For the BernieBots

I've heard too much from supporters of Sen. Bernie Sanders about sitting out the election if Hillary Clinton is the Democratic nominee (or voting Green, which is the same thing). They're pretending it's high principles -- "Oh, she's hand in glove with Wall Street," or "I don't think she's honest," or "she supports the TPP," or any of a baker's dozen of excuses. I see it as being childish and petulant.

So, for all you purist leftists (if any of you read this blog), I bring you this, via Digby, from President Obama's commencement speech at Howard University:

You can be completely right, and you still are going to have to engage folks who disagree with you. If you think that the only way forward is to be as uncompromising as possible, you will feel good about yourself, you will enjoy a certain moral purity, but you’re not going to get what you want. And if you don’t get what you want long enough, you will eventually think the whole system is rigged. And that will lead to more cynicism, and less participation, and a downward spiral of more injustice and more anger and more despair. And that's never been the source of our progress. That's how we cheat ourselves of progress.

You have to go through life with more than just a passion for change – you have to have strategy. Not just awareness, but action. Not just hashtags, but votes. Change requires more than righteous anger. To bring about structural change, lasting change, awareness is not enough. It requires changes in law, changes in customs.

There are over 310 million people in this country, including a lot of people who are frightened and dismayed by the pace of the changes we've had. You want instant Paradise? By whose definition?

Here's Obama delivering the speech:

And Tom Sullivan ("Undercover Blue") has a transcript here.

More on Marriage

First, this racist rant from Jasmyn Cannick. This is the sort of thing that leads me to think that the government is not the only dysfunctional aspect of this society:

As I pointed out before, it is a privilege to be able to focus solely on the issue of obtaining marriage for lesbian and gay couples. A privilege that many of us aren’t afforded.

It continues to be issue number one for the gay civil rights movement because for its leaders it is the last step in achieving parity with their heterosexual counterparts who already have the six-figure income, house, vacation house, an adopted son or daughter from somewhere in Africa or some other impoverished nation, and two or more cars.

This is the kind of argument we might see coming from Maggie Gallagher or Tony Perkins, except that I doubt either of them would play the race card quite so reflexively, as Cannick hastens to do. In formal logic, it's known as a "straw man" -- you invent a position or a condition that is supposed to represent your opponent's opinion or condition but doesn't do so accurately, then demolish it. It's an automatic "FAIL."

OK -- I'm white. I'm not rich, and I don't think I've ever been what anyone would call "privileged" (although I realize that to some, "white" and "privileged" are synonyms) -- I grew up poor, worked my way through college, and have at times been financially secure, but never what you'd even call well-off. I've never owned even one car, and the only thing I've ever adopted was a cat. So I think I'm quite legitimately calling "bullshit" on this one.

Add in that the post is factually challenged: marriage is the most high-profile issue right now because it's the most controversial, thanks to the fundies and, at the risk of ruffling some PC feathers, some high-profile leaders of the black community (although I'm very happy to acknowledge the role that black churches and the black community played in Washington, D.C., in securing our rights there). (Note to Jasmyne Connick: you won't get any sympathy from this quarter when you attack people who are actually fighting for equal rights for all of us and let Bishop Harry Jackson off the hook.) But marriage is not the only issue, and anyone who says that our organizations are not working for ENDA, DADT repeal, and any other facet of this struggle you care to name, both locally and nationally, is full of it. This is even more grossly distorted than it might seem at first when you remember that it was only recently that the national organizations even acknowledged the push for marriage rights as a legitimate area of concern and tried for years to redirect those efforts toward other issues. It's taken immense pressure from independent gay activists to reorient their priorities, and now Cannick is bitching because we haven't made black lesbians the main concern.

It's also a strategically critical issue: if we can get married as easily and freely as anyone else, if our families have the same legal and social recognition, if we have equal access to what is a core element of any society, denying us other rights becomes very obviously indefensible.

