2008 Presidential Election: May 2008 Archives

In yet another example of shifting attitudes toward gay and lesbian couples, Libertarian Party presidential nominee, Bob Barr has announced his vow to repeal the so-called Defense of Marriage Act, which excludes gay and lesbian families from federal marriage protections—a measure he authored and championed in 1996 while serving as a Republican Congressman from Georgia’s seventh district. On this point, Barr states, "The Defense of Marriage Act insofar has provided the federal government a club to club down rights of law-abiding American citizens, has been abused, misused, and should be repealed, and I will work to repeal it." The announcement was made at the Libertarian National Committee’s convention in Denver on May 25 amid little fanfare and zero mainstream media coverage. Only a few blogs picked up the story.

Barr also proclaimed his support for the recent California Supreme Court ruling extending marriage to gay and lesbian couples, noting that his original intent in supporting DOMA was to give states the authority to decide the marriage question. He says:

Regardless of whether one supports or opposes same sex-marriage, the decision to recognize such unions or not ought to be a power each state exercises on its own, rather than imposition of a one-size-fits-all mandate by the federal government -- as would be required by a Federal Marriage Amendment, which has been previously proposed and considered by the Congress. The decision today by the supreme court of California properly reflects this fundamental principle of federalism on which our nation was founded.

Democratic Presidential hopeful Sen. Barack Obama is the only other candidate who has clearly stated his support for a full repeal of DOMA. Meanwhile, Sen. Hillary Clinton and Sen. John McCain have voiced support in leaving it up to individual states to decide.

As we approach mid-June, when gay and lesbian couples in California will begin legally marrying for the first time, mainstream media should push all the candidates to clarify their positions on marriage and explain what protections they support and why— while scrutinizing statements that continue to fall short of full disclosure.

Cindi Creager is the Director of National News.

Since the presidential race kicked off nearly 16 months ago, Democratic voters have faced a choice between two candidates who would make history if nominated by their party.  No major party in the has nominated either an African-American or a woman as their standard-bearer, though a few have tried unsuccessfully in the past.

Both Senator Obama and Senator Clinton have spoken eloquently about the historic nature of the contest, and pundits continue to ask: have we broken the glass ceiling when it comes to race and/or gender?

An op-ed by David Wenner and Sue Gleiter in the Patriot-Ledger, the paper for Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, raises an equally interesting question: would voters feel comfortable voting for an openly gay candidate for president?

There are only two openly gay members of the United States House of Representatives and not a single openly gay senator.  The Gay and Lesbian Victory Fund, an organization that supports openly gay candidates, says that there are now 412 openly gay elected officials from across the country, which is a dramatic increase from the 49 the LGBT community had in 1991.

The op-ed by Wenner and Gleiter cites a 2007 study from the Pew Research Center that asked respondents if they would vote for an openly gay candidate for president.  46 percent of the sample said that they’d be less likely to vote for a candidate who identified as gay.  51 percent said that it would make no difference in who they cast their vote and 1 percent said it would make them more likely to vote for someone.

Voters in Oregon last week elected an openly gay man as mayor of the state’s largest city and also voted to send an openly bisexual candidate to be the Democratic nominee for secretary of state.

How long will it take to test the voters’ actual feelings when it comes to their comfort level an openly gay presidential candidate?  It’s hard to tell, but given the historic nature of the 2008 presidential race, hopefully it’s an indication of good things to come.

Paul Karr is the Director of Media Field Strategy.

John McCain on Thursday rejected the endorsements of two controversial pastors, John Hagee and Rod Parsley.  McCain gave up the months-old endorsement of Hagee after a recording surfaced in which the pastor portrayed Adolf Hitler as being sent by God to force Jews “to come back to the land of Israel.”  Then in an interview with The Associated Press, McCain said he rejected Parsley's support, too. The revelation of these incendiary comments by ABC News was undoubtedly the tipping point, which motivated McCain to renounce Hagee’s endorsement and repudiate the comments. McCain had stopped short of rejecting the endorsements before—even as Hagee and Parsley’s anti-gay comments were swirling around the blogospere and in a few mainstream media outlets.

And since Hagee’s endorsement earlier this year, McCain has only occasionally commented on the pastor’s statements including a claim by Hagee that Hurricane Katrina was God’s judgment against the city of New Orleans for hosting a gay pride parade.  At one point during a bus tour in late April, he snapped at a reporter, calling the Hagee controversy "nonsense."

Most mainstream media have rarely mentioned Hagee’s anti-gay comments, and have remained silent on Parsley’s, despite a constant stream of reports documenting the two pastors.  A few outlets however, such as MSNBC’s “Countdown with Keith Olbermann,” continued to hammer away at Hagee's anti-gay comments.

The media coverage of the Hagee and Parsley controversies underscores a degree to which anti-gay rhetoric is still not always given equal scrutiny by news media – a fact that will hopefully change as media professionals increasingly take note of the extreme anti-gay attitudes that still exist in mainstream politics.

Cindi Creager is the Director of National News

After the California Supreme Court decided yesterday that it’s unconstitutional for the state to deny marriage to gay and lesbian residents, the national media immediately began to examine whether marriage will now play a larger role in the 2008 election. Major newspapers and broadcast news networks have reported that the historic California decision will prompt the presidential candidates to more clearly assert their views on marriage for gay and lesbian Americans. All three candidates have issued statements, and the media have been speculating about what the implications of their stances could have as the presidential race continues.

The New York Times noted that it’s unlikely that the California decision will create the same amount of divisive political strategizing and campaigning around the issue of marriage as had existed during the 2004 elections. “At best, [the marriage issue] doesn’t move voters, and at worst for Republicans, it moves them against them,” said Matthew Dowd, President Bush’s 2004 chief strategist. “Why are we having a discussion on this issue when we should be talking about things that matter, like the economy, health care, or the war?” Similarly, the Los Angeles Times noted that political analysts have suggested that non-economic issues are no longer as compelling to most voters. The Associated Press explained that many voters are more concerned about the economy than initiatives that limit marriage.  In the news cycle following the announcement, the media have acknowledged the significance of the California decision while addressing the cultural shift the role of marriage will have for voters in the current presidential election.

Cindi Creager is the Director of National News.

Over the past few months, cable and network news programs have been asking why Sen. John McCain’s campaign pursued the endorsement of anti-gay televangelist John Hagee. Media scrutiny of the Rev. Hagee reached a wider audience on ABC’s popular daytime talk show The View on April 30.  During a heated exchange between co-hosts Joy Behar and Elisabeth Hasselbeck about the political relevance of Sen. Barack Obama’s relationship with controversial pastor Jeremiah Wright, Behar quoted the Rev. Hagee’s statement that God’s anger at New Orleans for having a gay pride parade caused Hurricane Katrina.

After giving the audience the opportunity to hear the Rev. Hagee’s incendiary quote word for word, Behar questioned why his relationship to Sen. McCain hasn’t received the same attention and criticism as the Rev. Wright’s relationship to Sen. Obama.  Though the hosts of The View often engage in political debates, this is the first time that involved discussion of the Rev. Hagee’s anti-gay statement has taken place on a daytime TV talk show.

The conversation on The View brought close scrutiny of Hagee’s comments to a much broader audience, and prompted Alan Colmes to ask guest pundits on the April 30 episode of Fox News’ Hannity & Colmes –which featured a clip from The View—to respond to the same issues that Behar addressed.  In this unique election climate, it’s not uncommon for the lines between hard news and entertainment to be increasingly blurred, underscoring the degree to which a wider variety of media outlets are shaping public perception of all of the candidates.

Cindi Creager is Director of National News