.”

In 1822, Denmark Vesey led one of the largest slave rebellions in pre- Civil War America. Vesey, a freed slave, purchased his own freedom sometime around 1800. He was a leader of a black church which preached the abolition of slavery in very white, very anti-abolition Charleston, S.C. Twice—and with the collusion of the authorities—white property owners shut down Vesey’s African Church, a provocation that would lead to the uprising of several thousand African-American slaves and freedmen.

Although the owners of the African Church property could have chosen to allow Vesey’s congregation to stay open, they instead decided to ignore the members’ First Amendment rights to assembly and to practice their beliefs.

Of course, as private landowners they were not actually constrained by the Bill of Rights—those Constitutional prohibitions are directed specifically at Congress—and so they were under no obligation to honor its language. But they apparently felt no obligation either to honor the Golden Rule, of doing unto others as one would have done unto them.

Doesn’t a community journal have an ethical obligation to provide a balance, offering ad space (and editorial column inches) for all political sides in a presidential election year? Would censorship have been the “high road?” I cannot in good conscience say that it would have been.

I know that others will debate on where a line of decency or good taste, not to mention humanity, should be drawn, and I hope to take part in that discussion. I know that I would hope that the LCRs will use a more sensitive measuring stick when they next try to influence the social message, since I think this time around they clearly went far afield. I think a long-term good will be served by that, in every sense.

The question of which good is best served by what deed puts me in mind of John Adams, who was in 1770 the lawyer selected to defend the British soldiers who took part in the Boston Massacre. Although even then a leading Patriot in the cause of American liberty, and a firm believer that the citizens of Boston had every reason to “call the action of that night a massacre,” Adams—later our country’s second president—held that not providing the British soldiers full access to the best defense “would have been as foul a stain upon this country as the executions of the Quakers or witches, anciently.”

Then as now, some things remain more indefensible than others.

A series of unrelated events last week— including the first presidential debate— put me in mind of the shortcomings of both government and business, and helped clarify for me the ridiculous nature of the notion that a President of the United States equates with the CEO of a Blue Chip Corporation, along with the idea that a country should be run like a business.

There are a large number of Americans who sincerely believe that a government of, by, and for the people should function under the same conventions that govern business, and who equate the forms themselves as being interchangeable, with POTUS as the hypothetical CEO, and Congress functioning as a Board of Directors.

Even that most well-groomed Captain of Industry, Mitt Romney, doesn’t believe this analogy. The trouble with trying to run a country like a business is that the “customer” base is different for each one. In a country, we are one another’s customer (as fellow citizens), and we contribute to one another’s common welfare. That is why when a tornado strikes a town in Kansas, the federal government sends money or material aid, just as it will if a hurricane ravages South Florida. That is, as Republican Oliver Wendell Holmes said, both “the price we pay for living in a civilized society,” and its benifit.

But if that scenario played like it does in “business”—which counts “customers” as well as “investors”—there would be a profitand- loss reckoning as to how many resources went to New Orleans, versus how much was sent to South Beach: A nation with a debt (which includes all the successful ones) has the “luxury” of not having to decide between those choices (just as—when push comes to shove—we don’t have to “choose” between fighting one war or two; “sadly,” wehave the resources —in the form of deficits—to do both, something employed by both Democrats and Republicans). In a nation, we are all customers and investors.

When Hurricane Katrina ravaged the Gulf Coast in 2005, the Bush Administration’s handling of the federal emergency response was unworthy of a great nation. The post- Katrina cleanup was handled like a business—one that enriched large contractors who had longstanding relationships with high-ranking officials. My purpose here is not to Bush Bash: It is to draw attention to the disastrous consequences of trying to manage a nation as a profit center.

Another dramatic example of the stark difference between the way a government and the way a business operate occurred in the hours immediately after the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks. Following the attacks, the New York City Municipal Credit Union, which is headquartered across from ground zero, lost its computer link to the network that controls its automated teller machines. Because of this, the network had no way to check accounts to verify that sufficient funds existed to cover ATM withdrawals.

Rather than shut down its ATM operation—and looking after the interests of its 300,000 members during a time of crisis—credit union officials allowed customers to make withdrawals from their accounts without knowing if the money was there to cover them.

The Municipal Credit Union, whose members include city, state, and federal employees, as well as health care workers, is a nonprofit financial institution with $1 billion in assets. As a credit union—of, by, and for its members—it functions much like a governmental body, providing financial services to those members, who in turn contribute to a pool used by other members (yes, this smacks of communism). In the months following 9/11, $15 million dollars was looted by credit unions members, and 118 individuals were charged by prosecutors in the thefts.

