That post, along with post #19, shows you’re engaging in the same ridiculous unwarranted hyperbole you assign to the GOP. I’ve heard and read lots of arguments for/against gay marriage–and Stalinism has never come up in any of them. Are we really going to get into which side has the monopoly on extremists here? B/C there is certainly no shortage of crazies on the Left.

Tammy Bruce, a lesbian who loves guns and is proud of having voted for Reagan twice, is a favorite at conservative-type gatherings.

Why? There was actually a study by the Kinsey Institute about this.

Actually, no. Most states had gotten rid of them, and (as you also note) they were not much enforced. In fact, almost the only situations in which they were applied was when the accused were caught in flagrante in a public place (and public lewdness remains illegal, as it should). The Lawrence case was unusual in that the acused were in a wholly private venue, and also, the Texas law did not apply to heterosexuals performing the same acts.

Maybe because Sorba was there in the first place. It’s a little like the teabaggers suddenly finding out their opening speaker is a birther.Who’da thunk the man would spend the better part of his speech railing about Obama’s birth certificate.

The GOP benefits from the gay bashers at election time and wants to feign ignorance of their existence when it suits them. I’d love to hear Dick Cheney devote a minute or two going off on the people in his party who think his daughter is lower than dirt. That would be a refreshing change.

Indeed, Megan highlights a few encouraging angles of an otherwise shameful CPAC event. But I’ll point out, again, that the Republican Party’s own Platform is inherently discriminatory where gay relationships are concerned. As long as that ideology and language remains in the Platform, certain Republican factions of which Sorba represents are granted viability and a podium by the Republican Party.

Talk is talk, but it’s the walk that matters. I’m not holding my breath.

So why are Mr. Knepper’s bloomers in a double half-hitch?

You misunderstand. What we are saying is there is recent high profile (and quite amusing to us) anecdotal evidence of the biggest GOP fag bashers being closet queens. But I understand assumptions do get made. I certainly get my chare of Jr. High jokes about my name, especially as a straight guy who supports gay rights.

And what the hell is the “gay agenda”?

Being able to get married, visit a sick lover in the hospital, to not be fired for what a person does in the bedroom? Yep, that’s right up there with Stalinism.

This is an old trope, if you oppose any jot or tittle of the gay agenda with any force you are accused of being gay.

That one has always bothered me as well.

There are a lot of people out there who just get off on hating people who are different than them. It is a very intense form of tribalism. Sometimes it’s over theology … sometimes it’s over politics … sometimes it’s over skin color … sometimes it’s over sexual orientation.

Sometimes the hatred is even warranted. And sometimes the hatred is cynically drummed up as a means of gaining control and power.