This past weekend was the first event of the 2016 Republican presidential campaign: a forum for would-be candidates to strut their stuff in Iowa, the early testing grounds during the primary/caucus cycle. The event dispelled any lingering belief that the party might tack toward the middle. Instead, it provided a preview of a Republican party that promises to be every bit as homophobic as the party of 2012 and 2008.
To begin with, the forum was hosted by Rep. Steve King, who believes that marriage equality leads to socialism, that homosexuality is a “self-professed” behavior and that President Obama contributed to the end of civilization by making a congratulatory phone call to openly gay NBA player Jason Collins. Instead of shunning King as the loon that he is, his fellow Republicans paid him homage.
What better way than to make opposition to marriage equality a litmus test for being a manly conservative. The candidates tripped all over themselves to outdo one another in their disdain for the right to marry (and, one might add, for reality.) At the forum and in the days leading up to it, the wannabes made it clear that anyone who supports marriage equality is a squish unworthy of the nomination.
Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee said that if the Supreme Court rules in favor of marriage equality, states can feel free to ignore the decision. Disputing the “notion of judicial supremacy,” Huckabee basically argued in favor of nullification, last used by the slave-holding South to ignore laws it didn’t like. Huckabee has already said that conservative Christians will leave the GOP if the party caves on marriage equality.
How about we take this to the next level?
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Not to be outdone, Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal threw his support behind a constitutional amendment “to allow states to continue to define marriage.”
Jindal was echoing Ted Cruz, the loathsome senator from Texas (thanks to gay billionaire Peter Thiel), who plans to introduce an amendment in Congress. Cruz is intent on making himself the standard against which others have to measure themselves. “Talk is cheap,” he told the audience at King’s forum. “One of the most important roles that men and women will play here in Iowa is to say ‘don’t talk, show me.’”
Even Chris Christie, who likes to portray himself as a realist, used his opposition to marriage equality in New Jersey to establish his credibility with the Iowa audience. The problem is that most conservatives believe that Christie threw in the towel on marriage equality instead of fighting to the bitter end. Opposition isn’t good enough. You need to be willing to die on that hill.
Also showing up for King’s jamboree were Rick Perry and Rick Santorum, who solidified their reputations as homophobes the last time around, and Ben Carson, who has decided that being a homophobe makes him qualified for the Oval Office.
Noticeably absent from the forum was Jeb Bush, the great establishment hope who is just a moderate homophobe by GOP standards, and Mitt Romney, about which nothing more need be said. Amazingly, in the face of all evidence that he’s a lousy candidate, Romney seems convinced that he should enter the fray yet again.
The fact that there are so many candidates is a sign of just how much disarray the party is in. There is no candidate who can satisfy all the factions. The Tea Party wing won’t settle for anything less than a true believer, which is a recipe for losing. The establishment wants a winner, which means someone who looks moderate by comparison to the rest of the field. But the ultra-conservative wing of the party calls the shots in the primaries, and they believe Romney and before him John McCain lost specifically because they were moderates.
Which means we’re in for a replay of 2012, in which laughable candidates like Herman Cain and Newt Gingrich managed to hang on for months while the establishment choice, Romney, failed to close the deal with voters. The fringe candidates will keep pulling the establishment candidates to the right. And what better issue to use than marriage equality? It fits all the requirements. It’s topical, it appeals to Christian voters, it revives nostalgia for the culture wars. And it’s a sign of just how unmoored from reality the GOP continues to be.
Cam
How many times to people like Huckabee have to repeat the exact same commentary used by the South before the Civil war before the Media starts to call the Conservatives on it?
They talk about states rights, this was a rallying cry of the South. They talk about nullification of Supreme Court decisions and states not having to abide by them (In violation of the Supremacy Clause of the Constitution) which they spoke of before the civil war and again during the school integration battles. And on and on and yet the media never ever calls them on it.
