ABE: HONEST & STRAIGHT

New York Post ^ | 12/27/04 | ERIC FETTMANN

[kattracks]

IN the pantheon of presidents, was Abraham Lincoln a queer eye among a bevy of straight guys?

Yes, claims a new book, "The Intimate World of Abraham Lincoln," which has received the imprimatur of a major publisher (Free Press) and a distinctly supportive article in The New York Times.

The book's author, the late C.A. Tripp, was a longtime gay writer and former sex-researcher for Alfred C. Kinsey. And he insists that the case is beyond dispute: Lincoln was gay, he writes, naming several alleged lovers.

But the evidence is not just slim, it's nonexistent.

[snip]

Which is why serious Lincoln historians — like two-time Pulitzer Prize winner David Herbert Donald, who's spent a lifetime studying the 16th president — reject these claims.

[snip]

Actually, there's much more to this than debatable historical research. As Larry Kramer, the provocative gay activist, told the Times: "It's a revolutionary book, because the most important president in the history of the United States was gay. Now maybe they'll leave us alone, all those people in the party he founded."

[snip]

Back in 1999, he attracted considerable media attention when he claimed he'd uncovered a previously unknown Joshua Speed diary that explicitly confirmed the "love affair." Kramer even gave a public reading of some lurid quotes from the diary that sounded like they could have been written by Danielle Steele.

Since then, the diary has never surfaced. Says Holzer, Kramer "said he invented the story as a means of reminding Americans that gays can become great." Indeed, Kramer has been quoted as saying that he was trying to provide "the first gay president" — even if that means having "to invent our own" history.

[snip]

The danger is that the disturbing trend of skewing history to a particular political worldview will keep growing.

[okie01]

If Gore Vidal can do a biography of Lincoln and make no remark or allusion as to a certain proclivity, we can be assured there is no there, there.

[international american]

Barfmao....

[Susannah]

I can't remember which channel it was on, but there was a group discussing the possibility of President Millard Fillmore and President James Buchanan as being gay because they were unmarried. Then someone in the group said that they should look at all the presidents as possible gays because of how Governor McGreevy came out while he was married and with children.

[Susannah]

Gay former presidents?

[risk]

Now maybe they'll leave us alone, all those people in the party he founded."

If they would stop asking for changes to the fundamental building blocks of our society? If they would stop demanding medical handouts and special tax relief? If they would stop trying to modify curriculum in our schools? If they would stop trying to break down the unity of churches? If they would stop infiltrating our prime-time TV and radio offerings with their "it's normal" agenda?

[WestVirginiaRebel]

Well, the powdered wigs Washington and Jefferson wore are a dead giveaway as far as I'm concerned. /sarcasm

[USNBandit]

they should look at all the presidents as possible gays because of how Governor McGreevy came out while he was married and with children.

Yeah, but everybody knew McGreevy was gay. Not much of a secret there.

[johnnycap]

This is why most research for and against the gay agenda at this point is baloney. The researchers currently have too much agenda to be honest purveyors of fact. The idea of creating a gay president to forward a cause is stupid. At this point in the debate, people are making things up to solidify their political agendas and calling it science. Its baloney.

[risk]

I suppose the metrosexuals are using those powdered wigs as an excuse. I'll believe it when they start having duels with each other.

[smoothsailing]

The word gay no longer makes any sense.

I remember when it meant happy, or cheerful, or carefree.

Now it is supposed to mean something quite queer.

I just find this sad.

[lizma]

Actually, as sick as this is, it's not as upsetting as the article I read "proving" Frodo and Sam Wise were lovers.

These authors are just too narcistic to be accepted in society. They are useless people and should be ignored.

[Mo1]

Actually, there's much more to this than debatable historical research. As Larry Kramer, the provocative gay activist, told the Times: "It's a revolutionary book, because the most important president in the history of the United States was gay. Now maybe they'll leave us alone, all those people in the party he founded."

So they think pushing this BS will make the gay life style more acceptable ???

[Maurice Tift]

Lincoln wasn't gay, he was bipedal!

[capitan_refugio]

Kat - you know, with this thread, you are going to break the hearts of some of the confederate cabal and lincoln-haters who post here at FR. They have been counting on this book to "prove" President Lincoln was a homosexual, especially after their mentor, gay activist Larry Kramer, failed to publish the "secret diaries of Joshua Speed."

[capitan_refugio]

Ping for your information.

Did you know Larry Kramer fabricated the whole "secret diary of Joshua Speed" story?

[Mo1]

And therein lies the problem with the blatant politicization of history: Truth ends up getting lost. legitimate scholarly debate is inhibited in the process, too: Already, says Holzer, "historians are being put into a position where if you object too strenuously to Tripp's book, you seem homophobic."

If I recall correctly .. many in the news business were afraid of reporting on McGrevey's secret gay life style for the exact same reason.

And let McGreevey get away with appointing his lover as Head of Home Land Security in NJ even though he had ZERO experience for the job

[The Raven]

Yep...the libs like a living, breathing Constitution...but they also need a living breathing history rewrite to go along with it.

[GOPcapitalist]

I've always been content to wait for whoever wants to make the case to present whatever evidence he has. Seeing as I have not read this book, I cannot comment on its evidence (Perhaps you can pick up a copy and summarize it for us on your next trip to one of those Californy bathhouses, eh capitan?).

What I do know and have stated many times is that Lincoln _probably_ was not gay, though this also cannot be said definitively. Why? Because there are lots of little things ole "Aunt Rebecca" did including a very gay sounding poem called the "Chronicles of Rueben" that cast just enough doubt to keep the story alive.

One possible interpretation of Lincoln's poem is gay-sounding. A more likely explanation is that Lincoln was simply a very crass individual who liked to talk about lewd subjects and tell fart jokes.

Then again, one must wonder why you are suddenly so interested in pinging us all to threads about Lincoln's alleged gayness. Given your recent episode in which you accused me of bigotry for criticizing and making fun of the homosexual agenda that y'all seem to celebrate out west, one would think that you would be eager to embrace this newer, gayer version of your idol Saint Abe.

[L.N. Smithee]

As Larry Kramer, the provocative gay activist, told the Times: "It's a revolutionary book, because the most important president in the history of the United States was gay. Now maybe they'll leave us alone, all those people in the party he founded."

Setting aside the clunker about Lincoln 'founding' the Republican Party, something he certainly did not do, let us, purely for the sake of argument, accept the premise that Lincoln was indeed a homosexual.

What does that tell us? That a openly homosexual man is capable of being the President of the United States? On the contrary! It shows that if a homosexual man wants to lead a country in which his lifestyle/inclination/orientation is rejected as disgusting, sinful, or both, he must deny himself for the greater good, and maintain a relationship with a woman so nobody will suspect anything is awry.

Not exactly what Larry Kramer had in mind, was it?