Ironically, I think their bad example is the exception that proves both the rule and my point. Those members who took advantage of the goodwill of the credit union officials after 9/11 were scoundrels in their actions, and we don’t know how many honest members were helped during those months. But the fact that the “bottom line” wasn’t the bottom-line for those officials in a time of trauma is very much to their credit.

CLIFF DUNN

In recent months my boyfriend has made me a fan of the “zombie” genre of horror movies. Believe me when I say, some of the more-dubious fare is well-labeled as “horror.” (Ever the snob, I prefer more “realistic” offerings, like the AMC cable network’s compelling and dramatic “The Walking Dead” series to some of the grosser, “meat”-and-potatoes productions of George Romero and his homagists.)

We often joke that if the other was to be bitten (or by some other means zombified), each would “mercifully” put the other out of his misery, with an ax, a shotgun, or whatever traditionally antiundead ordnance happened to be lying around. That’s why I listened with some amusement last week when he told me—with absolute certainty—that if we found ourselves marooned on a desert island, or lost in the frozen arctic, or otherwise in desperate straits and running out of supplies and comestibles, he was sure that I would eat him.

He said this in a tone that betrayed sleep deprivation, yes, but also surprise and disappointment mixed with an accusatory tone driven by his “discovery”—as if, having experienced the “truth” of this revelation, he would make me pay for it.

This pillow talk became more relevant when I posted something on Facebook over the weekend that was meant to garner laughter, but instead brought out the “ugly” in a friend-of-a-friend. The actor Samuel L. Jackson has lent his talent to a pro-Obama parody in which he harangues a middle class family to “Wake the F*** up!” and support the president in November. I had (and still have) no clue what my friend’s political persuasions might be, but we share a similar sense of what’s funny, so I thought he would get the humor. (WATCH THE VIDEO BELOW)

To be on the safe side—this is Facebook we’re talking about, after all, and not everyone who posts has taken their medication this morning—I added a disclaimer to the effect that, whatever your individual political beliefs, the video was funny and worth a gander. Less than a minute later—without having had the time to open the video file, much less listen to Jackson’s comedic rant—one of my friend’s friends commented that I was an “Obama Zombie.”

Clearly this person had mistaken the intent of my post, which hadn’t been meant to promote any candidate, belief, or cause—other than to stimulate the cracking of a smile, for crying out loud. But the exchange that ensued showed that—Transactional Analysis games notwithstanding—this person was determined to be “victimized” by me, whom he perceived to be a threat to him, his politics, and his worldview. At that point, I was more than happy to oblige.

So much of the national dialog these past several months has been geared up to playing the game of “gotcha” and similar efforts to be “right” rather than be helpful, that an entire industry of fact-checkers has produced a subgenre of media, with such now-familiar names as FactCheck.org and PolitiFact churning out ever-increasing examples of both sides in the presidential election playing fast and loose with the facts (never mind the “truth”).

For me, the worst part of being labeled an “Obama Zombie” (other than the assumption that I would end up one of the walking dead, something that galls my inner fanboy to no end) is that the numbskull who so labeled me had no idea who I support or don’t support, but that by my “signing off ” on the Samuel L. Jackson video I am—at best— helping to promote a pro-Obama message, and—at worst—I am actually going to vote for the— what? Muslim? Foreign national? (African American? Gay-lover?) Who’s the real zombie here?

CLIFF DUNN

This week, I took the arguably drastic step of “de-friending” some people on Facebook who I felt had taken the whole “post whatever is on your mind” thing a bit too far. (I have seen some doozies, believe me, including someone who, moments before I forever “blocked” them, had posted an image of their most recent—I am not making this up—bowel movement.)

I’m all in favor of free speech and free expression, which is convenient, since I’m a writer by trade and my boyfriend is a talented sketch artist, but there’s a time and a place for everything, including bowel movements. This isn’t to say that I don’t support your “right” to broadcast your bodily functions, just not while my laptop is open to that page (the reason I likewise support Facebook’s right to remove particularly egregious violators).

In the case of this past week, it was the irresponsible use of free speech that caused me—with sincere regret—to “block” these individuals, at least until the Cessation of Hostilities (in this case, November 7, the day after the general election).

The angry political rhetoric of this year’s Silly Season (so-called because apparently there is nothing too ridiculous, unfathomable, or out-of-bounds about any given candidate or cause that some— uh, fellow citizen wouldn’t give credence to: Obama is a Muslim. Obama is a foreigner. Obama is a communist. (Or, as Hank Williams, Jr. so eloquently put it, “We’ve got a Muslim for a President who hates cowboys, hates cowgirls, hates fishing, hates farming, loves gays, and we hate him!”)