And now that I've vented my temper a bit, let me point out that none of these issues are either/or for most of us, and none of our national advocacy organizations is focusing solely on any one of them -- that's just more BS. We all meet prejudice in our daily lives, even in places where we least expect it. I don't see that the attempt to co-opt the gay civil rights movement into fighting racial prejudice on a day-to-day basis is helping anyone, frankly, and, trying to be as nice about it as I possibly can, Cannick's post strikes me as terribly self-centered and childish.

Dan Savage has a much more succinct rejoinder, underscored by the first couple to get their marriage license in D.C.

Follow-Up on "Criminalizing Normalcy"

An update on this post about sex offender registries and teenagers.

One of Sullivan's readers makes a good point in relation to Classically Liberal's original post:

I do think, however, that "cls" could've served his/her readers... his/her own credibility... and the blogosphere in general, a lot better, had (s)he taken a day or two to conduct more research on sexual abuse, pedophilia, and so forth.

Whenever you have a sexual situation involving young people, it's important to consider the age differences between the parties involved. If the age difference is less than three years, you're most likely dealing with innocent exploration; if the age difference is three years or more, there's a good chance that some sort of coercion is involved.

"Coercion" in this context is a tricky word -- the implication in most people's minds is the use of force, and that's not necessarily the case. I suspect in a lot of the "coercion" cases, it's much more a matter of the younger child following the older child's lead. Is that "child sexual abuse"? That's iffy. It's much clearer in the case of an adult and a child -- the adult is able to make reasoned decisions and has the responsibility of looking out for the welfare of the child. It's much closer to black and white, as much as anything ever is. (Just to make it crystal clear, I am not excusing those instances in which coercion does mean forcing someone -- that's something that's unacceptable under any cirumstances, at any age.)

In the instance related by Sullivan's reader, he was the victim of abuse by an older child -- he was 8, the older boy 14. There's no question in my mind that the older boy was way over the line.

But the issue of placing a child on a sex offender registry for the rest of his/her life is a separate one. The Economist took a hard look at some of the consequences of our sex offender laws. And "sex offender" becomes a very loose term indeed:

Every American state keeps a register of sex offenders. California has had one since 1947, but most states started theirs in the 1990s. Many people assume that anyone listed on a sex-offender registry must be a rapist or a child molester. But most states spread the net much more widely. A report by Sarah Tofte of Human Rights Watch, a pressure group, found that at least five states required men to register if they were caught visiting prostitutes. At least 13 required it for urinating in public (in two of which, only if a child was present). No fewer than 29 states required registration for teenagers who had consensual sex with another teenager. And 32 states registered flashers and streakers.

Some of these laws are, as you can see, ludicrous. And getting off those registries is almost impossible. Read the piece in The Economist -- it's pretty thoroughly depressing, and brings up the point I mentioned above: most of the people on these registries pose no threat to children or anyone else. To some extent, Sullivan's reader is correct: in some cases, registration is reasonable. But in 65% of them it's not.

So my outrage and disgust remain unchanged: is it justice to place an eighteen-year-old on a sex offender registry for life because he had consensual sex with his sixteen-yer-old boyfriend? Give me a break.

Criminalizing Normalcy

It's something we've done as a reflex in this country for way too long. Here's an extraordinary post on just what our idea of "sex offender" includes.

The whole idea of sex offender registries has bothered me for a long time, particularly considering the kinds of things that people get registered for -- as in these cases, experimenting with sex between age-mates. Until Lawrence vs. Texas, having sex with his boyfriend meant a man would have to register as a sex offender in any number of states.

I would find it hard to believe that this actually happens, but given the tenor of this country, and the sorts of people who drive these efforts -- the small-minded and mean-spirited on both the right and the left who can't stand the idea that other people are doing things without their permission -- it's not so surprising. The impulse might be benign, at least in its broadest outlines: given the high rate of recidivism among, for example, child molesters, it makes sense to keep tabs on them. But too often, the "criminals" are the real victims:

These kids are criminals, not necessarily because they violated the life, liberty or property of another person. They are criminals because the politicians defined them as criminals. These damned “family values” conservatives, and compassionate feminist Leftists, who banded together to “save the children,” turned America’s kids into sex offenders by fiat. And they feel good about it. They are satisfied by it and only wish more had been rounded up earlier. The Left wants everyone in therapy and under the perpetual care of the state, and the Right wants everyone in prison, or in fear of the law, and under the thumb of the police. And that is what is happening.