AxelDC
The GOP has a difficult task in 2016. They are likely running against the most popular and best qualified non-incumbent since Gen. Eisenhower. The US economy is finally recovering from the terrible 3rd Bush recession. Falling oil prices are boosting the economy even further with little risk of inflation while taking money from the biggest GOP bankrollers, Big Oil. Polls show Clinton’s lead against all GOP contenders in the teens.
How do Republicans run when they can’t cry about the economy? Social issues. Unfortunately, their favorite issues, abortion and homophobia, are not going to do much for them. Abortion hasn’t changed as an issue in 40 years, and a majority of Americans have supported gay marriage since before the 2012 election that the GOP lost.
Maybe the GOP can hope for backlash when the Supreme Court rules on gay marriage this summer. That would be surprising, since even in Mormon Utah, gay marriage is more popular than unpopular.
This isn’t 2004. Running against gay marriage barely worked for Bush, and that was 12 years go.
Desert Boy
Huck-a-Bible and Cruz are gutter scum. Neither has a chance of winning the Republican nomination.
But even the great white hopes of the GOP: Jebby Bush and Mitt Romney are opposed to marriage equality.
The country has changed but the Republican party desperately clings to their guns and Bibles and the 1950s.
maxdadmark
Please be careful not to provoke the right-wing closet cases that troll this site…. HAHAHAHAHAHA.
stonrdude
There is not one Republican that has anything to offer. I noted that Frothy was missing from the party. Mit has not been able to close the deal for 2 other times, why is he trying again. Republicans have nothing but hate to offer. Age old wealthy objections, the same once for years. This will be one long and nasty election process.
AtticusBennett
Well, they HAVE to. What are they gonna say? Hey! Vote for us! We will continue to vote against benefits for america’s military veterans! we will continue to ignore the middle and working classes and give tax breaks only to the wealthiest americans! we will continue to try to tear down The Affordable Care Act while NOT OFFERING ANY REAL ALTERNATIVE to it! We will continue to pretend we hate government handouts while being the states that take them the most!
they can’t be honest about their fiscal policies, so they have to run on “i’ll stop gays from turning your daughters into muslim abortionists who play golf while your sons become HAIR DRESSERS!!”
Curtispsf
The Republican Party will reluctantly unite around Bush or McCain. Don’t underestimate the Republican playbook. Romney stood a decent chance of winning but for the 47% comment. Meanwhile presumptive Queen Bee Clinton will still fail to arouse the Democrats because of her perceived failure to show passion and arouse the left wing of the party. She’s NO Bill Clinton…just a cold policy wonk. It’s time for the democrats to find their balls and nominate someone like Elizabeth Warren. She has “fire in her belly” and is unafraid to embrace the old ideals of the Democratic base which have been sorely lacking. IMHO.
VampDC
As someone who has lots of republican views…I would never vote for a republican who doesn’t believe in basic equality.
Kathukid
Oh, how I wish conservative Christians would opt out of the GOP and form their own party. Then perhaps the Republicans could return to some semblance of sanity and the Christian dominionists who wish to turn this nation into a Christian theocracy would be shut out forever.
SteveDenver
Political blogs have noted how few of the would-be candidates have MENTIONED gays or gay marriage. Just Tea Party extremists are going there.
jlfbman
@AtticusBennett: That was great, so funny!! always like your comments. Witty and stinging.
BJ McFrisky
@VampDC: On the same page with you there. Which is why in 2016 we’ll likely have President Clinton: The Sequel.
jlfbman
Wow!! These pea-brained Republicans are madly arrogant!! Supreme court rules for same sex marriage?? No problem, we will just change the laws so we can continue to discriminate. But it’s all about the money. The Christian power brokers who hold the strings for these puppets will not allow any head strong puppets to run. Keep going GOP, the more you shout out your homophobic rants, the more decent, good, wise people turn their backs.
Cam
@VampDC: said….. “As someone who has lots of republican views…I would never vote for a republican who doesn’t believe in basic equality.”