“Collectively, these hatemongers form a global industry of outrage, working feverishly to give and take offense, frequently over religion, and to ignite the combustible mix of ignorance and suspicion that exists,” said an article in Time last week. Interestingly, the writer was speaking about the powder keg of the Middle East, in an analysis of the causes of the rioting that led to the death in Libya of U.S. Ambassador Chris Stevens. But he could just as easily been referring to the loutish and loud who are every bit as hateful as the extremists they are decrying.

Honestly, I am a patriot who loves my country and who believes— without the flurry and flourish of rattling sabers or beating breasts— that America is an exceptional country, because of its people and the principles and values for which we at least think we believe we stand. But I would—I’m serious—be challenged as to whom I would call a greater enemy to American values: Rush Limbaugh, or some ignorant teenager learning how to hate the U.S. in a Muslim madrasa. Neither of these types shares anything of my own personal feelings for my country or countrymen, and each (I am pretty certain) thinks in his own way that the world would be a better place without me.

A friend recently referred to the members of the Occupy Wall Street movement as “traitors.” I find this sort of anachronistic speech amusing in my own paternalistic way—until I realize this is the same rhetoric that was voiced against Jews in some of the most “enlightened” places in the world, including Paris, Vienna, London, and Washington, D.C., through the modern era. How can a free citizen in a nation of laws that protects the right of assembly and the right of expression be considered a “traitor?”

I take comfort that this kind of dangerous rhetoric has been preached and practiced in the Republic since its inception, with Jeffersonians accusing Washington (the actual George, in this case) of being pro-English and anti- American, and Hamiltonians and Adamsites in turn calling Jeffersonians the worst name they could think of: “Democrats” (the word had a different context in early-19th Century, post-French Revolution America, although Rush, Sean Hannity, and Company are having just as much fun with it).

My dislike of Limbaugh, Michael Savage, and the Bloviating Class (which doesn’t translate to a disdain for commentator Bill O’Reilly, incidentally, because he dislikes the hypocrisy against Obama as much as I do) often takes the form of imagining them as my “opponents” in some of the mindless video games my boyfriend and I sometimes play while we’re cooking (“Bloons Tower Defense,” anyone?), watching them explode in a whirl of hot air—and hotter gas—when my game avatar “pops” a balloon opponent.

A part of me thinks it’s not in some of the mindless video games my boyfriend and I sometimes play while we’re cooking (“Bloons Tower
Defense,” anyone?), watching them explode in a whirl of hot air—and hotter gas—when my game avatar “pops” a balloon opponent. A part of me thinks it’s not very “patriotic” of me to imagine my fellow countrymen in such straits, but another part recognizes that in today’s political climate, it  is very “American.”

“Faith and science have at least one thing in common: Both are lifelong searches for the truth.
But while faith is an unshakable belief in the unseen, science is the study of testable, observable
phenomena. The two coexist, and may at times complement each other. But neither should be
asked to validate the other. Scientists have no more business questioning the existence of God
than theologians had telling Galileo the Earth was the center of the universe.” – Bill Allen

By Cliff Dunn

I always enjoy explaining the difference between what’s “natural” versus what’s “normal.” For something to be considered normal, it just needs the behavioral approval of the thundering herd. What defines the “norm” explains what is normal. (Example: Culturally, it is “normal” for many African-American males to disdain the homosexual lifestyle.

This, of course, fails to account for the large number of brothers who are living on the “down-low.”) What’s “natural” is informed by one’s “nature” (duh). This isn’t to say that all things that are natural are necessarily good (Ted Bundy, for instance, found it perfectly natural to kidnap, sexually assault, and murder young women). This is where a strong moral compass (and a liberal application of impulse control) comes in handy, but I suspect that all of us deal with personal demons (or at least imps) as we marry behavior that is socially-acceptable with that which is secretly-desired, and live productively as members of the greater mass of humankind. This isn’t the point I want to make, however.

I was secretly pulling for the chop-logic coalition of libertarians, establishment stalwarts, Ron Paul mavericks, and gay conservatives who banded together in Tampa last month in an effort to drag the Grand Old Party of Lincoln and Eisenhower into the 21st Century (and the company of the rest of the civilized world) and modulate the anti-gay flame that has burned so brightly since the late-1980s in the party’s ideological cauldron. (The thinly-disguised veneer of soft homophobia that was ushered in by Pat Robertson lived long past the political career of his protégé, some time-hottie Ralph Reed, and of the bullhorn they wielded— the now-discredited Christian Coalition. Clearly, dreams can come true.)

Unfortunately, when the dust settled, the Republican National Committee adopted language that calls court decisions supporting marriage equality “an assault on the foundations of our society,” and adds that “we believe that marriage, the union of one man and one woman, must be upheld as the national standard, a goal to stand for, encourage, and promote through laws governing marriage.” Take that, child-corrupters in GOProud and Log Cabin Republicans.