The implementation is too often hamhanded and stupid and partakes too much of a neo-Puritan desire for punishment for punishment's sake. It's like the death penalty -- if you can't do it right, best just not to do it.

(Frankly, if I had the money, I'd take these kids in hand and start filing suits against the states for violation of Constitutional prohibitions of cruel and unusual punishment. I get really furious about stuff like this.)

The people who push for this are beyond disgusting.

Via Von at Obsidian Wings, who has some comments. He raises the race issue, which I see as a sidebar. At this point, I'm not so much worried about who is being victimized most as I am furious that kids are being victimized at all.

Thought Police

They're everywhere. William Saletan has some comments:

But check out Farley's second argument: Kids shouldn't "have to be watching someone smoke." We're no longer talking about breathing even a particle of smoke. We're talking about banning bad habits to prevent cultural contamination. . . .

Why is a huge outdoor smoking ban justified even in the absence of substantiating medical evidence? Because, as one anti-smoking leader tells the Times, "There is no redeeming value in smoking at beaches or parks." That's the bottom line: Any basis for a ban, no matter how slight, is now sufficient, because the value of smoking is zero.

I'm trying to figure out the redeeming value in this kind of neo-Puritanism. As far as I can see, this is the exact left-wing equivalent to David Parker's lawsuit against Massachusetts schools for including same-sex marriage in their health and family classes. No difference.

I find it hard to believe that I'm actually agreeing with Saletan, but I think he's pretty much on point here. In Chicago, when the new anti-smoking ordinance went into effect, Starbucks posted signs in all their outlets (I can't call them "coffee shops") stating that no smoking was allowed on the patio or within fifteen feet of it. I'm waiting for some busybody barista to try to stop me from smoking within fifteen feet of a Starbucks patio. I'll file a complaint for interfering with a public thoroughfare. (The funniest example is the Starbucks at State and Erie, near where I work -- no smoking within fifteen feet of a "patio" that is right on the corner of two major streets, and within twenty feet of a bus stop. Yes, the left has its share of idiots. I'd boycott Starbucks, but I don't patronize them anyway -- the coffee sucks and the atmosphere is, as we used to say in the '70s, "plastic.")

So the left has found a new minority to oppress. I guess it was only a matter of time -- they tend to concentrate on safe targets.

(Full disclosure: Unlike Saletan, I'm a smoker. For reasons of my own, I've cut way down, but every time I see a story like this, I have an overwhelming impulse to light up and blow smoke in some asshole's face.)

Via Sullivan, and I can only echo his conclusion: "Jesus, these busy-bodies need to get a life."

Saletan has a follow-up.

A Seat At the Table

A couple of notes from AmericaBlog (here and here).

I keep remembering that Frank is one of the people who has actually made things happen with civil rights legislation for gays. HRC and the other national "rights" organizations haven't, and after thirty years, they are once again prepared to torpedo the boat if they don't get their ideologically pure way. It's an object lesson in how to be completely ineffective.

I hope I've made it plain that I support a trans-inclusive ENDA, but that the arguments for dropping the orientation-only bill, which can pass, in favor a trans-inclusive bill that can't, are not in the least persuasive. Frank is right, and that's all there is to it. I'm also more than a little bit irritated at the revisionist history I've seen coming out on the gay movement, with the not-so-subtle subtext that the transpeople have been carrying the rest of us on their backs and it's payback time.

Crock, that.

You're welcome to come in, but you don't own the house.

Sanchez Update

I'm never sure if y'all go back to previous posts, because I do sometimes update them. This one, however, got bigger than I had expected.

