How Hispanics Became the New Gays: By FRANK RICH

[kpete]

How Hispanics Became the New Gays
By FRANK RICH
Published: June 11, 2006

HE never promised them the Rose Garden. But that's where America's self-appointed defenders of family values had expected President Bush to take his latest stand against same-sex marriage last week. In the end, without explanation, the event was shunted off to a nondescript auditorium in the Executive Office Building, where the president spoke for a scant 10 minutes at the non-prime-time hour of 1:45 p.m. The subtext was clear: he was embarrassed to be there, a constitutional amendment "protecting" marriage was a loser, and he feared being branded a bigot. "As this debate goes forward, every American deserves to be treated with tolerance and respect and dignity," Mr. Bush said.

That debate died on the floor of the Senate less than 48 hours later, when the amendment went down to an even worse defeat than expected. Washington instantly codified the moral: a desperate president at rock bottom in the polls went through the motions of a cynical and transparent charade to rally his base in an election year. Nothing was gained — even the president of the Family Policy Network branded Mr. Bush's pandering a ruse — and no harm was done.

Except to gay people. That's why the president went out of his way to talk about "tolerance" at this rally, bizarrely held on the widely marked 25th anniversary of the first mention of an AIDS diagnosis in a federal report. Mr. Bush knew very well that his participation in this tired political stunt, while certain to have no effect on the Constitution, could harm innocent Americans.

When young people hear repeatedly that gay couples aspiring to marital commitment are "undermining the moral fabric of the country, that stuff doesn't wash off," says Matt Foreman of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force. Most concretely, the Washington ruckus trickles down into sweeping assaults on gay partners' employee benefits and parental rights at the state level, as exemplified by a broadly worded referendum on the Virginia ballot this fall outlawing any kind of civil union. Had Mr. Bush really believed that his words had no consequences, he would have spoken in broad daylight at the White House and without any defensive touchy-feely bromides about "tolerance."

more at:
http://select.nytimes.com/2006/06/11/opinion/11rich.html?_r=1&hp
http://www.rawstory.com/news/2006/Frank_Rich_How_Hispanics_became_new_0610.html

[Deja Q]

1. As with his other speeches, his definition of "American" is the same.

Wealthy corporate executive.

And some of them are gay.

And wouldn't care because their money is more important than their humanity.

[idgiehkt]

2. John Aravosis ran that headline about 2 weeks ago

journalists love to bitch about bloggers not being real journalists and yet they steal from them with impunity.

[PSPS]

3. I laughed when I heard bush's silly non-sequitur

"Every American deserves to be treated with tolerance and respect and dignity," said bush in his speech promoting the intolerance, disrespect and demonizing of a large number of Americans.

[UTUSN]

4. Careful, Frank! I said Hispanics are the new Jews &a DUer sed to STOP IT!