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While the conservative faction of the Republican Party is busy rending its garments over the four GOP turncoats in the New York Senate that made marriage equality possible, some in the GOP have adopted a wholly different attitude.
A top GOP operative in Neveda has suggested Nevada Republican party should throw in the towel on the marriage equality as well.
Not to do what's just, right or in line with our Constitution. Oh no. It's all about the money.
Las Vegas blog The Strip relays these comments from Chuck Muth. The Strip describes Muth as an “outspoken conservative activist whose wrath is feared by most Republican elected officials in Nevada.” Muth wrote this in his daily email blast that goes to GOPers and journalists:
Many, if not most of you won't like this but gay marriage is coming. Nationwide. It's inevitable. It's only a matter of time. It can and will be delayed, but not stopped. And eventually, it will be as acceptable as black/white marriages. The problem isn't letting gays into marriage, but having already let the government into marriage.
As an economy based almost solely on tourism and entertainment, Nevada — and especially Las Vegas — should accept reality, embrace the inevitable, repeal the state's ban on gay marriage, and scarf up on the tourism bonanza that would result rather than suck hind teat behind the likes of Hawaii and New York.
Moth's biography from his own blog, Muth Truths:
Chuck Muth is President of Citizen Outreach and a professional political communications consultant.
He is a former executive director of the American Conservative Union, a National Chairman of the Republican Liberty Caucus, a Clark County GOP chairman and former Nevada Republican Party executive director.
Chuck is also a professional campaign trainer who volunteers as a national field instructor for numerous groups, campaigns and organizations.
Many of us in the LGBT activist community fight for the right to marry so our families will not have to endure what Janice Langbehn and Lisa Marie Pond did in Florida in 2007. The lesbian couple were celebrating their 20th anniversary in the Sunshine State with their children when Pond suffered an aneurysm and was rushed to Ryder Trauma Center at Jackson Memorial Hospital in Miami.
Thence began the nightmare for Langbehn and the children, as they were at first treated as virtual strangers to Pond, denied access and information as she was struggling for her life in the trauma center. Langbehn claims that a hospital social worker said to her they she should not expect any information or access because they were in an “anti-gay city and state.”
Hospital administrators ignored the power of attorney Langbehn had faxed over and continued to deny her requests for information or the chance to see her partner. Pond died alone, denied the comforting presence of her wife and children. A lawsuit filed by Langbehn and Lambda Legal was subsequently dismissed.
No, injustices like this seems unpersuasive to many in the Republican party. Instead, it looks like this is the genesis of Muth's change of heart came from this initiative reported by from Bloomberg News:
New York City Plans Campaign to Woo Gay Weddings
New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg plans to unveil a campaign to sell the most populous U.S. city as a gay-wedding destination after thousands marched to celebrate the state’s legalization of such marriages.
The “NYC I Do” campaign “will create millions of dollars in additional economic impact to the city’s $31 billion tourism industry,” Kimberly Spell, a spokeswoman for NYC & Company, the city’s marketing office, said yesterday in an e-mail. Bloomberg will unveil more details in coming days, she said.
A report by marriage equality advocates suggested New York stood to reap $391 million in from areas including economic activity and tax revenue within three years.
The report predicted about 3,300 couples from surrounding states without such laws would choose to marry in New York, and that almost 42,000 other out-of-state gay and lesbian couples would go there for a “destination wedding.”
[...]
The benefit to Massachusetts’ economy was worth more than $100 million over five years after legalizing same-sex marriage, according to the [Los Angeles-based Williams] institute.
Well, whatever gets them from point A to point B, I guess I'll take it. If the conclusion is correct, who am I to quibble with the reasoning that gets them there?
It is interesting that they are willing to usher in End Times and anarchy for the sake of a few bucks.
Social conservatives see the writing on the wall and are furiously rending their garments. The American Families Association's Bryan Fischer had a meltdown via Twitter yesterday.
Fischer was responding to news that Clarke Cooper of the LGBT group Log Cabin Republicans had secured a high-level position as director of finance on the Republican National Committee. Cooper had been quoted as saying the GOP should “not take a position on social issues.”