Finally got a clear link to the post I'd been looking for. From Max Blumenthal:

There is of course nothing inherently wrong with Sanchez being a gay porn star or a male escort. His past is only notable because he chose to join a movement that exploits anti-gay sentiment for political gain. Coulter’s now-famous “faggot” remark was not an aberration, but rather a symbol of the politics of resentment that propels the conservative movement and its elected Republican surrogates; a reflection of the bigotry conservatives have sought to write into the Constitution through the so-called Federal Marriage Amendment. The ascendant “family values” wing of the right is also responsible for sabotaging legislation allowing homosexuals to serve openly in the armed forces, a maneuver that may now spell the end of Sanchez’s career.

Blumenthal gets it pretty much right, although I tend to shy away from psychoanalyzing people I don't know, much less entire political movements. For that matter, I don't usually psychoanalyze people I do know.

It is interesting, however, to note this comment from John Aravosis:

Anyway, Alan Colmes of Hannity & Colmes was kind enough to send me a clip of his interview yesterday with Sanchez on his radio show. Sanchez claims, among other things, that he's not gay, and that his male prostitution clients weren't gay either. He also said that he hadn't done gay porn or prostitution in 15 years. Holmes corrected him, pointing out a "massage" ad for Sanchez' services placed only 3 years ago. I'd also point out that IMDB says that Sanchez' last movie was 1999, that's 8 years ago, not 15.

It really is a Ted Haggard moment. Not only is he not gay, but his clients aren't, either. Get serious. How many straight guys go out looking for the services of a male hooker? And how many male hookers with a male clientele are really into women? This, of course, ties into the whole Christianist "repentance" thing. You can do whatever you want, as long as you repent at some point -- like when you see an opportunity to make more money posing as a poster boy for the anti-gay right. This free pass is, of course, only available to conservative Republicans, and only if they're approved by James Dobson. Democrats and Rudy Giuliani are damned for eternity.

And, harking back to the hypocrisy trope, I think there's more than a whiff of it here. It's a fascinating study of the interplay of denial and projection. Let's go back to this quote from Sanchez:

There's something about the beleaguered gay psyche that wants to prove to the world that everyone is just as messed up as they are. So, they start off with the term hypocrite and work their way backwards looking for signs of deviant behavior in hopes of discovering some type of bastard kinship. That's why I've had the term self-loathing thrown at me so often. The gay community eats its own in a frenzied hope of self-serving fulfillment.

Offhand, I'd say his information about the "beleaguered gay psyche" is decades out of date. But then, most of us don't deny being gay, especially when we've been making our living from it. And considering where his support is coming from, referring to those attacking him as having beleaguered psyches is only to be expected -- after all, that's what his party wants to maintain. Let's face it, "deviant behavior" is something that the right likes to spotlight -- in other people. (I guess he really is a right-winger.) In case you haven't gotten it yet, the only reason that the left is spotlighting Sanchez' history is what many see as the hypocrisy integral to his adoption of the self-styled "conservatives" and their politics of bigotry. We've been used as the boogeyman for a couple of decades now, and Sanchez is not only buying into it, he's coming out in favor of it. Of course, the prose does veer toward the purple -- the last sentence is up there on the "dark and stormy night" scale. And looking at it again, I'm not sure what it means, if anything.

This, from his Salon piece, just puts the icing on the cake:

Instead, those who complain about wire-tapping reserve the right to pry into my private life and my past for political brownie points.

Sorry, honey, but if you're waving your dick around on the silver screen, you can hardly call it your "private life." Or, as Nitpicker puts it:

Malkin, who initially wrote that CPAC "should do more extensive background research before handing out an honor with Jeane Kirkpatrick's name on it," has now decided that liberals are "hate-filled" because someone "outed" his "gay porn past." For the record, "outing" is a term traditionally reserved for times when someone uncovers a secret life someone else has been carefully hiding. It's hard to argue that Sanchez was "outed" when you can go buy reminders of his past for $29.95 at Randy Bottom's House of Video.

Let me put it this way: Sanchez denies being gay and bitches about those who "outed" him. He calls his critics vicious, hateful, messed-up. He defends Ann Coulter, who calls a presidential candidate a "faggot," with the comment that "she was making a joke."

Do I really need to connect the dots?

