Hating the "Sinner"

Do those of you who cluster around urban areas have some
hereditary aversion to limited government or fiscal
conservatism?
Doubtful.
And since you brought it up, it's social conservatism that will
most often turn those with secular sensibilities away from the
right. Even within the movement, a libertarian vs. social
conservative debate has roiled on forever. This dynamic is only
going to change when political expediency becomes a force more
powerful than faith?which is to say the day after we pay off the
national debt.
Now, it's true that social conservatives can be unfairly
ridiculed as bigots in these debates. But sometimes, as it happens,
they act like bigots.
When, for instance, a bunch of influential organizations decide
to boycott the Conservative Political Action Committee yearly
confab simply because a gay Republican group named GOProud happens
to be participating, we have stumbled upon such a moment.
As Peter Wehner of conservative Commentary magazine
noted, "the boycotting organizations come across as defensive and
insecure, as if they fear that their arguments cannot win the day
on the merits." It's worse. The boycott demonstrates a lack of any
argument. For some, apparently, it's not really the policy sin but
the sinner him-and-himself that's the real problem. (I know, it's
not technically in the Good Book.)
Though I support gay marriage?more specifically, removing
government from the marriage business altogether?it strikes me as
deceitful to dismiss legitimate arguments for preserving
traditional marriage and ugly to smear everyone making them as
homophobic Neanderthals.
Yet, really, what can one say about a person who won't attend a
political event featuring 70 disparate groups?including, yes, The
John Birch Society?because he or she might be sitting a table or
two away from a lesbian infiltrator who agrees with him or her
approximately 90 percent of the time?
As Hot Air's Ed Morrissey recently pointed out, the GOProud
agenda is perhaps a point or two off the conventional conservative
agenda. Actually, it seems to me, GOProud is more focused on the
fundamental problems facing the country than the Concerned Women
for America and the Family Research Council are.
Then again, these groups will probably tell you the kerfuffle is
about far more than gays. The popular right-wing conspiratorial
website leading the charge has even cooked up a transcendentally
silly (and retroactive) theory that claims CPAC is now under the
influence of the Muslim Brotherhood. Quite convenient, I say,
because it allows someone to point out that one of the many quirks
about religious fundamentalists is that they make no distinctions
between politics and religion or personal behavior and individual
freedom.
Speaking of which, let's remember that last year, leading GOP
presidential contender Mike Huckabee skipped CPAC, explaining that
the event had become "more libertarian and less Republican."
"Republican" must be a code word for those who have sworn their
rock-ribbed allegiance to the entire consecrated GOP agenda. Others
won't be engaged or debated or shown the errors of their decadent
ways, I suppose.
Which is a fine way to bring down your own party or, if that
party happens to smarten up, your own cause.
David Harsanyi is a columnist at The Denver Post and the
author of Nanny State. Visit his website at www.DavidHarsanyi.com.
COPYRIGHT 2011 THE DENVER POST
DISTRIBUTED BY CREATORS.COM

lesbian books lesbian dvd lesbian romance