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I think the problem is that the GOP doesn’t have many of it’s own views anymore. They still try to claim the mantra of fiscal responsibility but GOP presidents blew out the budget. They claim they are for working Americans but have passed bills in states like Oklahoma stating that jurisdictions don’t have the right to pay more or offer sick leave etc…
So the values and beliefs that the party used to stand for don’t really seem to be there right now. A good housecleaning is in order.
AxelDC
@Cam: Republicans seem to have nothing but resentment on their side. Their leaders siphon tax money away from the public to their political donors while they distract their voters with racism, homophobia and culture wars.
jwtraveler
@AtticusBennett: You hit it right on the nose, although I don’t quite get the “golf” reference.
Charlie in Charge
Good, it’s a losing strategy.
jwtraveler
Neither the country nor the GOP revolves entirely around gay marriage and homophobia. The GOP, particularly this crop of lunatics, seems to embrace the values, beliefs and intellectual knowledge of the Middle Ages: Christian supremacy, subjugation of women, anti-science, anti-intellectualism, a feudalistic economic system, an eye for an eye approach to justice and survival of the fittest. They are attempting to erase 500 years of progress in civilization. Unfortunately they have been successful in convincing a large number of ignorant Americans that all this is in their best interest. If they succeed in gaining control of the government a lot of people who voted for them will be in for a rude awakening and the rest of us will pay the price.
onthemark
Isn’t it definite that Canada Cruz is NOT constitutionally qualified to be president? Apparently that gasbag Trump is no longer concerned about this problem. After the crap from Republican “birthers” about Obama supposedly being born elsewhere, I wish the Dems would protest any talk of Cruz running AT ALL.
Cruz bugs me the most of the bunch, for various reasons. He seems the most potentially dangerous if he ever actually got in.
Bill Maher says, “Ted Cruz is what you’d get if Ayn Rand had half a sex change operation.”
jwtraveler
@VampDC: There are NO Republicans who believe in basic equality. The single focus of the Republican Party is to maintain and increase the wealth and power of the wealthy and powerful. The rest is just distraction and deception. @AtticusBennett explains it very clearly.
GayEGO
Another bunch of hoopla that the Repugnantan candidates are spewing forth. It is amazing that they have made this far. I am tired of them and their ilk, refusing to use their brain to think logically to support equality for all American citizens. Next they will try to sell slavery and discrimination laws to put America back into last century.
RIGay
Hey folks, you have to remember where we are – this is the same playbook they used in the last election; let ALL the wing-nuts in the Big Tent implode and leave as early as possible. Imagine how much cleaner the slate will be in 12 months? THEN you take another look at what they are running on. No sense getting riled up over this absolute garbage.
For now, all you have is fodder and really obnoxious soundbites for cable news; something that is blessedly missing from our home.
Rad
Ladbrook
The growing list of Repubs seems to be filled mostly with loony Bible wavers (Cruz, Jindal, Santorum), a bunch of vanity candidates hoping for better book deals or TV ratings (Carson, Trump, Huckabee, Carly), and a predictable few from the billionaire bootlickers wing (Christie, Bush, Romney). Ugh.
They will spend most of 2015 and 2016 beating up on each other, and the last man standing will probably be Scott Walker. He’s the only one who fits somewhat comfortably with the social cons and the establishment set. And he’ll give Hillary a pretty tough race.
PLAYS WELL WITH OTHERS
MEMO TO:The GOP Right Wing Abhorrent Noxious Nutbags
FROM: The Democratic Party
THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU! We 1000% are on board with your following Mike Schmuckabees and Little Bobby Gindouche’s lead. Being virtual every poll taken in the last two years in has proven the majority of Americans now favor equality and are more likely to vote against a politician who spews bitter, bigoted hatred your strategy seems like a winner to us!!!
Many Thanks!!
tdx3fan
@Curtispsf: There is not a chance in hell that Warren will ever win the presidential race. I’m pretty much completely on the left (except for partial birth abortion) and I consider her to extremely radical to vote for. I’ll let Russia keep the communists in power, thank you very much.
