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Friday, April 08, 2005

Dianne Feinstein's damage worse than Lou Sheldon or Traditional Values Coalition

From the A.P.

Organizers of the gay pride parade held in the city every June announced Thursday that Feinstein was the winner of this year's "Pink Brick" award, a dubious honor bestowed on the public figure the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender Pride Committee decides has done the most to damage the gay rights cause. President Bush and talk show host Laura Schlessinger were the previous winners.

Joey Cain, president of the committee said Feinstein was nominated for the prize for telling reporters the morning after Bush's re-election that progress on the gay marriage front "has been too much, too fast, too soon." [...]

Feinstein's competition for the prize, which is the gay community's answer to Hollywood's "Golden Raspberry" awards honoring the worst in film, was the Rev. Lou Sheldon, a vocal opponent of gay rights, and the Traditional Values Coalition, the Orange County-based organization Sheldon leads.

Feinstein was out of line with her comments against San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom. Remember, Newsom has been vindicated for his civil rights stance. Feinstein's DLC-style attack on Newsom was more about him going too far too fast. She's jealous that Newsom has been a better Mayor than she was. While Feinstein faced a recall, Newsom is more popular than chocolate. Feinstein was wrong, Newsom was right, and now Feinstein is getting what she deserves.

Posted at 04:47 PM in 2006 Elections, 2006 Elections - Senate, California | Technorati

Comments

If you've ever seen the gay pride parade in San Francisco, it is clear the organizers of the parade should give themselves the "pink brick." Many of my gay co-workers refused to attend the parade that they felt "made gays look bad." Indeed, most of the audience seemed to be straight folks who wanted to gawk at the topless "dykes on bikes" or what not.

Barney Frank, one of the first openly gay Congressmen, said the same as Ms. Feinstein. Indeed, he said the main problem Mr. Newsom caused was that he chose to conduct "mass weddings" as a sort of spectacle, an in-your-fce to middle America.

I find it interesting, but not at all surprising, that some self-appointed representatives of the gay community would choose to attack their own allies, rather than the right-wing wackos and staunch conservatives who are the real enemy. If they (the left wing interest groups) won't stand with us, why should we stand with them? For too long they have acted as a sort of Republican "fifth column" making real progressives who are working for change look bad. Case in point: anti-American protests in my former hometown of Boulder the WEEK after the 9/11 attacks -- what good did this do? All it did was undermine the case against the Iraq war by allowing the right-wing to stereotype war opponents.

Posted by: mcittone at April 9, 2005 06:17 PM | Permalink | Edit Comment | Delete Comment