(Just to keep the right-wing victims happy, here's a "vicious, vitriolic" post from Cliff Schechter at AmericaBlog. [Not really, but you'll just have to make do.])

The Obligatory Matt Sanchez Post

OK -- I promised you this one. I think one reason I love blogging is that I can spend time on non-stories if it suits me. Something like this also gives me a chance to investigate some of the major flaws in our public discourse as it involves the blogosphere.

By way of background, Matt Sanchez is the new hero of the right wing -- a Marine, a student at Columbia, and a former porn star and male escort. He claims, in a round-about way, not to be gay, but allow me some scepticism: I can see performing in gay porn if you're straight, on the assumption that men evolved as sexual creatures, pure and simple, and will fuck anything with a hole. I have a harder time accepting the idea that anyone who does not like sex with men would offer himself as an escort. Of course, this may be a Ted Haggard moment -- just acting out.

Robbie at The Malcontent is a little too predictable in his first post on Matt Sanchez:

There's something about the beleaguered gay psyche that wants to prove to the world that everyone is just as messed up as they are. So, they start off with the term hypocrite and work their way backwards looking for signs of deviant behavior in hopes of discovering some type of bastard kinship. That's why I've had the term self-loathing thrown at me so often. The gay community eats its own in a frenzied hope of self-serving fulfillment. - Matt Sanchez

You know, I'm finding it very difficult to disagree with this sentiment in light of how certain quarters are reacting to Matt Sanchez. (Check out this bit of over the top hysteria. Get thee some valium).

Frankly, I find Sanchez' comment self-serving. After all, the best defense is a strong offense, and it's just too pat to come back to the perceived attacks with the tired old line about how we all hate ourselves and take it out on each other. I say "perceived" attacks because I'm having trouble finding them. Here's the Towleroad post that Robbie characterizes as "over the top hysteria." Excuse me? I found this comment by John Aravosis at AmericaBlog. It's shrill, but Aravosis is always shrill, about everything, so you can't take that as an indication of much. And here is the original post at Joe.My.God, which Shanchez characterized as vicious, and the interview with Joe and Sanchez. (It seems to me that if all you're interested in is trashing someone, you're not going to give them the opportunity to be heard on your own blog.

Robbie follows up the first post with this one, in which he grudgingly agrees with Matt Foreman:

This is in direct contradiction to the queerospheric hysterics attacking Sanchez and the mass amounts of vitriol currently being piled upon him. It seems to me, rather than attacking Sanchez, certain bloggers might have been wiser in using him as strong example against Don't Ask, Don't Tell. Instead, certain bloggers saw Republican, underwent the predictable radical queerwolf transformation, and brought out the claws.

(The interesting thing is that Pam Spaulding, who is usually among the more vitriolic of the left-wing gay bloggers, largely confines herself to Foreman's statement. In fact, she doesn't editorialize as much as Robbie does, at least as of this writing.)

Robbie, unfortunately, falls immediately into an all-too-predictable gay-left bashing (and let's refer back to Sanchez' comments about "self-loathing" and "devouring our own").

I even read Sanchez' famous OpEd, which turned out to be a string of conservatives cliches about the left, and tremendously self-serving. But then, he admits he wants to be heard as much as anyone does.

Of course, I had to check out GayPatriot, hoping (in vain) for a surprise. Bruce Carroll had had this to say:

One of the greatest things about our nation (as opposed to others) is that we give our fellow citizens a second, third, and fourth, etc. chance to re-do their lives. Here’s an extreme example… just to make my point…. It was amazing how Richard Nixon morphed from Constitutional Villian to Elder Cold War Statesman.

But does this spirit of tolerance and renewal extend to those who challenge moral standards? Does a gay porn star get a second, third, or fourth chance to do something else with his life? Apparently the Post-Clinton Angry Liberals say “NO!”

It is amazing how an issue like this really challenges the political stereotypes of who is truly tolerant. Most (not all) Liberals these days talk the talk, but can’t walk the walk. And most (not all) Conservatives that I know don’t preach but instead accept all Americans as individual gifts from God. I’d prefer the latter.