This lurch to the extreme would have drawn consternation from even Ronald Reagan. You scoff? Consider: When “Dutch” accepted his party’s nomination in 1980, the Republican platform acknowledged the national debate over reproductive freedom, introducing its abortion plank by saying that “we recognize differing views on this question among Americans in general—and in our own party.” Consider that conciliatory prose in light of this year’s authoritarian “the unborn child has a fundamental individual right to life which cannot be infringed.” (The 2012 GOP platform also calls for public display of the Ten Commandments.)

As a small “d” democrat (and a small “l” libertarian), I believe that religious and socially conservative folks should have a voice in our great democratic republic, and representation in our halls of legislation. I have had many close friends from my childhood to the present who were Jehovah’s Witnesses, Southern Baptists, Latter-day Saints, Evangelical Christians, and orthodox Jews, and they have each had a way of believing how the world/cosmos/ existence works, as seen through the prism of their individual faiths, as well as a humane way of treating and dealing with those who their beliefs might consider “different.”

That’s perfectly well and good. Score one for tolerance. (Or in the words of Tony Soprano, “They don’t want my son with their daughters, and I don’t want their sons with mine.”)

Every one is entitled to their own beliefs—but no one is entitled to their own facts (a word that comes from the Latin factum, or “deeds”), and when all is said and done, in a nation of laws, every citizen is entitled to engage in the same “deeds” as every other citizen, including that most desperate deed of all—getting married to the consent adults of their choosing.

Gay Republicans are certainly free to vote how they like, selecting the candidates and ideologies that most closely calibrate to their beliefs, values, morals, principles, and ethics. But they must know that they are doing so as second tier technocrats, who have been granted only the most grudging of nods in their party’s platform. (“We embrace the principle that all Americans should be treated with respect and dignity.”)

From my vantage point, that just encourages the bad behavior, perpetuating the “Jim Queer” mindset in many on the far right with the tacit endorsement of those who should instead be calling for the full measure of their civil rights the loudest. A dirty deed, indeed.

CLIFF DUNN

I was at a barbecue over the weekend at my boyfriend’s family’s place, and before the corn on the cob had even been thrown onto the gas grill, someone asked me for whom I was voting in November’s presidential election. After good-naturedly breaking his balls about the sacro-sanctity of my vote and its very personal nature, I told him which of the candidates was more in line with my political views, circa-2012, and was immediately assailed with comments, pro and con, about my “guy.”

I honestly don’t have a lot of patience for this kind of ‘polite conversation,’ because I was a radio and television talk show host for ten years, and it doesn’t take much to set my gorge to rising, especially during the quadrennial presidential election cycle. There is very little in the current political climate (that’s watchable for more than three minutes, anyway) that smacks of intelligent, articulated, sober, and rational conversation about the most important issues that matter to us, as a community and as a nation.

The talking heads are spewing the talking points, and talk radio is so Agenda-driven (pardon the pun), that Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity have become the equivalent of World Wrestling Entertainment “stars:” Loudmouthed, opinionated regurgitators of a canned message that won’t brook (or invite) any debate. (There’s plenty of this to go around on the Left, too, but my homo-animus is momentarily directed towards the ’tards of the Right, thank you.)

I know when I watch one of the tights-clad personae created by promoter Vince McMahon that I am being treated to Theatre of the Grotesque, with larger-than-life depictions of dime-novel villains (or for a more recent, pop-culture relevant specie, Tom Hardy’s Bane in the latest “Batman” film is a perfect example), little more than caricatures to tease some Jungian archetypal yearning of the psyche.

That’s all well on TV—but it has no place in a grownup political conversation, and certainly shouldn’t inform a citizen’s voting choice.

(You can stop laughing now.) Unfortunately, there’s no such “mental warning label” accompanying the likes of Rush Limbaugh as when you are watching the antics of say, Hulk Hogan. But Limbaugh is no less a clown for all that he advocates policies and positions which are oh-so-less-than funny.

But at least I personally know that the pill-popping hypocrite is a clown—what excuse do his legions of Ditto-heads have to offer? Are they so starved for guidance and a firm hand (“paging Dr. Freud”) that they are willing to overlook the dishonesty, fact-twisting, and blatant lies that spew from his nicotinestained lips? They obviously don’t mind that Limbaugh never cast a vote for Ronald Reagan (because he didn’t register to vote until he was 35). Telling other people how they should think is easier, I guess, than making up your own mind.

