Hot Topics August 19, 2010

It was obvious Fox and the other Republican media outlets would turn to gay-baiting following Judge Vaughn Walker's August 4 decision to strike down California's ban on same-sex marriages. The attacks on Judge Walker, and by extension our entire system of justice, follow tabloid Fox's strategy for Republican victories this fall.

Ironically, Judge Walker is a conservative judge originally nominated to the Northern California Federal District Court by Ronald Reagan. In the late 80's, gay activists fought this nomination after Walker forced the "Gay Olympics" to change its name to the "Gay Games," following a lawsuit where he successfully represented the US Olympic Committee. Judge Walker finally made it to the bench under George H.W. Bush.

Judge Walker's conservative pedigree did not keep Fox contributor Liz Trotta from directing her sarcastic disapproval at Judge Walker following the Prop. 8 ruling: "Justice Walker, who by the way is 'openly gay,' a fact that is not, that is just glossed over in most of the coverage of the liberal media, so supposedly he couldn't possibly have a vested interest in this case."

Fox's Trotta also trots out the "special rights" fantasy: "[Judge Walker] takes on the whole question of how special homosexuals are, and therefore they should have homosexual marriage." In reality, Judge Walker's ruling describes the opposite: how un-special gays are; how un-special are our families. The only special thing about us is the discrimination we face, lacking the rights and obligations to protect ourselves and our loved ones.

Trotta's former employee, the Washington Times (the Fox of newspapers), goes even further, in what media watch dog group Media Matters calls an "insanely bigoted" take on Judge Walker's ruling: Walker "decided he would reshape the state to better suit his personal lifestyle" and "undermined not just the political process, but society itself."

The Washington Times editorial, which inexplicably referred to the judge by his first name, continued with a comparison of Judge Walker to an ancient Roman emperor: "Nero, like Judge Vaughn, wanted the community to embrace his unnatural way of life."

Also keeping the focus on Judge Walker's sexual orientation is Maggie Gallagher, Chairman of the Board for the National Organization for Marriage (NOM): "Here we have an openly gay federal judge substituting his views for those of the American people and our Founding Fathers who I promise you would be shocked by courts that imagine they have the right to put gay marriage in our Constitution." Hell, the Founding Fathers would be shocked to see women voting!

The right wing American Family Association calls Judge Walker's ruling "very bad behavior," and insists the House of Representatives start impeachment proceedings against Judge Walker. With anti-gay hatred such a defining characteristic of today's Republican Party, this absurdity could actually become reality should the GOP gain control of the House in November.

The Traditional Values Coalition warns of this even more directly: "If folks think the Tea Party movement is a force to be reckoned with now, wait until the silent majority of pro-family voters flex their political muscle once again. Judges beware, you will go the way of Rose Bird (Chief Justice of California ousted by social conservatives), stripped of their robes and kicked off the bench." The Christian right fully intends to "take back" the courts if the Republican Tea Party regains power.

Not surprisingly, all but a handful of Republican senators opposed the nomination of Elena Kagan to the Supreme Court because, you guessed it, she was far too respectful of gay rights. Only seconds after the GOP lost the Kagan vote, Arizona Republican John McCain resumed his obsessive gay bashing on the Senate floor.

McCain was irate over the Democratic Party adding LGBT inclusive hate crimes legislation to a Defense Authorization bill last year, and the Democratic attempts to begin ending "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" in another Defense Authorization bill this year. McCain called it "disgraceful" that the Armed Services Committee was trying to move a "social agenda." Michigan Democrat Carl Levin, unfazed by McCain's meltdown, responded like a human being: "We try to defeat hate in this country."

Not so for the folks at Fox. At any time of day or night, Fox can be found using its arsenal of hate to rile up Republicans. Fox's O'Reilly denies this, writing there is not "a shred of evidence" that his network tries to whip up fear. Yet almost every night O'Reilly can be found ginning up stories about schools "indoctrinating children" about homosexuality, Islamic Centers taking over lower Manhattan, "baby killer" abortion doctors, drunk illegal immigrants killing nuns, or scary black people intimidating voters or ignoring struggling white farmers. Fox's other peddlers of fear, Rove, Palin, Beck, Gingrich, Malkin, Huckabee, Coulter and Hannity, market their homophobia, Islamophobia, xenophobia, racism, and occasionally even anti-Semitism, with shameless skill.

Heading towards Election Day, most Republican candidates are likely to avoid issues like Prop. 8 and marriage equality to keep the focus on the struggling economy. But Fox will continue their campaign to scare their viewers about gays, Latinos, blacks and Moslems, hoping fear guarantees them Republican victories in November.