Why the GOP should welcome gays into the party

northjersey.com ^ | STEVE LONEGAN

[Coleus]

SOMETIMES tragic occurrences force us to stop and think – those are the moments that crystallize our perceptions of human relations. I found myself in such a state with the passing of a constituent, friend and fellow conservative who also happened to be gay. Our conversations convinced me that my beliefs in limited government can be shared across the chasms that liberals and conservatives perceive to separate us – ethnicity, gender and sexual orientation. That conclusion is not popular on either side of the left-right spectrum: Liberals don't believe gays should be conservative and conservatives don't believe gays can be conservative, especially when a radical left gay contingent dominates media attention and right-wing conformists place their own moral judgment before individual freedom.

The Republican Party claims to be a "Big Tent," and rightfully so, as the core conservative principles of the party revolve around individual liberty and a limited government that serves to protect that liberty. These ideas can help our party cut across lines of "group identity," because the idea of freedom is appealing to groups that lack the political clout necessary to keep government out of their pocketbooks and lives. Historically, gay Americans have struggled for the freedom to live their lives the way they choose in order to pursue happiness. This is the American Dream, the cornerstone of conservative thinking, and it is these principles that make the increasingly influential gay community the conservative movement's natural ally.

It may surprise some to learn that the very same conservative who refused to be coerced into performing civil union ceremonies by government believes gay voters should be conservative, yet this very instance points to our common ground – a commitment to the rights of the individual and opposition to the power of a collectivist state. The media like to portray conservatives as wild-eyed ideologues, which is unfair. Of the philosophies that have directed civilization, conservatism has resulted in the most liberty for people around the world. It is at the hands of the liberal welfare state that individualism is destroyed; thus the failure of communism, fascism and socialism in promoting a signature American entitlement – "the pursuit of happiness."

Americans take that phrase for granted, but the idea was culture-transforming. Happiness derives its meaning from the Middle English hap, meaning "chance" or "luck." It is the same root present in the words perhaps or happenstance. The idea present in the words "pursuit of happiness" is the notion that individuals can make their own happiness. Happiness is not purely a matter of luck, but a goal to be pursued in a free environment characterized by limited government. Our Founding Fathers held this truth to be so "self-evident" that they declared it was the indisputable right of all individuals to pursue happiness. With this belief, many members of the gay community have played a critical role in the conservative movement. Conservatives from Terry Dolan to Andrew Sullivan prove there has been no shortage of influential gay leadership. Arguably, their involvement is even greater in the conservative wing of the party than in the moderate middle.

Upper income brackets

Many gay adults are also in upper income brackets, making the issue of low taxes, which conservatives have staked their reputation on, an important one. The principles of limited government that keep Big Brother out of our personal lives must also keep him out of our pocketbooks. Liberal Democrats may not care what individuals do in their bedrooms, but they are already rattling their tax-hiking sabers to let us know they do care what individuals do with their money. Obstacles to achieving our real goal of reducing the size of government and limiting its ability to interfere in our lives must be torn down. Gays shouldn't expect government to foist acceptance of their lifestyle on others; religious conservatives shouldn't expect gays to abandon an integral part of their being.

Barry Goldwater once remarked that government cannot pass laws to "make people like each other." His words still ring true today. Labeling people "homophobes" or "bigots" if they refuse to accept the entire gay agenda creates political fractures that work against individual liberties and serve to keep gay voters in the Democratic Party's political ghetto. The Republican Party must reestablish its commitment to the rights of the individual while respecting the moral code of one subset and upholding the freedom of another. Quite a challenge, indeed. However, the Big Tent needn't become a kaleidoscope of political policies designed to appeal to a large crowd at the expense of sacrificing principles.

Rather, it must transcend mere politics by becoming a manifestation of the principles that culminated in our Declaration of Independence and attract those who share this vision. The principles that are the underpinning of conservatism will ultimately make room in the tent for a surprisingly wide range of membership.

Reestablishing a commitment

In memory of the fine gentleman who inspired this article, I will reestablish my commitment to understanding and the core principles of conservative thought that I believe will best serve our future. My friend fought a tragic inner battle that tormented him to suicide. No one will ever understand the emotional turmoil that destroyed his life. The demons that haunted him and drove him to such a dark and lonely end also know no ethnic, gender or sexual-orientation boundaries. The boundaries of infinity are large enough and eternity long enough for all of us.

So let the values that we share, as mutual as those terrible instances of suffering that each of us can encounter, allow us all to strive for happiness during our brief stay on Earth. Thanks, buddy, see you in a better place. Steve Lonegan, a Republican, is mayor of Bogota.