There’s nothing wrong with being a Democrat, or a Republican, or a Libertarian (small or large “l”), or a progressive, traditionalist, ad infinitum, ad nauseum. What’s wrong is refusing to be an HONEST one of those things. The modern political party system, as practiced in the U.S., is two major corporations competing for sponsorship dollars.

Period. To say it a different way, the DNC and the RNC are like Ford or General Motors, competing for you as a consumer of their product, which is one of ideas. Brand loyalty is fine when it comes to soft drinks, sports teams, and clothing. It’s okay to be a “Chevy man,” or a “Binaca boy,” but to call oneself a “Yellow Dog Democrat” in the context of a modern information age is being willfully ignorant, something which, sadly doesn’t un-qualify a person to vote. My respect and admiration for FDR isn’t about to cloud my worldview concerning the gross and corrupt Vito Lopez of Brooklyn, just as my reverence of Lincoln and my appreciation for Reagan won’t blind me to the disappointment of George W. Bush, or the embarrassment of Sarah Palin and Todd Akin. Nor should they you.

Because I choose—when it comes to my voting franchise, anyway—to be willfully informed, I refuse to allow “brand loyalty” to inform my choice for president any more than it will impact my choice for dinner.

I “enjoy” (in the broadest definition of the word) listening to Limbaugh barn-burn his way to the fringe, because I “get” that he is, on some level, playing a part (as hatefully as did Father Coughlin in the 1930s), just as I get a kick out of the acerbic barbs of the more rational (to my mind) Rachel Maddow. But I understand it to be info-tainment, and I am more likely to make a voting choice based on something that the Economist said about the euro than something Kathy Griffin said about Romney.

The stakes for marriage equality, as well as ongoing efforts like the repeal of the bigoted and un- American Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) and the passage of ENDA (which even Paul Ryan— although not Mitt Romney— supported), and lingering concerns like the final vestiges of DADT, are too high to do otherwise.

CLIFF DUNN

“It is unpatriotic not to tell the truth, whether about the President or anyone else.” – Theodore Roosevelt

I used to love the national political conventions, but no longer. Over the next two weeks, politically active Americans will “drink the Kool Aid” and engage in saber-rattling diatribes and unleash the most unpleasant hyperbole concerning their fellow countrymen since Republicans questioned the bravery, honor, and military awards of John Kerry in 2004 (unless you count their 2008 vilification of Obama’s putative “Muslim religion” and their calling into question his citizenship). Democrats don’t get a pass here, with 30-year-old irrelevancies about Ronald Reagan’s senility, the 1988 “wimp” bombs they threw at George H.W. Bush, accusations in 2004 that his son, George W. Bush, was somehow complicit in the September 11 attacks, ad nauseum. More galling to me than that sort of nonstarter is the quasi-tribal, siege mindset that overtakes the most partisan among us, and the accompanying notion that members of the opposing party are the ENEMY (as if Osama bin Laden gave a rat’s toenail what the political party affiliations were of the World Trade Center’s honored dead).

Each year, the Democrats and Republicans host annual fundraising dinner events which bring local, state, and national brass to the trenches (in this case, ones filled with rubber chicken and contribution envelopes) in an effort to rally the—moneyed—troops and preach the Gospel of Talking Points to the chewing choir. The Democrats’ Jefferson- Jackson and the Republicans’ Lincoln- Reagan dinners are ideological red meat for “starved” political operatives and wannabes, and it never ceases to amuse me that most of the party stalwarts have no clue just who— or what—they are honoring.

Thomas Jefferson was a “small government” progressive who envisioned America as an agrarian society, where laws and regulations would be minimal, allowing the “good sense” of the people to reign as well as rule. In this, he was opposed by Alexander Hamilton and the Federalists, who resemble Mitt Romney and the modern GOP in that they favored the moneyed classes and capital, but they also supported a centralized Federal government to facilitate the growth and stability of the new nation.X

Although many Republicans claim that in today’s political climate, Jefferson would be a member of the Grand Old Party, this doesn’t take into account the 18th Century realities: In the 1700s, America WAS an agricultural nation, and didn’t require the degree of government regulation that a modern, industrialized society demands.X

In fact, it was two bona fide Republican Presidents who set into motion the very “Era of Big Government” that a Democratic president, Bill Clinton, proclaimed to be “over” in the 1990s. Abraham Lincoln’s calls for a national military draft during the American Civil War was the first of its kind—and made northerners hate the Great Emancipator as much as did slaveholders in the then-solidly Democratic south.

Legal scholars of the 1860s were as divided as the nation was in their opinions over whether Lincoln had the constitutional power to prevent southern secession and dissolution of the Union. And his suspension of habeas corpus foreshadowed the modern debate over the Patriot Act’s encroachment into civil liberties (a law, incidentally, that was championed by a “small government” conservative President, Bush-43).

