SOUNDBITES — “I’ll never forget one of my first meetings with Clinton in the White House. He had walked into a firestorm over the question of whether gays should be allowed to serve in the military. He’d invited all the Democratic members of the Armed Services Committee to this gathering. He went around the room, asking everyone’s opinion about gays in the military. Some senators gave long answers. Some were terse. Some were flowery and revealing, and others held their cards close to their vest. It added up to a very lengthy meeting. I remember it well partly because Vicki and I had tickets to the ballet that night. Baryshnikov was dancing at the Warner Theatre. I’d told Vicki to go ahead and that I’d meet her there when I could. But the meeting went on and on, for more than two hours – extraordinary by White House standards. Finally, my turn to speak came. I made a brief comment in support of allowing gays in the military, in which I mentioned that all the arguments against such a policy had already been made….Well, I was wrong about that. Almost all the arguments had been used before. The last senator to speak was Robert Byrd, and he came up with a new one on all of us…..He informed us, with many ornate flourishes, that there had been a terrible problem in ancient Rome with young military boys turned into sex slaves. I don’t remember the exact details, but I think the story involved Tiberius Julius Caesar being captured and abused and used as a sex slave. He escaped and then years later he sought vengeance and killed his captors. Anyway, it was something like that. The room fell silent. The senator continued. Then President Clinton stood up. His response was short and sweet. ‘Well,’ he said. ‘Moses went up to the mountain, and he came back with the tablets and there were ten commandments on those tablets. I’ve read those commandments. I know what they say, just like I know you do. And nowhere in those ten commandments will you find anything about homosexuality. Thank y’all for coming.’ He ended the meeting and walked out of the room.” —Ted Kennedy, in his memoir True Compass, recalling the former president’s M.O. for dealing with the military’s gays
ted kennedy
‘I don’t remember the exact details, but I think the story involved Tiberius Julius Caesar being captured and abused and used as a sex slave’
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ggreen
Bravo Mr. Clinton. This is the problem with having people in the Senate and Congress that wore shoes that buttoned and were teen-agers during the silent move era. Senator Byrd has been in office 50 years and spent most of that time enriching himself and his cronies. He has spent little time doing anything for the people of the US or his constituents in West Virgina. He is the young version of Dianne Feinstein.
robert
Lets not forget, Senator Byrd was once a white supremacist. Leopards never change their spots.
Jaroslaw
Thanks Robert for reminding some and informing others….
robert
@Jaroslaw:
You are welcome.
InExile
@ggreen: Agree with you on Feinstein. Doesn’t she look like Divine, same lips? Although I must admit, I have nothing against Divine.
Andrew
Uh, no.
Gaius Julius Caesar was once captured by pirates as a young man, but there is no mention of him being raped. He was held for ransom. In ancient times there was a big taboo against physically assaulting the upper class, even while they were held hostage, so I doubt very much any suggestion that they raped him.
The ransom was paid and Caesar was returned. He did hunt the pirates down and kill them, but only because while he was being held, he promised them that if he was freed that’s what he would do.
There were rumors during Caesar’s early political career that he had submitted himself (the un-manly position to ancient peoples) to the king of Bithynia (Western Turkey). I’ve even seen LGBT groups try to claim that Caesar was gay because of this account.
But again, this is bullshit. Those rumors were started by Caesar’s political opponents. Cicero used them to slander Caesar before the senate. That doesn’t mean that it’s a trustworthy or accurate description of his sexual orientation. It would be like 2000 years from now communists holding up Barack Obama as one of their own because his political enemies call him that. It’s ridiculous.
M Shane
No. 6 · Andrew I think that your’re historically accurate. There seems to be more than meets the eye to this story, that I’m not quite getting.
One thing I’ll say for Byrd is that of all the people in the Senate i believe he was the only one to make known his rage and disgust at the Senates caving into Bush’s unconstitutiuionl requsuist for the power to make war in Iraq.
I have to read more into this particular incident though and what the exchange means.
B
Here’s one version of “Caesar and the pirates”: http://www.yaggyslatin.com/Caesarandthepirates.html (moral of the story: don’t mess with Caesar).
The other part of the story can be read at http://books.google.com/books?id=clZgThbI5yIC&pg=PA156&lpg=PA156&dq=Caesar+Nicomedes&source=bl&ots=dImeEQ82KT&sig=1nX-RVyBOBlq5uewcQ6y3PeZIdQ&hl=en&ei=J7-uSsy6DJTYtgP5_LjJCw&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=8#v=onepage&q=Caesar Nicomedes&f=false which claims, among other things, that Roman soldiers sang “Gallias Caesar subegit, Nicomedes Caesarem.” (Caesar conquered the Gauls, Nicomedes conquered Caesar).
It was OK for an upper-class Roman to be top, but not a bottom. As Andrew said, there was a lot of politics and dirty tricks going on, so who knows what Caesar actually did, but the mud throwing is rather funny to read about 2000 years later – its something you could imagine happening today.