It’s been a hell of a few days for Governor Bill Richardson. The Democratic presidential contender caused a stir at the gay forum by mistakenly saying gays choose to be gay. A big no, no, to be sure and became the talk of the town. And, apparently, Richardson’s growing weary of all the gay drama. And, it seems, all gay talk – period.
NYDN attempted to chat with Richardson on gay marriage, but the 59-year old politico stonewalled ’em:
Richardson, who supports civil unions, was asked if he would veto a gay marriage bill because he believed in his heart that same-sex marriage is wrong. He replied, “I don’t want to get into that. I thought you guys were going to ask me about other stuff. Don’t you care about other stuff?”
Apparently Richardson’s not as worried about equal rights as he’d like one to believe.
ds
yeah, um, either that or unlike the majority of the myopic ‘mos, he realizes there’s more on the table than “gay marriage” (and in the end, it all really boils down to the one thing: the role of the government and its goons and the social insurances offered us by said government).
I myself am willing to put “gay marriage” on hold if it means we have a chance in hell of changing our imperialist global policies, reforming domestic education, access to a quality health care system, fairer taxes, and you know, if there’s going to be a fucking planet left in 50 years.
Between the HRC feelie-show and the YouTube debates, this election is increasingly becoming a Miss America pageant, where we’re more concerned about one individual’s views than their ability to actually implement change. Guess what matters more than whether your candidate “personally” supports gay marriage: Whether they’ll have the cajones to scoff the turkey-farm and upwardly-distributing traditions of our political system.
GoodBuddy
You seem to have it in for Bill Richardson. You could have been linking to this article instead.
I don’t quite know what to make of him as a candidate. He seemed to fumble the part of the Logo/HRC forum about being gay being a choice instead of something inate at birth, even when he was being telegraphed the answers by the questioners. It was amusing to hear him say later he was confused by the question because he was tying the word choice to abortion and the concept of a ‘woman’s right to choose’. Maybe he was real tired or jet lagged or something.
I want a president that is a seasoned politian. This stuff about wanting to change things in Washington is a bunch of crap in may opinion. I thought Bill Richardson’s responses in the Logo/HRC forum were rather nuanced, such as when he related that DOMA was a stopgap measure to keep a Marriage Amendment out of the constitution. But Hillary Clinton also showed that kind of grasp of the issues, while Obama, Gravel, and Edwards were prepped on the things the crowd wanted to hear. Kuchinich came across as the true believer in gay rights as well as in truth, justice, and the American way. Obama probably also believes in gay rights, the problem with Richardson is you can’t really tell. The last major outsider candidate (like Obama), who was going to reject the evil ways of Washington, was Jimmy Carter. He was the president who would never lie (except to gay people — while running he promised to issue an executive order barring discrimination against gay people in the federal government, which he never did).
Bill Clinton’s very first substantive action as president was to end the ban on gay people in the military. The uproar that ensued, resulting in the Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell legislation, was the result of his fumbling the issue. Had he waited a few months things would have gone very differently (or not – who knows for sure).
The sad thing to me is that my opinion doesn’t really count. I really don’t like it that the choice of candidates is decided in Iowa, New Hampshire, and South Carolina. I think some of the big states need to pass laws putting there primaries the week after New Hampshire.