You are beyond delusional if you think the Dems will not rally for Clintion. They have been doing it since 2010. Even moderate Republicans rally for Clinton. Clinton is not Bill, that is correct, but people respect and admire her for her brains. If she was male, no one would expect her to bake cookies… your comment reeks of sexism.
tdx3fan
@jwtraveler: They still will not really accomplish anything. They will never get an amendment to pass (it requires 2/3 2/3 3/4 to do so). It is just not going to happen. That means the best they can hope for is to throw some stupidity at us until we are smart enough to realize that it is stupidity.
wpewen
Just remember boys, how many Republican and Libertarian gay guys there are now. In “the good old days” almost nobody out declared themselves Republican. Now there are quite a few, and they are riding on the wave that we Democrats made for them. It looks at a cursory glance that they are not here, but don’t take anything for granted. Vote. I came out in the 70’s and can assuren you the parade down Market then was a lot more political than now. As long as we keep vigilant the wingnuts in the GOP will ultimately die, and it won’t be too long.
polarisfashion
We have to make sure as liberals that we get our base to come out and vote in this next election. The only reason the Republicans have the House and Senate is because too many of us stayed home. I would rather see Senator Bernie Sanders or Elizabeth Warren run for President but I’ll still support Hillary Clinton because there is no way in hell I would ever vote for a Republican!
One thing I do find interesting though is that if the Republicans want the White House so bad, why are so many their candidates belong in the crazy house? Even listening to them on Fox News they say some of the most bizarre stuff. I watched the Republican Presidential Debates and I’m thinking this is the best they can do? At times it was like watching Saturday Night Live!
Anyhow, back to my original point, we have got to throw our full support for whoever the Democratic candidate turns out to be. If we don’t show up to vote, the worse of two “evils” will always win and that is exactly what happened in this last mid term election.
polarisfashion
I really enjoy reading many of the comments in here and in the other articles on this website. It is so much better than yahoo because I can’t stand reading ignorant comments from trolls.
jwtraveler
@onthemark: McCain was born in Panama, Cruz was born in Canada, Obama was born in Hawaii. As usual, right-wing rhetoric has no rational basis. The only objection they’ve ever had about Obama is that he’s black. They know they can’t say that so they make up a lot of stupid stuff. Cruz’s father was from Cuba so he gets to be an honorary white boy despite the Spanish name. He’s also a right-wing lunatic so he fits in well with the Republicans.
jwtraveler
@tdx3fan: Only in the U.S. of fascist A. is Warren considered a leftist or a radical. In most of the world she’d be a centrist. In most other countries the major right-wing parties (excluding the nationalist and neo-fascist parties) are farther left than the Democratic Party here. In Australia, the party on the right is called the Liberal Party.
“Partial-birth abortion” is a Republican invention. The procedure it refers to is very rare and is used only in the most dire of circumstances, usually when the woman’s life is in danger.
onthemark
@jwtraveler: Totally agree, except I’d quibble that McCain was a bit of a gray area having been born in the Panama Canal Zone. No president was ever a native of an overseas “U.S. Territory.” Probably fine, but just a bit of a gray area. But his opponents Bush & Obama never made a fuss about it, and no election official squawked about it, so the courts were never asked to weigh in on it.
If Cruz were seriously challenged on this, however, it could get interesting. The news media should at least be bringing it up!
Cagnazzo82
Étrange.
The usual republican voices on this board are oddly silent and/or entirely absent in this comment section.
jwtraveler
@onthemark: Yeah, you’re right about McCain. George Romney (father of Mitt), who ran for the GOP nomination in the 1968 presidential race was born in Mexico. I don’t believe that was a U.S. territory at the time.
enlightenone
@Desert Boy: “…Republican party desperately clings to their guns and Bibles and the 1950s.”
You forgot the gravy!