[Candor7]

That would be ‘surrending’ to them.>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

Nah! The RINOs are gonna stick each other to death. They are wannabes. There are only two good candidates in the Republican field. The rest are just whoopin' it up. Soon the whoopin' be over. Then the real battle begins. Won't be any RINOs left in the Valley of the Gun.( Willy Nelson Reference: 7 Spanish Angels took a Another Angel Home)

I love that song been humming it all day out in the corn fields.

Lyrics: Yup:

Willie Nelson Song: Seven Spanish Angels

He looked down into her brown eyes,

Said, " Say a prayer for me."

She threw her arms around him,

Whispered, "God will keep us free."

They could hear the riders comin,

He said, "This is my last fight.

If they take me back to Texas,

They won't take me back alive."

Chorus

There were seven Spanish Angels,

At the alter of the Sun.

They were prayin' for the lovers,

In the valley of the gun.

When the battle stopped,

And the smoke cleared.

There was thunder from the throne.

And seven Spanish angels,

Took another angel home.

******************

She reached down and picked the gun up,

That lay smokin in his hand.

She said, "Father please forgive me,

I can't make it without my man."

And she knew the gun was empty,

And she knew she couldn't win.

Her final prayer was answered,

When the rifles fired again.

Chorus

**************************

I once was in Helotes Texas for the San Antonio Highland Games, and saw the road house where Willy got his start. I often entertain myself by thinking that the song is about Bill and Hillery Clinton, and it do make me laugh.Try it and you'll see what I mean. I like the Ray Charles/Willy Nelson version.

Ain't gonna be no RINOs left in the Vally of the Gun.

None of THEM can handle this kind of show down, pard.

[Old_Mil]

These are the principles of libertarianism, not of conservatism. Conservatism seeks to conserve the faith and governance of the founders of the nation.<< well, they were certainly part of Ronald Reagan’s brand of conservatism.

They are a part of conservatism, but not its guiding principles. A means to the latter end. Certainly not an excuse to justify sodomy. Gays should get out of the party.

[puroresu]

And Ronald Reagan opposed “gay rights” legislation.

[mimaw]

The problem is that people like Andrew Sullivan let his desire for gay marriage approval and disdain of those that disagree cloud his judgment on just about every other issue important to conservatives. I personally don't give a damn who he sleeps with and use to enjoy reading him but when he started thinking with his penis instead of his brain I quit.

[gondramB]

>>And Ronald Reagan opposed “gay rights” legislation.<<

As I recall, he opposed special rights for anyone, a position I share.

[Sovietski05]

nice try...sounds like a wolf in sheeps clothing.

I get goosebumps everytime I see something try to mix values with a modern “compromise” to its core.

I pray conservative thought never embraces the homosexual lifestyle or views.

[BritExPatInFla]

“Ann is absolutely right. I think most gays are more conservative than the MSM (wrong, yet again) would have us believe. At this point, I don’t think we should be trying to turn anyone away.”

---

The only problem with that argument is that there is a portion of the GOP that doesn’t want those who are homosexual to remain that way, and feel that they need to be ‘saved’, regardless of said homosexual person’s thoughts on marriage or activism. If we could shut the Homosexual ‘activists’ up and shut up the ‘Moral Majority’, the GOP would be seen to be a lot more inclusive, and gays would be seen as less ‘radical’.

[dooltotheend]

Frankly, it’s beyond me why I need to know a person by their sexual persuasion. I don’t introduce myself as heterosexual Chuck Dooley. I’m simply Chuck Dooley. Tell me where I’m going wrong?

[ikka]

The Republican Party claims to be a "Big Tent," and rightfully so, as the core conservative principles of the party revolve around individual liberty and a limited government that serves to protect that liberty.

Liberty does not equal "Libertinism".

There must be SOME kind of reason that the following faiths discourage homosexuality: Christianity, Judaism, Hinduism (mostly), Islam, Buddhism (mostly).

[Calpernia]

He won both times he was endorsed by LCR.

[Calpernia]

>>>>Reminds me of the Greek communist Ariana Huffington who, with her homosexual husband, penetrated the upper levels of GOP.

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1235065/posts?page=27#27

The Rise of Adolf Hitler and Nazism in Germany

It is said that Communism was largely responsible for the rise of Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party. It will be recalled that when the German Kaiser capitulated in 1918 the Communists tried to take over Germany. Anticommunist political groups immediately sprang up and through a frantic coalition they prevented the Communists from seizing power. It was this anticommunist atmosphere that Adolf Hitler began his political career.

(snip)

...[Stalin] recognized in the Nazi dictator a formidable opponent of his own breed and kind. He saw that Hitler was shrewd and ruthless. He was completely amoral. He had no compunction whatever against violence, the purging of his own people, the use of deceit in propaganda, or the sacrifice of millions of lives to achieve personal power. Materialism had produced precisely the same product in Germany that it had produced in Russia. Although called by different names, Nazism and Communism were aimed at the same identical mark and were forged in very similar ideological molds.

