Butch, Butch Bush! (Dowd alert)

The New York Times ^ | 08/03/03 | Maureen Dowd

[Pokey78]

WASHINGTON

Let's get it straight. The president and the pope aren't riding the new gay wave.

"I believe a marriage is between a man and a woman," said President Bush last week. "And I think we ought to codify that one way or the other. And we've got lawyers looking at the best way to do that." Trying to add a tolerant note to an intolerant policy, he allowed that he was "mindful that we're all sinners."

Last time I checked, we had separation of church and state, so I don't know why the president is talking about sin, or why he is implying that gays who want to make a permanent commitment in a world full of divorce and loneliness are sinners.

If we follow Mr. Bush's logic, shouldn't we have a one-strike-and-you're-out constitutional amendment: no marriage for gays, but no second marriage for straights who prove they're not up to it?

The Vatican, always eager to erase lines between church and state, warned Catholic lawmakers it would be "gravely immoral" to vote for gay marriage or gay adoption. Such preaching seems tinny coming after revelations about the scope of homosexuality in the priesthood.

Until last week's denunciations, this had been a giddy Summer of Gays. First the Supreme Court blessing. Then Hollywood's raft of gay-themed projects, from J.Lo's lesbian turn in "Gigli" to the Bravo reality shows "Boy Meets Boy" and "Queer Eye for the Straight Guy."

"Queer Eye," the summer makeover hit, on the cover of Entertainment Weekly, features five gay guys who swoop in to give the Cinderfella treatment to unexfoliated straight guys, while scattering catty comments about their grooming and decor, such as, "This place screams women's correctional facility."

Maybe we should pity President Bush, stranded in his 50's world of hypermasculinity as his country goes gay and metrosexual (straight men with femme tastes like facials). Even the uptight Wal-Mart stores have expanded antidiscrimination policy to protect gay employees, and Bride's magazine is offering its first feature on same-sex weddings.

Maybe the president and his swaggering circle should think about a "Queer Eye" makeover. I asked a gay political reporter friend if he could offer some tips:

On the vice president: "I'd love to see Cheney with a pierced ear and a diamond stud. Or in a body-hugging black T-shirt, just for the pure sport of it.

"He needs new eyewear. With his big face and lantern jaw, he should lose those five-pound glasses. There are some fabulous frames out there.

"About his hair, all I can offer is my sincere regrets."

On the defense secretary: "In his own sort of antediluvian way, Rummy is a metrosexual. He works. He may be a warmonger, he may be intemperate, but just about every third woman I know wants him."

When it came to the president's possibilities, he got really excited: "Cowboy boots are fine for a certain kind of saucy backyard barbecue. But wearing them as often as he does, with those big belt buckles in the shape of Texas, it seems like he's trying too hard to prove his masculinity.

"He's definitely on the right track with low-stress weight lifting, but if he really wants a physique for the ages, a little yoga would help uncoil that gunslinger hunch.

"His hair is too tightly clipped. It looks painted on. And he's a huge squinter. The corner of his eyes are starting to look lined. Botox alert!

"He needs to dip into the merciful world of cosmetic products and avail himself of some kind of lip balm or gloss that helps mask the fact that he misplaced his lips somewhere.

"In open-collar shirts, he has a tiny little island of lost chest hair. It is too low to be a shaving oversight and too high to be a peripheral outgrowth of Alec Baldwin chest mat. It's neither fish nor fowl, so he should wax it out of there.

"Everything else about him just shouts `Butch, butch, butch!' But to throw Bush a metrosexual bone, whenever you see him walking off Air Force One with that little furball Barney under his arm, that canine puff of air that most drag queens wouldn't be caught dead with, it's like he's halfway to a Chanel rabbit fur handbag.

"Bush does such a good job of seeming blissfully laid back and vacantly bubbly that he might as well go blond. It might help with California's electoral votes, too."   

[Pokey78]

Maureen wants to go to Crawford, get W in the barn and let him show her what a REAL man is. She's so smitten with him.

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From Oxblog:

IMMUTABLE LAWS OF DOWD

1. Ashcroft never deserves credit.

2. Offering constructive solutions to problems, instead of whining endlessly about them, is a sign of weakness.

3. The People Magazine principle: all political phenomena can be explained with reference solely to caricatures of the personalities involved ("Dubya" is stupid; "Poppy" is an aristocrat; Cheney is macho-man; etc.). Any reference to the common good or even to old-fashioned politicking is, like, so passe.

4. It is much better to be cute than coherent.

5. Maureen knows best. Her long years as a columnist (doing basically what your great-aunt Tillie does in the nursing home bull sessions, but getting paid for it) have given her deep insight into foreign relations, politics, welfare, the Constitution, and all other topics. To disagree with Maureen in any way is not only a sign of being wrong, it's a hallmark of pure evil...or at least membership in the NRA, which is pretty much the same thing.