Possibly America’s “biggest government” President, Theodore Roosevelt gave nightmares to bosses of his day’s GOP for his support of progressive causes. (When he was chosen as running mate for the incumbent president, Republican William McKinley, an exasperated machine boss, Mark Hanna of New York, shouted, “Don’t any of you realize that there’s only one life between that madman and the Presidency? What…will he do as President if McKinley should die?” As if on cue, McKinley was assassinated 15 months later.)

The Republican Teddy spoke of a “Square Deal,” a progressive outline for equal opportunity for all Americans—with special emphasis on the importance of fair government regulations over corporate “special interests.” (Read about the Triangle Shirt Factory fire and tell me that employees need LESS workplace protections.) Does that mean that he—or Obama—stand for harm to small business? Uh—no.

Roosevelt made America’s natural resources a national issue. He favored using them wisely, and opposed wasteful consumption. He leaves a legacy of five national parks, 18 national monuments, and 150 National Forests, among other works. Does that make the Rough Rider— or Obama—a tree-hugging nature lover? Is this even actually a bad thing?

In his 1908 Annual Message to Congress, T.R. spoke of the need for the federal government to regulate interstate corporations (under the constitution’s Interstate Commerce Clause), and cited big business’ battle against federal regulations, by appealing to the importance of states’ rights (which was as much a canard in 1912 as it is in 2012).

Child labor laws, workplace safety requirements, an eight-hour work day, and the Republic itself—we owe all these to liberal Republicans. Enjoy Tampa, members of the Grand Old Party.

“Men, it has been well said, think in herds; it will be seen that they go mad in herds, while they only recover their senses slowly, and one by one.” – Charles Mackay 

CLIFF DUNN – EDITOR

It’s probably a case of residual childhood naivety—and, admittedly, way too early in the silly season—for me to ask the politically active to “stop the insanity” when it comes to making blanket judgments, statements, and actions, about opposing candidates, ideologies—or sexual identities—but a boy can wish. I also seem to experience a form of quadrennial amnesia, in that after each presidential election cycle I forget just how acerbic and “nutty” the attacks can become. I experienced a touch of this over the past month, when this publication ran (and in this issue is running) opinion columns with a decidedly conservative (albeit LGBT) bent. (For a deeper discussion of this, see the Box, below.)

Like a lot of gay people, I take exception to businesses that contribute to causes which have a deleterious effect on LGBT rights and specifically—at this juncture in our history—marriage equality. When Chick-fil-A’s brand of conservative politics became public knowledge, I decided that I would no longer “fund” their perfectly legitimate right to oppose an issue that is central to my sense of fairness and what it means to be a free American (this same sentiment fuels my electoral discomfort with the GOP). In fairness to Chick-fil-A and the Cathy family, they didn’t lose much in the way of revenues, but I know many gay and lesbian consumers who couldn’t even spell “K-F-C” last week and now have suddenly developed worship-fantasies for the Colonel. (As is their right.)

What I can’t countenance is when people who are generally fair and wellmeaning in most areas of their private and public lives are targeted because they have acted against the politically correct dynamic of the moment. This happened this week to a friend of mine, an elected official who is straight but who is very progressive (he might say “libertarian”) in his views to gay rights. A traditionalist Republican, he is nonetheless a patriot and “good” citizen who doesn’t care what goes on in your bed or mine, and who supports (both capitalistically and financially) numerous Fortune 500 companies with progressive employment and public policies towards LGBT rights and employees.

So when my friend “liked” Chickfil- A on Facebook, he thought nothing of it (other than that he was supporting in a traditionalist—he might say “libertarian”—fashion a business’ right to give their money and support as they see fit, and as is their right), until a local political activist “un-friended” him and took him to task for his support of the chicken chain. My friend was shocked, because to his mind, his support for businesses that support gay rights should give him some cover (or at least buy him some goodwill).

Clearly, I’m not dismissing the value of “voting with your wallet,” and taking your business to places that value both it and you. But this seems to me to be a case of throwing the baby out with the bath water. It also strikes me as a loss of perspective on what it means for us to be countrymen, rather than the very partisan beasts that many of the nation’s Founders warned us against becoming. I’m not saying that issues of this magnitude don’t deserve a serious and sober accounting of how we as a community will respond to issues of mutual concern—but let’s not forget that our diverse community includes many political stripes, and there are more gay conservatives in this community than you may realize.

We can either marginalize them (with the anticipated results and coeval loss of opportunities to build bridges and support systems), or welcome them in the greater whole. Most of us agree on the big picture items (rolling back DOMA, destroying the remaining cultural vestiges of DADT, enacting ENDA, etc), and, seriously— there’s no uniquely Democratic or Republican way to fix a street light, or approve a school zone, issues we can all come to accord upon, too.

