An entertaining Roberts scenario, if we can get the Dems to work with us

[jmowreader]

I see gaydar kicking off all over DU on John Roberts. Let's play.

Let us assume that, just for the sake of discussion, that Roberts doesn't just act gay to get chicks. We also can assume that if George Bush would have nominated a pat of butter to be Chief Justice the Republicans would confirm it. They're just so predictable.

With those two things in mind, we need a straight party-line vote on this nominee. All 55 Republicans aye, all 44 Democrats plus one independent nay.

After he's confirmed he comes out.

This does a number of things to the GOP, all of them bad. A party-line vote to confirm translates into a party-line vote to impeach, and just being gay isn't impeachable conduct so they probably can't bring an impeachment to the floor in the first place. Also, when the Republicans go on the campaign trail to try winning reelection they have to fight the stigma of having put a gay Chief Justice on the bench. This translates into Republican voters staying home in droves.

IF we could convince all 44 Democrats to sit on their hands, Roberts could...well, ruin their agenda for decades.

[illflem]

1. Don't think Roberts will admit he's gay

not even sure if he will admit it to himself.

[TheStates]

2. How in the world would you convince all 44?

Lieberman especially, I mean to get a straight-party line vote....It would be difficult.

[Kenroy]

3. I must have missed something

why do people believe Roberts is gay?

[jmowreader]

5. Because he looks really, really gay

There are lots of gay DUers who are very proficient at picking out other gays. This art is called "gaydar."

Many of the folks who have finely-tuned gaydar think he's gay.

[TankLV]

13. And as a gay man myself - "gaydar" is complete nonsense.

But go ahead and believe it if you will - it's just amazing at what is considered "fact".

"Gaydar". Hah!

[maine_raptor]

6. See this thread

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=104&topic_id=4803569&mesg_id=4803569

[Eric J in MN]

8. Photo

[Kenroy]

9. I don't

see a cock in his mouth, so it's difficult to tell.

[shadowlight]

12. thankyou n/t

[TankLV]

14. Thank you.

This whole discussion is utter bull and silly.

But I always enjoy makeing repukes squirm.

[maine_raptor]

4. I said just about the same thing

See this:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=104&topic_id=4803569&mesg_id=4803782

[Kenroy]

7. Because Bill Maher made a joke

about a photograph? Seems a bit of an overreaction, but I'm quite used to people just assuming everybody they don't like is gay. It's common in our culture, even, sadly, among liberals.

[illflem]

10. Don't think claiming he might be gay is negative

is more like a slap in the conservative's face.

[Kenroy]

11. Why?

[terrya]

15. This is nasty homophobia

Oh, ok...so, lets assume that John Roberts is gay. And then lets use that to bring him down.

What the fuck is this? Why is this even being brought up?

If he's gay...and I don't think he is...that's entirely besides the point.

This is blatant homophobia here. It's the "gay is negative, so let's use it to smear someone" crap, which I thought we left in the 1960's. I guess I was wrong.

[maine_raptor]

16. Nope that is NOT what it is at all

This was started because of something Bill Maher said last night on his show. It is all over the net (blogs) now.

It is NOT "gay is negative, so let's use it to smear someone", quite the opposite. If, and I do mean IF, he is, then it puts the Rethugs in quite a quandary. And anything that does that is a good thing.

[Kenroy]

18. Why would it put them in a quandary?

Phyllis Schafly's son is gay, Randall Terry's son is gay, the chairman of the Republican National Committee is gay, Dick Cheney's daughter is gay, David Souter is probably gay.The entire Bush family are drug addicts, lushes and thieves. The two senior members of the executive branch have 7 arrests between them... what kind of quandary did any of this put them in?

[maine_raptor]

19. Quandary is simple

The selection of Roberts is Bush's and therefore an order that "must be" followed. The RW, and especially the Religious Right, have pushed for Bush's choice (remember Justice Sunday I & II?).

They are particularly strong against "activist" (read social liberal) judges and would tend to view a "Gay" judge as one in spite of his past judicial rulings (of which Roberts has few, only 3 yrs on bench).

Therefore, to discover that this individual, that they have invested time, energy, and money into getting on SOCTUS, and who they had taken on the faith of their leader is in fact "Gay", a "lifestyle" which they have vilified, would cause considerable consternation.

All the examples that you list are ones (with the exception of Souter*) of "Family Matters". Roberts would be, if he is gay and does come out, BUSINESS!!!!

And they do not like to have "business" embarrassment.

* And Souter is a "probable" much as Roberts is now. Should Souter come out when Roberts does, the feces will be hitting the rotating air impeller...BIG TIME as our esteemed VP who say.

[Kenroy]

20. LOL

ok, whatever.

The fact is there are MANY prominent gay conservatives, or close family-members of conservatives, and it hasn't caused a whit of disruption in the Republican Party.

But yet people insist on pretending that somehow outing someone as gay will hurt the republican party. I think it's homophobic.

You don't accuse him of drinking chardonnay, being a closet atheist, or having an unnatural attraction to bullfrogs - all of which would cause the same "quandary" as him being gay.

The quandary doesn't exist, and people don't make those other unfounded accusations, because they don't find bullfrog-fucking as shameful as being homosexual.

[jmowreader]

21. I don't want to bring John Roberts down over being gay

I want to bring John Roberts down over being a pro-fetus, pro-business asshole.

I want to bring the whole Republican Party down, and if we gotta use John Roberts being gay to do it I'll take it. Look, if they can get this man on the Supreme Court he's there for life. It takes a two-thirds supermajority to impeach, and with a slight amount of intestinal fortitude on the part of the Democrats they'll never get there. Once he's up there, he's never coming down.

This is all about the hypocrisy of the Right. Tell me there's a Republican senator out there who really likes gays. Oh, there's tolerance among some of them, but liking? No. And their constituencies are even worse. Take the Log Cabin Republicans out of the picture, and the Republican rank-and-file are almost uniformly anti-gay. Hell, there are probably people over there who make Fred Phelps seem moderate on this stance. So far as I know, Phelps hasn't yet called for gays to kill themselves and there are people over there who'd happily kill a gay man if they thought they could find one. Now given that, what happens when your Republican senator, who you worked hard to elect because he pledged to uphold Traditional Morality and Family Values, goes off and puts an Unrepentant Gay Homosexual on the Supreme Court?

I don't think we'd ever get those people to vote Democratic, but so long as they stop voting Republican that's fine by me.

[illflem]

17. Some good discussion on this at Maher's website

http://boards.billmaher.com/showthread.php?p=452235#post452235