6. It is usually possible and always desirable to name-drop and name-call in the same sentence.

7. The particulars of my consumer-driven, shamefully self-involved life reveal universal truths.

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Explanation of the Dowd/Douglas connection: by Miss Marple- 2/11/03

Ms. Dowd was escorted around New York and DC for many months by one Michael Douglas of Hollywood fame and fortune. She got to go to all the best parties, was photographed for the tabloids, and was picking out a gown to wear at the Oscars. Of course, Michael had become interested in her during Clinton's impeachment, when she had written some very anti-Clinton columns. After a few weeks of the Michael treatment, she began to write anti-Starr, ant-Newt columns, ignoring Clinton.

Then Clinton was acquitted by the Senate. In an amazing coincidence, Michael Douglas dropped Ms. Dowd like a hot potato, and instead picked up a hot tomato, Catherin Zeta-Jones, who subsequently bore him a son and they were married.

Ms. Dowd cannot get over her tragic loss. Her columns are increasingly anti-Bush, in the hope of impressing her lost love, Michael.

In addition, we think she has a secret crush on the President and is trying to get him to pay attention to her. Ha!

[ChewedGum]

Why do I read the Dowd threads? Why Why Why! It's not like they ever warrant a response. (I don't respond to whining ever - ask my kids!) There is no argument you can make because she never offers anything concrete...just pointles and outrageous whining. And someone, somewhere pays her to do it. Unbelievable.

Gum

[TomB]

Hey Mo, you might want to check your email. The editor of the Mobile Register is still holding your column until you correct your slander against Bush:

Dowd Doubts: In Our Business, When You Goof, You Fix It.

[CROSSHIGHWAYMAN]

If there ever was a real female bum, it's Maureen Dowd!

[RichInOC]

No. I do not need to see Dick Cheney wearing a diamond stud and a black muscle T-shirt. I do not need to see Dubya wearing lip gloss and highlights. That would be just as unnatural as Mark Morford from the San Francisco Chronicle trying to act puro macho. And I think Barney, if he could read, would be deeply offended by the implication that he was less than 100% manly.

[TomB]

"I believe a marriage is between a man and a woman," said President Bush last week.

From dictionary.com:

mar·riage

1. The legal union of a man and woman as husband and wife.

Doesn't seem all that difficult to me.

[ChadGore]

re: shouldn't we have a one-strike-and-you're-out constitutional amendment: no marriage for gays, but no second marriage for straights who prove they're not up to it?

[ sigh ] liberals

Bashing the institution of marriage, and pushing a gay agenda both at the same time. Deplorable, by any measure.

[Chi-townChief]

I, for one, read the Dowd threads to dig the pics of Cathy Zeta-Jones!

[gatorgriz]

Mo, well what can one say about Mo? Other than she lives to crawl upon her soap box to whine, whine, whine! What Mo really wants, what she want's most of all, is a corn cob dildo... I wish someone would send her one soon so this harridan would remove herself from the pages of my paper ASAP!

[xm177e2]

Last time I checked, we had separation of church and state, so I don't know why the president is talking about sin, or why he is implying that gays who want to make a permanent commitment in a world full of divorce and loneliness are sinners.

?

The separation of Church and State does not forbid the President from talking about morality.

?

"I don't know... why he is implying that gays who want to make a permanent commitment in a world full of divorce and loneliness are sinners"

Um, because he said we're ALL sinners?

I don't know how Mo manages to pass this stuff off as intelligent discourse.

[dennisw]

Ya know.... I have a sinking feeling that this stuff goes over well in NYC. And other Times target markets. They actually think this is witty and clever.

To me it's lame, derivative.

[tet68]

Po Mo, if we had a one strike and you're out policy like
she implies, she'd be up the river, another girl toy of a big inmatress.

Wonder who's sthuping her now? Oh that's right......no one!

[YaYa123]

"Let's get it straight"

The only semi-clever line in the whole column.

[proud American in Canada]

"it seems like he's trying too hard to prove his masculinity"


It's so obvious that GW doesn't have to prove his masculinity, unlike the guys on Queer Eye... ;)

Maureen: you know you want him! (um, GW, not the gay guy)....

hehehe.....

[proud American in Canada]

"Why do I read the Dowd threads? Why Why Why! It's not like they ever warrant a response. (I don't respond to whining ever - ask my kids!) There is no argument you can make because she never offers anything concrete...just pointles and outrageous whining. And someone, somewhere pays her to do it. Unbelievable."


I couldn't have said it better myself.

Somehow, these threads are like the massive pileup on the other side of the road... you can't help but look.

[Miss Marple]

"What in the heck is a Metrosexual?"

[Athelas]

Hey I think this column from Dowd is encouraging. Look at the quote I found:

"I think we ought to...follow Mr. Bush's logic...no marriage for gays"

[Miss Marple]

Ah, I love little Freudian hints like this:

When it came to the president's possibilities, he got really excited..."

Now either there is an undercurrent of admiration in the gay community, or Ms. Dowd is revealing something of herself in this line. Heheheh.

[Pokey78]

There you go! Dowdify = the truth! hehe

[tet68]

I rather fancy that post about her going to Texas and
grappling with GW in the barn.

Like that line in a recent movie?

"Oh GW you're such a strong bull and I'm just a helpless heifer..........."

In your dreams MO.