(Full Disclosure: I was a registered Republican from 1997 to 2001, but had a “centrist” recovery in the early 2000s and now usually vote left-of-center.) Some Democrats will support Al Lamberti for Sheriff, and some Republicans will—gasp!—secretly press the lever for Obama. But I guess we are all entitled to our naughtiness, eh, love?

“All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed. Second, it is violently opposed. Third, it is accepted as being self-evident.” – Arthur Schopen

CLIFF DUNN – Editor

I have always been an admirer of the struggle for African- American civil rights. I remember watching “Roots” with my mom in 1977, cramped in front of our small TV set, in our apartment in Sunrise. The experience of Alex Haley’s ancestors—and all of those who suffered the harrowing trip of the Middle Passage from Africa to slavery in America—made me emotional then, and it does now.

I can only imagine the sense of injustice that many modern African-Americans (both those alive today, and those who preceded them in recent generations) experienced to be doubly-done-dirty: For the fate of their ancestors, brought here in shackles in large measure because of the color of their skin (there wasn’t a widescale slave trade for white Scandinavians in the mid-1600s, for example), and for the subsequent discrimination and relegation to second-class status they lived through after earning their national freedom.

The indignities of Jim Crow America (which was as alive and well in the liberal northeast of my birth as it was in the deep south of Old Dixie) were incalculable, and had many fathers.

I also can understand the discomfort for many African-Americans when a comparison is made between the centuries-long fight for civil rights and the modern struggle for LGBT rights. I don’t want to rehash the arguments— that you can’t choose the color of your skin (no smarmy remarks about Michael Jackson are necessary), while the nature/ nurture causes of sexual identity remain subject to interpretation—because that smacks of moral relativism: Human rights isn’t a zero-sum game, where one group’s comforts and security are enjoyed at the expense of another’s.

It is an American trait to feel outrage at injustice (often colored by one’s innerpolitical- voice, which regulates your sympathy level for the plight of say, Cuban refugees over Haitian ones, or your choice to support a boycott of South Africa, but not Cuba), and to help someone who is down. (This was the “John Wayne”- dynamic which shaped America’s post- WWII foreign policy, under which we would rebuild and help prosper those nations that had taken a righteous “lickin’” at our hands, once they had admitted their wrong actions, and recognized our official Bad Assedness, much like the “Duke” did after a bar fight in a western saloon.)

I think that Mitt Romney has trouble finding that sense of outrage toward injustice. Don’t misread me: I think he cares about right and wrong, and I think he was on the side of right last week when he reaffirmed a position he first stated in 1994: “I feel that all people should be allowed to participate in the Boy Scouts, regardless of their sexual orientation,”

Romney said during his failed U.S. Senate run against Ted Kennedy. At the time, he added that he supports “the right of the Boy Scouts of America to decide what it wants to do on that issue” (which is also an Americanized spin on liberty). Gov. Romney can take pride in beating President Obama to the punch on this one. Gay kids need all the allies and support they can get.

But I think that his laudatory sympathy and sense of fair play for the plight of children and teenagers doesn’t translate into “big picture” empathy for those gay Americans who want ALL their civil rights NOW, thank you. After President Obama endorsed marriage equality in May, Romney reiterated “I do not favor marriage between people of the same gender, and I do not favor civil unions if they are identical to marriage other than by name. My view is the domestic partnership benefits, hospital visitation rights, and the like are appropriate, but that the others are not.” Oh really?

My own sense of outrage—to say nothing of my gorge—begins to rise when I ask myself “Who the hell does Romney think he is, telling me what he thinks is good for the future of my—or your—loving relationships?” I get it, Mitt: The descendant of polygamists must toe a special line when it comes to the “M” word. But it seems like that should be his problem, not mine.

A little-recalled footnote in the history of African-American civil rights is the so-called “Atlanta Compromise,” an 1895 agreement struck between African- American leaders and Southern white politicians. It called for Southern blacks to work for substandard weekly wages, and to submit to white political rule. Although Southern whites would guarantee that blacks would receive basic education and due process under the law, blacks would not be allowed to “agitate” for equality, integration, or justice, they would not ask for the right to vote, they would tolerate segregation and discrimination, and they would not retaliate against racist behavior and violence.

