Am I the only one to see New Jersey Governor McGreevey as just another reactionary wolf in progressive sheep’s clothes? He has an oped today in the NYT in which he again wraps his personal angst and political activites in the mantle of the Gay Rights Struggle.
While there are many different and sometimes competing influences, it is my humble hope that my “coming out” could, in some small way, help those gay Americans who have yet to become open with their sexuality. To be gay, for me, was not a choice, but simply stating a reality. Now at peace with arguably one of the most important truths of my life, it is my prayer that I will now be free to live openly and integrate my sexuality with my daily life. This integration will hopefully help my actions, my thoughts and my heart to be in alignment going forward, keeping me from the pitfalls of a divided self or secret truths.
Let’s leave aside for the moment that this is about the governor of the state with the second largest number of citizens killed on 9/11 choosing his paramour for Home Security Advisor… that might be enough to charge a man with treason whether the paramour was man, woman or zebra… and examine whether McGreevey is a help or hindrance to the gay rights movement.
Well, we are in the year 2004. That is already thirty-five years since gays courageously fought off cops trying to bust the Stonewall Inn in Greenwich Village, thus launching the modern American gay rights movement. It is thirty-one years since the American Psychiatric Association removed homosexuality from its list of mental disorders. Out Magazine itself is decades old. We have reached a point where in polite society, anti-gay is deemed Neanderthal, as it should be. Equal legal rights for gays are recognized in many and increasing areas. There are openly gay members of Congress and more sure to come. Gay marriage is in the air and seems inevitable in some form, again as it should be.
Yet, Governor McGreevey chose to hide his gayness. Ah, but it was New Jersey, you say, land of The Sopranos. He couldn’t have run for office as an “out” homosexual and have won. Really? Well, maybe, maybe not, although I’d wager five to ten years from now hardly anyone in Joisy would give an RA, assuming they do now. No, what we are dealing with here is ambition in its most naked form (no pun intended). In reality, Jim McGreevey set back gay rights by choosing to live, and therefore ratifying, a white picket fence lifestyle as the road to the governor’s office. The Gay Community and therefore gay rights was the last thing on his mind. The only thing on his mind was power — and continues to be.
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39 Comments
1. asher813@aol.com:Spot on, Roger. Being gay is not a choice but styaing in the closet is, when there is no imminent threat to life and limb as is clearly the case here. Running for public office is most certainly a choice. And hiding behind the supposed “victim status” of being gay is a choice, and a repellent one.
Aug 22, 2004 - 10:26 am 2. asher813@aol.com:And yes, McGreevey did terrible damage to the cause of gay rights by his disgraceful series of “choices”.
Aug 22, 2004 - 10:28 am 3. BigFire:I really couldn’t care much whom an elected official engages sexual intercourse with, so as long as that individual is an consenting adult. However, McGreevey’s problem isn’t his sexuality, nor his breaking of marital vow, but good ole fashion New Jersey political corruption. Just how many jobs have the governor put this guy in just to stay near him. And we haven’t even go near what he done with the tax money.
Aug 22, 2004 - 10:45 am 4. John Moore ( Useful Fools ):What exactly is a “reactionary?”
In the old days it seemed to be anyone who wasn’t on the left. But it apparently has broader us.
Conservatives are used to be called reactionary.
But huh?
Aug 22, 2004 - 10:52 am 5. richard mcenroe:Dammit, Roger! Don’t you understand?! It’s all because Bush won’t support Gay marriage! We’re losing the respect of the world! McGreevey is the true patriot here…
Aug 22, 2004 - 10:54 am 6. John Moore ( Useful Fools ):Oops… wake up first, then post. Lets try that again:
What exactly is a “reactionary?”
In the old days it seemed to be anyone who wasn’t on the left. But it apparently has broader use.
Conservatives are used to being called reactionary.
But huh?
Aug 22, 2004 - 10:54 am 7. richard mcenroe:Just for the record, that should have read:
{{{demspeak}}}Dammit, Roger! Don’t you understand?! It’s all because Bush won’t support Gay marriage! We’re losing the respect of the world! McGreevey is the true patriot here… {{{/demspeak}}}
Aug 22, 2004 - 10:56 am 8. David Thomson:The Jim McGreevy controversy is small potatoes. The frightening possibility that John Kerry could be our next president in of far greater importance. Still, I find it absolutely amazing that the politically correct media have fallen for his gay rights bovine excrement. Any rational person should be laughing at this obvious attempt to deflect legitimate criticism. Didnít Woody Allen question if there was any sign of intelligence in New Jersey? Is it something in the water?