On Cooper's appointment, Fischer also said:
Wow. Fischer is so apoplectic he skipped right over Godwin and went straight to slavery.
Appointing Cooper to such a high-profile position within the Republican establishment is an interesting move for the party to have made. Recall that not long ago CPAC conference “endured” the boycotting of social conservatives to protest the presence of the LGBT group GOProud.
The battle for the GOP's priorities is heating up and the American Taliban is enduring some hits. Think Progress reports that internal polling by New York's state Republican party have given them no cause t
o be concerned about reelection prospects for their four Republicans who voted yes to equality. Top GOP Albany insider John McArdle says:
They can win. There were polls that were done throughout this whole effort and what we’ve seen consistently is that while this issue is important, that are a lot of issues that are probably more important on the minds of most people.
To conservative threats to his own seat, Republican Senator Mark Grisanti has a flippant response, “Go ahead and do what you’ve got to do.”
Sounds like “Bring it on!” to me.
6 Comments
so what he is admitting…is that hsi oppostion had nothing to do with any sanctity of marriage BS, or even to making money before, but simply politics at the expense of gay people.
Now that he can see some money in it, the wind is blowing him the other way. something like a long stroke.
Nice to know
Well, I don’t know if he specifically was ever opposed on the grounds of “sanctity of marriage.”
There may be many in the GOP that don’t care much one way or another. (In fact, polling that asks voters to prioritize topics often shows most people who are “opposed” do not consider it important issue.)
And now that the tide is turning, in polling, in public opinion, they may now be feeling less inclined to let the Bryan Fischers speak for the GOP perspective on this topic.
We’re here, we’re queer…might as well make a few bucks off us! Most of my friends I’d like to invite to our wedding live in Las Vegas and Henderson. I’d seriously consider marrying my sweetie there.
David Frum struck an impersonal, stand-offish tone, as well, in his “I was wrong” pieceIn his piece a few days ago, I found Frum’s approach to be personally detached.
His perspective was solely about statistical realities, breaking it down that marriage equality has not been, and will not be, the thing which harms the “traditional” family. More worrisome in his mind is that children are increasingly born to unmarried parents:
(I don’t know the full context of the stats on unmarried Latina/o parents, and it probably doesn’t matter to Frum how many of the parents are together and marry within their child’s first year… no matter how strong those families are, he strikes me as unlikely to acknowledge them as positive force.)
But the thing that stands out to me is that he never acknowledges the humanity of same-sex married couples, or their children. It doesn’t seem real to him that his past testimony — that marriage equality would cause irreparable harm to all families — actually caused harm to gay families. He even ignores the real-life joys and blessings of same-sex couples to mention that, writing on his own 23rd wedding anniversary, no blessing is equal to a happy marriage.
So, this strikes me as very worthwhile:
It fits with the historical perspective, as well. Loving v. Virginia didn’t come after, or result in, general acceptance of interracial families. Some of the most critical, necessary support for LGBT civil rights is going to come from folks who give it guardedly, in technical terms, and/or reluctantly.
I read Frumm’s piece too On the one hand I loved his reversal and such mea culpas are always welcome.
But I do agree with you. It was an emotionally detached piece. And filled with odd asides, like while the American family is doing relatively well, “statistically, Latino families are doing worse…” I mean so what?
And the worrying about kids being born out of wedlock seems to presume that they are being raised by single parents.
But in truth, many of today’s youth in their child bearing years do not aspire to wed. They shack up and have kids. And the childrens’ experience may be functionally no different from kids in wedded two parent households. They still have two involved adults to financially and emotionally support them.
And yeah, we do get spoiled because some of our new converts to equality deliver some of the most awesome testimony for our community. The last Governor of Maine comes to mind when he shared the thought process that lead him to decide to sign the marriage equality bill in 2009. And Grisanti & Saland qualify from the floor of the NY Senate last week.
But even if the conversion is seemingly half hearted or a little muddled or indecipherable in the thought process, imo, we should endeavor to welcome them, rather than tell them they’re doing equality wrong.
Some people may never get it fully right.
re: imo, we should endeavor to welcome them…Exactly… that’s been the starting point of the process that many of us have navigated within our own families after coming out.