The primary architect of the compromise (on behalf of African- Americans) was Booker T. Washington, President of the Tuskegee Institute and a national black leader. Later, other prominent African-Americans, including W. E. B. Du Bois and William Monroe Trotter, saw the compromise for what it was, and believed that American blacks must take their own futures in hand (the fruit of their vision was the NAACP). It wasn’t until after Booker T. Washington’s death in 1915, that black support for his accommodational second-class citizenship shifted to an allegiance for activism. But what might modern civil rights look like today if Washington’s compromise had prevailed? How will LGBT rights look four years from now if we accommodate Romney and his “vision?”

Cliff Dunn - Editor Florida Agenda

“The religious factions that are growing throughout our land are not using their religious clout with wisdom. They are trying to force government leaders into following their position 100 percent. If you disagree with these religious groups on a particular moral issue, they complain, they threaten you with a loss of money or votes or both.” – U.S. Sen. Barry Goldwater (R-Arizona), 1981

CLIFF DUNN

I’m going to depart this week from my usual tones of conciliation and tolerance because, as my grandmother would say, My Irish is up. This sort of mood often accompanies casting caution to the wind, and speaking in broader generalities than with I am normally comfortable. So be it. My feeling as I write this is that anyone who decides to vote for a Republican U.S. House candidate come November must harbor some— realized or unknown—degree of homophobia, or at least a well-honed sense of Schadenfreude that is focused on one group, namely us.

(Note that I said “decides” to vote: I recognize that there are many factors that go into casting one’s vote, not the least of which are a predisposition to choose a political party based upon one’s parents’ voting habits, or one’s geographic region of birth, which also relates to the first. If you vote solely based on one of these criteria, I am hard-pressed to think of you as homophobic—more properly, you lack self-identity, or may just be lazy.)

In the reverse, any GOP House candidate who supports LGBT rights (to my present, captured-in-amberin- the-moment way-of-thinking) must be either a) insincere, or b) in the wrong party (but there’s redress for this). Sorry, Ileana Ros-Lehtinen. I believe that 5 million guncontrol advocates should get together and join the NRA (which claims a membership of 4.3 million), vote out the hard core gun nuts (the ones who think Junior should get a howitzer for Christmas), and the next day add the Brady Law to its membership platform. (But, see “laziness,” above.) and I am not saying that there aren’t good Republicans—gay and straight—who want the same things for themselves and their families that I want for mine.

I was a very right-of-center member of the Grand Old Party during the mid-90s—a reaction, I realize now, to the entitlement and corruption that marked the early Bill Clinton years. I have since made peace with Clinton, and both my beliefs and my political self-discovery have matured into selfknowledge that I am left-of-center, with some traditionalist values (like a gay Mike Logan on “Law and Order: Criminal Intent,” but less boozy). On Tuesday, July 31, U.S. District Judge Vanessa Bryant, in Hartford, Connecticut, issued a 104-page decision, in which she ruled that a provision in the 1996 Defense of Marriage Act violates the Fifth Amendment’s guarantee of equal protection. This is the fifth federal judge to rule that DOMA is repellant to the U.S. Constitution.

Bryant—who was appointed to the federal bench by George W. Bush—ruled that the provision, which denies federal recognition of tax, health, and other benefits to married same-sex couples, “obligates the federal government to single out a certain category of marriages as excluded from federal recognition, thereby resulting in an inconsistent distribution of federal marital benefits.” She added that “many courts have concluded that homosexuals have suffered a long and significant history of purposeful discrimination.”

The ink on Bryant’s ruling was barely dry when the House Republican leadership—which has made itself the guardian of DOMA’s sacred screed since Attorney General Eric Holder decided last year to no longer waste tax dollars defending the indefensible—announced that it would continue to represent the interests of bigots and the narrowminded, by hiring outside legal counsel to fly to the nation’s far reaches when danger exists that American citizens might exercise their rights as free men and women. That sends a powerfuly bad message that is impossible to ignore.

Although I have no allegiance to the party of Jefferson, Jackson, FDR, and Obama, I would challenge any gay American to name another issue as important to the future of civil rights as marriage equality. I don’t think that civil unions are a terrible idea, but I understand the outrage of those who believe that a right for one should be a right for all. This is plain fairness. For House Republicans to throw ideological red meat to bigots and demagogues is an endorsement of hate, and in this moment, those gay Republicans who give their political or monetary support to GOP House candidates are endorsing hatred, plain and simple.

I don’t know if North Miami pastor Jack Hakimian hates gays as much as his words would indicate, but through his sermons, he is creating another generation of bigots and small-thinkers, and for what? A regular paying job? The satisfaction of being shepherd to the anchorless and rudderless? Maybe 5 million LGBT Americans should descend upon Chick-fil-A and order “Santorum shakes” to make the point that we may not like bigotry, but we think so little of it that we will ignore your narrow-mindedness, and show you true power, to forgive as well as to buy. But I would rather take my money—and my vote—elsewhere.