OPINION:

Sounds like the Log Cabin Republicans and the Victory Fund Democrats.

[BellStar]

dooltotheend, I could not have said it better!
My sexuality is only one part of my very full life.
Does it not seem to be all the "third sex" is about.
Very sad!

[Scotsman will be Free]

Exactly so. Being “socially liberal” means expanding govt, and taking money from people to fund “socially liberal” projects. That doesn’t square with “fiscally conservative”. I believe that anyone who claims to be “socially liberal” but “fiscally conservative” is a cheapskate who wants everyone else to fund his pet projects while he buys himself a boat.

[Scotsman will be Free]

Are you saying that one man being turned on by another man’s hairy butt is perversion? I’m shocked! Shocked, I tell you.

[F.J. Mitchell]

And Gomorrah too.

[puroresu]

Excellent point!

Homosexuality is unnatural. Furthermore, homosexuals themselves know that their behavior is unnatural. When homosexuality is in the closet, homosexuals go off into private and do their little unnatural deeds and mostly leave everyone else alone. But once homosexuality is uncloseted, its adherents go on an ideological rampage that is very unrepublican in nature.

You’re probably familiar with the tale of The Emperor’s New Clothes. The emperor in this fairy tale (no pun intended) was nude, but he had been told that he was wearing beautiful clothing that could only be seen by the best and the brightest. Since everyone wanted to be included in this elite category, the entire nation pretended that the emperor was clothed even though he was parading around naked. But it came crashing down one day when a child who didn’t know the rules shouted out that the emperor was in fact nude.

Just as the emperor needed constant positive reinforcement to believe the falsehood that he was fully clothed, uncloseted homosexuals need to be constantly assured that they’re normal, or they’ll realize they aren’t. So it’s not enough for homosexuals to be allowed to go off into private and do their thing. They have to be ratified in their behavior 24/7, and anyone who disapproves of their conduct has to be stifled. Even one person asserting that homosexuality is unnatural is enough to bring down the whole house of cards. That’s why President Bush’s recent Surgeon General nominee had to recant writings from 1990 in which he described homosexuality as unnatural.

So in a society where homosexuality is uncloseted, homosexuals wallow in their behavior every waking moment. They aren’t an accountant, they’re a gay accountant who belongs to the gay accountants’ association, where they sit around and discuss how their homosexuality is inherently linked to their job as an accountant and leads them to engage in accountancy in a uniquely gay way.

Suppose you were a carrot farmer and decided to launch a monthly magazine dealing with carrot farming and marketing issues. You wouldn’t receive requests from celibate people demanding that they be profiled in your magazine specifically as a celibate carrot farmer. A carrot marketer who lives with someone of the opposite sex out of wedlock wouldn’t insist on being profiled as such. You wouldn’t write an article featuring carrot truck drivers who are also adulterers, with emphasis on the latter.

But you’d very likely be contacted by homosexuals who would request....even demand....that you dedicate one issue per year to homosexual carrot farmers, homosexual carrot marketers, gay carrot recipes, lesbian carrot truck drivers, etc.

Once uncloseted homosexuality is unleashed, it goes completely mad in an effort to find positive reinforcement. It equally must censor any negative opinion. That’s why the San Diego Padres will never have a leather fetish night, or a cohabitation night, but they recently had a gay night at one of their games.

Adultery, fornication, and polygamy may be sinful in the eyes of many people, but they aren’t literally against nature. Homosexuality is. And that’s why its practitioners need to parade down the street in the St. Patrick’s Day parade on a special homosexual float. They’re like the emperor trying to convince himself that he’s clothed, even though he’s stark naked.

[JohnnyZ]

Gays are welcome into the party, as fellow men and women, not as homosexuals.

We do not recognize interest groups based upon sexual behavior. That is a subject best left in the bedroom and has no place in the public forum. They are not a minority deserving of special rights.

QFT.

[Calpernia]

It was and still is very common for homosexuals to be used as spies especially by the Communist Party. They are easy to blackmail and the pathology makes them susceptible to indoctrination.

From 1947 thru 1970(ish), there was a purge of homosexuals from government positions called The Lavender Scare. This purge was related to all the documents that were being purged from Russian spies.

Investigation resulted from the atomic bomb Russia exploded.

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1235065/posts?page=27#27

[DesScorp]

I refuse to openly welcome any group that wants to promote bad things as a virtue.

[massgopguy]

Why does Sexual Orientation merit a parade? Is it some sort of accomplishment?