Aug 22, 2004 - 10:56 am 9. asher813@aol.com:JM, I think Roger is using the term somewhat ironically, as do a lot of us old-school liberals. “Reactionary” means (as I understand it – haven’t checked the OED yet) someone who dogmatically defends the old order, old beliefs, old power structures, etc., and “reacts” negatively against change. Formerly employed as a term of abuse by the hippie generation, it now fits many of those same self-styled “liberals” and “progressives” perfectly.
Aug 22, 2004 - 11:04 am 10. Goof®:Roger,
I suspect that you’ll end up being wrong as to whether this is a help or a hinderance to the gay rights movement, but only time will tell. It’ll depend on who, if anyone, ends up being indicted–and for what.
72 days to go.
Aug 22, 2004 - 11:04 am 11. ricpic:Hey McGreevey, why don’t you just suck it up and do right by your wife and kids?!
Aug 22, 2004 - 11:22 am 12. Charlie (Colorado):“Reactionary” means (as I understand it – haven’t checked the OED yet) someone who dogmatically defends the old order, old beliefs, old power structures, etc., and “reacts” negatively against change. Formerly employed as a term of abuse by the hippie generation, it now fits many of those same self-styled “liberals” and “progressives” perfectly.
I think you’ve nailed it, Ascher.
This is certainly the feeling I’ve had about the Democrats recently — that what they’re doing is trying to react to 9/11 by pushing politics back to the days when politics were about who could buy more votes with government goodies and the big media got to choose who and what was news.
Aug 22, 2004 - 11:32 am 13. richard mcenroe:Ricpic ó James Lileks made the same point about the recently appointed Episcopalian gay bishop. The point is not that he’s gay, but that he abandoned his wife and two daughters, and now expects to provide moral guidance for his diocese?
And of course, John Kerry had his first marriage annulled, not merely a divorce. So now in the eyes of the Church both his daughters are illegitimate…
Aug 22, 2004 - 11:33 am 14. richard mcenroe:Charlie (colorado), Ascher, John Moore… I call them 70’s reactionaries because they refuse to believe the world has changed since they occupied the dean’s office in ‘72. Certainly their talking heads on the Sunday shows today support that contention…
Aug 22, 2004 - 11:35 am 15. Hovig:Roger,
I thought you might be interested in the opinion of Jonathan Capehart, himself openly homosexual, entitled Out of the closet, into gay history [NY Daily News, Aug 2004].
Let me be clear. That McGreevey is hightailing it out of Trenton under an ethical cloud thicker than the smog over the New Jersey Turnpike makes me suspicious of his motives in wrapping himself in the rainbow flag. No doubt he wants to generate sympathy. When it comes to allegations of criminality, blackmail and sexual harassment, coming out of the closet cannot, should not and must not be a shield from scrutiny and possible prosecution. [emphasis added]
(FYI, here is Mr Caprhart’s bio: Jonathan Capehart, 35, is The News’ deputy editorial page editor. From 1993-2000, Capehart was a member The News’ editorial board. While he wrote on myriad local, national and international issues, Capehart’s 16-month editorial campaign to save the famed Apollo Theater in Harlem earned him and the board the 1999 Pulitzer Prize for Editorial Writing. Capehart left The News in July 2000 to become the national affairs columnist at Bloomberg News, then took a leave to serve as a policy adviser to Michael Bloomberg in his successful campaign for mayor of New York City.)
Aug 22, 2004 - 11:49 am 16. Terrye:Roger:
Yes, it impacts badly on gay rights. I doubt it will be a huge impact in the long run but in the near term it trivializes their desire to be treated just like anyone else. After all if this was the usual corrupt politics McGreevey would just be another predatory politician and he could not claim any socalled status for coming out.
I don’t know why Dems in NJ dont just kick all the bums out of the state house and start over.
Aug 22, 2004 - 11:55 am 17. dr. sanity:Mcgreevy is yet another public example of people (especially celebrities and politicians) who have failed to take responsiblity for their entire life, and now expect kudos for saying something they should have said decades ago. This failure of accepting personal responsibility for the consequences of one’s actions is a psychological epidemic on the Left (but, of course, is not limited to that side of the political spectrum!). Other defense mechanisms that are rampant (and that McGreevey typifies) are Denial, Projection, and Distortion. The Democrats don’t have an exclusive hold on these psychological strategies, but since 9/11 they have made them their official policy.
Aug 22, 2004 - 12:00 pm 18. Jay Rice:If Jesse Jackson counseled Slick Willie after his fall from grace, who will McGreevey pick? “Sammy the Bull” Gravano?
Aug 22, 2004 - 12:17 pm 19. Annalucia:“And of course, John Kerry had his first marriage annulled, not merely a divorce. So now in the eyes of the Church both his daughters are illegitimate…”
No they’re not – not in the Church’s eyes or anyone else’s. The term used regarding annulled marriages is that it was a “putative” marriage – that is, believed at the time to have been made in good faith, and binding.