1EqualityUSA
Republicans have rigged the voting to go their way. Gerrymandering, moving voting locations near college campuses to inconvenient areas that have no sidewalks nor easy access, conservative, politically-minded Supreme Court Justices gutted the Voting Rights Act, allowing immediate barriers for non-white voters to fulminate, and bundles of Democratic votes being found dumped in rivers….on and on and on. It takes an inordinate amount of Democratic votes to even compete with just one Republican vote. No wonder these Republican nut-bags are rolling around in the mud with religious loons, as they have cheated beyond measure and set themselves up to have an advantage. We ought to be able to vote with our ATM cards. If banking is considered sound, can we not figure out a convenient way to vote that cuts out all of the cheating too? I remember reading an article during the Prop H8 days where anti-gay propaganda/pro-hetero-marriage posters were up on the wall of the church where voting takes place. We all must vote. Just remember who they would want on the Supreme Court, if you feel like staying home and zoning out on films that day.
PLAYS WELL WITH OTHERS
@wpewen:
You are so very correct. The hate filled, noxious, abhorrent bigots are slowly burning their vile mortal coils ready to embark on their one way already purchased, procured, and processed one way ticket to a special corner of hell to suffer in eternity…………
As the age or respondents decreases, the acceptance of all things Gay increases dramatically in virtually every single poll taken in the last decade…….
Maude
Must we always stick our heads in the sand by not recognizing the reality of the 2014 midterm election(s)?!!
The GOP stampeded allover us. I hate that that is so, but it is!
Those bastards who voted overwhelmingly against “GAY” in general, will be voting again in 2016……and we don’t need a crystal ball to see that they are growing in number and will continue to grow unless we stop them in their tracks right now.
There are eighty (80) more republican men and women in congress than there was just
two months ago…and they haven’t even begun to roll back all we’ve accomplished.
The enemy is growing by leaps and bounds, and we are moving forward no more, because the States now run by those congressmen and women we seem not to realize how much power they actually have.
Wishful thinking and calling the enemy bad names is fine in it’s place, but we need to support our brethren with more than just words…we need to volunteer to work to raise money to present opposite views against the GOP garbage.
We need to donate cash as well as our time and efforts.
Google, how to fight the GOP, or how to help the GAY cause.
Do something. Anything. Make phone calls, write to the editors of your local newspapers. Call the radio stations, tv stations, and your own congressperson.
Cam
@Maude: said….. “Must we always stick our heads in the sand by not recognizing the reality of the 2014 midterm election(s)?!!
The GOP stampeded allover us. I hate that that is so, but it is!”
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IF you want to look at reality 2014 was always going to come down in the GOP favor, they were defending 1/3 as many Senate seats as the Dems. In 2016, it is the opposite.
Maude
Cam, I remember you from last time….You accused me of being someone else other than myself..do you ever get anything right?
you always come right up to the edge….and then you jump off.
I don’t really care that you jump, but I fear, like a lemming, you might take some innocent with you.
Billysees
@wpewen:
“As long as we keep vigilant the wingnuts in the GOP will ultimately die, and it won’t be too long.”
There’s much merit to what you’ve said.
Cam
@Maude:
Did you have an actual response to my post or were you just trying to do an homage to Palin’s Iowa speech and ramble nonsensically?
jwtraveler
@Billysees: I’m not sure. Those people tend to breed like rabbits.
Billysees
@jwtraveler:
“I’m not sure. Those people tend to breed like rabbits.”
That’s true also. The original comment probably should have read, “As long as we keep vigilant, the wingnuts in the GOP and whatever influence they have will remain at a minimum.”
SouthwestSun
I’m a gay Republican and I believe firmly that the GOP will one day be just as welcoming to gays as Democrats. Is that day going to come tomorrow? No, but anti-gayers will be shoved into unpopular far-our parties that are irrelevant and gay rights will be mainstream in both parties. That’s where I see the future. … I’m Republican because I believe in low taxes, teacher accountability, tort reform and a strong defense.
enlightenone
@SouthwestSun: ” I’m Republican because I believe in low taxes, teacher accountability, tort reform and a strong defense.”
Can you be more specific Lindsay Graham?
Ruhlmann
American politics is like driving past an accident, you don’t want to look but a small part of you wants to see the head in the ditch. You really need another revolution.