The rules regarding annullment are too lengthy to go into here, and since we don’t know the details of Kerry’s, I have no idea whether it was a genuinely invalid marriage or whether (like Henry VIII and certain people named Kennedy) he wanted to get rid of his wife and have a clear conscience while doing so. Either way it has no effect on the status of the children.
Aug 22, 2004 - 12:34 pm 20. John Moore ( Useful Fools ):From a human standpoint, there’s the question of what he did to his family. The issue isn’t that he’s gay – that’s passe.
Why can’t this creep continue as normal? Why did this guy have to do aything at all?
Notice that Johnny Taliban had the same thing happen with his parents. Did this have some effect on the strange behavior he exhibited – he became a Muslim that year?
I think it’s pure politics – destroy his family to distract from scandal. What a pathetic creep.
Aug 22, 2004 - 12:40 pm 21. PeterUK:Did the man not think of his wife before spIf he lattering this all over the newspaper? The poor woman must be mortified.
The man talks as if there is no collateral damage and that he is the only one affected.Did he not hesitate before humiliating the mother of his children?
Aug 22, 2004 - 1:15 pm 22. DennisThePeasant:One can only hope the gay community reacts to McGreevey in about the same manner that the Swift Boaters have reacted to Kerry.
Aug 22, 2004 - 1:20 pm 23. Good Ole Charlie:McGreevey is typical of the Joisey political culture. The state – my ex-homeland – has always taken the low road if given a chance or a choice politically. And leading the charge to the trough has been the local Democratic Party. Not that the Republicans are uniformly Mirrors Of Virtue, but the Demos have been the more spectacular and amusing.
McGreevey is – in a word – a pig for his treatment of first his family and secondly his homosexual partner. I would have said lover but, like Good Ole Bill Clinton, McGreevey is denying he ever inhaled, so to speak.
But nothing is too low for the McGreeveys of the word to sink down to (spectacularly bad English, GOC). And shedding tears of self-pity while they do so.
To quote a politico from the 19th Century’s Gilded Age: “Nothing has been lost, save Honor.”. Honor is the least of the McGreeveyite’s concerns. And perhaps the least of the Demos’??
Aug 22, 2004 - 3:49 pm 24. Homer:Folks, McGreevey is a man who wants power, any way he can get it, at any price. Men or women like McGreevey leave wrecked and shattered lives littered behind them. And you know what worse, that they don’t care, don’t care at all.
Aug 22, 2004 - 4:24 pm 25. Homer:And for the record, I think Kerry is the same, only more dangous. Kerry has shown that he has no limit to what he would do to win the White House. The trail of wrecked and destroyed lives is testimony to that.
Aug 22, 2004 - 4:34 pm 26. Knucklehead:Roger,
You are absolutely correct. McGreevey’s political (and legal) problems have nothing to do with his homosexuality. His problem is corruption at every level of his political and personal life. Every level. The man is so corrupt he cannot fathom how corrupt he is. Very similar, BTW, to John Kerry. Kerry has lied to himself and everyone else for so long that he has lost all ability to determine truth from lies, even for himself. Both McGreevery and Kerry are loons of the first order.
Aug 22, 2004 - 6:03 pm 27. Roberts:Everyone is focusing on the McGreevey situation with respect to the scandal of McGreevey’s ethics, his pandering to his own confused sexuality as victimhood and the possibility of his being indicted for graft.
But I’m not hearing much commentary on the essential anti-democratic nature of his actions. By delaying the effectiveness of his resignation he is intentionally denying the citizens of New Jersey a say in who their governor will be.
That’s an astonishingly arrogant anti-democracy act.
Aug 22, 2004 - 7:00 pm 28. Dr. Rusty Shackleford:Wait, are you saying McGreevy was gay? Well that’s news to me!!!
Aug 22, 2004 - 7:06 pm 29. Godzilla:Roger!!!! Protest Warrior site was hacked and email addresses/phone numbers posted. The hacker left an email warning that right wing blogs would be attacked. This blog would probably be in their crosshairs. I hope you’ve got good security measures.
Aug 22, 2004 - 7:23 pm 30. Godzilla:There’s a thread going on Little Green Footballs on this. If you go to the Protest Warrior site, it looks like it’s running, but try any of the links for loging in (or any in that menu) and you’ll get an error warnings. They are working to enhance the security now.
Aug 22, 2004 - 7:24 pm 31. Macker:It’s nice to know that it doesnt matter if one is straight or gay…their CROOKEDNESS can and should trump their lifestyle preferences.
It is my hope that the good people of New Jersey (Democrats and Republicans, whites, blacks, hispanics, men and women, straights AND gays) will raise their voices in righteous wrath and demand McGreevey’s immediate resignation. If they don’t…then they deserve the government they have now.
Aug 22, 2004 - 9:00 pm 32. Samuel:My youngest brother is gay and is so pissed off at Governor McGreevey, his cynical use of Gay Right’s, and his obvious attempt to hide his corrupt and perhaps even predatory behaviour behind such rights, that he is just beside himself. According to him this will hurt and not help the gay cause. (no kidding!)
“Corrupt members of the Gay Communtity who use Civil Right’s arguments as a personal shield to hide behind, especially when dealing with issues that have nothing to do with these right’s along with a “f—–g” stupid liberal press that immediately starts toting the “G-d D–n” politically correct line, do more harm to my cause then any Christian Conservative could ever do. F—–g Idiots!”
These are words spoken by him and I concur.
But I must add that he is one of only two family members besides myself that will vote for Bush (My Father in Law who lives in New Jersey and works in NYC is the other, he hasn’t forgot 9/11 and is what I would call an “Ed Koch” Democrat, very liberal, very Jewish but also very realistic about the state of this world we live in. My brother is pretty damn level headed, in fact a hell of a lot more level headed then many in this world that would call him a “flake”, that’s for sure.
Aug 22, 2004 - 9:22 pm 33. bdog57:Roger,
Let me begin by saying that I agree that McGreevey was using his “homosexuality” (I’d say he’s bi-…he had to have sex at least twice, and enjoy it enough to impregnate) to shield him from scrutiny. I also agree that this wasn’t a big step forward for the gay rights movement. Nobody wants their cause to be used for ill.
My points of disagreement comes during the following soapbox emanations:
We have reached a point where in polite society, anti-gay is deemed Neanderthal, as it should be…Gay marriage is in the air and seems inevitable in some form, again as it should be.
Phew! Thanks for clearing that up. To think, if I had lived in another state and voted before you made these grand proclamations on the natural order of things, I could have been part of the tyranny of the majority!
To think, my opposition to this behavior wasn’t informed by my religious beliefs, it was just uninformed (Neanderthal? You can do better than that).
Inevitable? You’d like to think so. You didn’t even post on the Missouri ban. Your primary response to the groundswell of support for traditional marriage has been to ignore it. This tactic has been used before, by lesser individuals.
Look, we all have our pet causes. We all believe the things that we do (strongly, I might add) because of our experiences and what we have been taught. To paint a large swath of the populace as a bunch of large-foreheaded, slouchy, uncontrollable droolers who oppose your illuminated cause is something I would expect from a MSM news account. I just think that this kind of thing is beneath you.
Aug 23, 2004 - 8:00 am 34. Fausta:Roberts, But I’m not hearing much commentary on the essential anti-democratic nature of his actions
I have. In fact, I’ve been running a countdown to total disenfranchisement for a week or so by now. 11 days to go.
On the subject of McG’s article quoted by Roger:
Now at peace with arguably one of the most important truths of my life,
One could argue that another important truth of his is holding on to power even when overwhelmed by corruption and scandal, and by doing so denying the voters the right to vote.
it is my prayer that I will now be free to live openly and integrate my sexuality with my daily life.
As a former Roman Catholic (allow me to clarify that I am a former Roman Catholic because of a number of issues, including the RC position on gays), I find this offensive in three levels:
1. injecting the “prayer”, he aims to portray himself as a man of faith, while
2. obscuring the fact that he is a married man who, if he were to observe the tennents of his faith, is not “free to live openly and integrate my sexuality with my daily life” because by doing so he’s committing adultery. Were his sexuality to incline him towards supporting multiple mistresses, he’d still be acting against the very faith he so much touts.
3. Implicitly, his “integrating with his daily life” disregards his marital vows and disrespects the family he hides behind. He’s even said that “he would stay until Nov. 15 because he could not ask his wife and young daughter to leave the governor’s mansion — their home — on any shorter notice”.
Family values as a front for disenfranchisement. Only a NJ Democrat could cough that one up.
Aug 23, 2004 - 8:06 am 35. Fausta:And don’t miss the irony that McGreevey’s stood against gay marriage
Aug 23, 2004 - 8:11 am 36. hollywood:Now it can be told! http://www.borowitzreport.com/
Aug 23, 2004 - 10:50 am 37. Roberts:Well, Fausta, I didn’t mean my comment to denigrate your postings.
Aug 23, 2004 - 2:51 pm 38. Fausta:Not to worry, Roberts. Few outside NJ have even heard of the plethora of scandals — and McGreevey’s working hard at positioning himself for a political future, too.
Aug 23, 2004 - 2:54 pm 39. Mike Silverman:bDog57, I appreciate your sharing your views, but to Roger (and myself I may add), it is as self evidently just and right that gay marriage ought to be supported as it is the Islamofascism must be opposed.
I personally do not believe you are a neanderthal; I think you are a good person, who, on the issue of homosexuality are simply….mistaken.
Aug 23, 2004 - 3:47 pm