Case in point….. Contrast Michelle Malkin’s awesome post this morning on the Sanchez matter versus the hate-filled, angry liberal commenters at Joe.My.God.

Notice one thing: Michelle Malkin is cited as a contrast to the commenters at Joe.My.God. I find a pattern here: Commenters at blog posts are taken as the representatives of liberal thought, while the actual posters are virtually ignored (in this case, the comments by Joe himself might as well not exist). Sorry, not equivalent, and if Carroll honestly thinks they are, I think I deserve a pass on considering him shallow. However, if we're going to be fair (not something that I'd accuse Carroll of without serious thought), we should haul in Malkin's commenters, or those wonderful folks at LGF, as the counterpart, or put up someone like David Neiwert or Digby as the counterpart to Malkin. (Y'know, the left doesn't seem to have an Ann Coulter.)

There are also his comments about the Post-Clinton Angry Liberals and political stereotypes. Here's another place where I'm convinced GayPatriot and I do not inhabit the same universe. I'm still looking for the monolithic, goose-stepping PC leftists. They're probably someplace close to where I left my copy of the Gay Agenda. Carroll's blog lives on straw-men and red herrings, and this is just another example. I mean, c'mon -- we're talking about a political group that can't even get its shit together long enough to run a decent campaign and only wins elections when the right gets so repellent the voters have no other alternative. Sorry -- speaking with one mouth is not something you're going to find on the left side of the aisle. Why don't we just admit it?

Ah, but then who could we accuse of doing what we're doing while we're pointing at them?

You see why I tend to dismiss GayPatriot: Zero Credibility.

Notice also, in Sanchez' remarks as well as Carroll's (and for Carroll it seems to be a mantra) -- they are "patriotic Americans." In fact, Sanchez is a "red-blooded, flag-waving 100% American." OK -- a fast and easy one, no thought required. Just say you're patriotic, and of course that means your opponents (or should I call them enemies?) are not. Let's talk for a bit about shallow readings of "patriotism," the kind that play right into the hands of the people who are trying to dismantle the country.

To both Sanchez and Carroll: You're patriotic Americans, as opposed to what? Equally patriotic Americans who don't agree with you? Of course not -- the implication is that those who disagree are dirty raghead-loving, terrorist-supporting, Christian-burning, morally depraved America haters. Like me. And those who are reading this, most likely. So you know first-hand how correct that implication is. Cheap shot, and morally dishonest. In case you hadn't noticed, I'm really tired of the "hate-filled vitriol" remarks coming from a group that lionizes people like Ann Coulter and Michelle Malkin.

Dan Blatt at GayPatriot has this take:

First, I probably have a different opinion of porn than Michelle Malkin and others on the right. While I don’t think acting, er, performing in such videos is a noble profession nor is it something to be proud of, it’s not an evil thing. As I wrote about Tom Malin’s escorting, “As long as he’s not coercing anyone and not having sex with minors, it’s his body. What Malin used to do may not be good for his soul.”

That said, the second issue is the more important one. He has changed and is no longer doing gay porn. If a man has changed his past behavior, then we should consider the man as he is, not as he once was. Again, as I wrote about Malin, “Jewish law teaches us that if someone does Teshuvah or repentance (the word itself literally means ‘return’), by forsaking his sin and not doing it again, it cannot be held against him.” We have all done things in our past that upon reflection, we wish we hadn’t done — or were appropriate at one time in our lives, but not in our present circumstances.

The interesting thing about the posts at GayPatriot, particularly Blatt's piece, is that they're predicated on the idea that performing in gay porn (or any porn, I would assume) and having been a male escort are bad. They are "mistakes" and we should move away from them. Why? (In case anyone's wondering, I favor legalizing prostitution and I have no problems with porn. OK, there's a major ick factor to some of it -- scat is just disgusting, child porn and snuff films are disgusting in another way. Some things should be illegal -- there's simply no justifying them.) I really don't care that Sanchez was an actor in gay porn or that he's been an escort.

I see it as a shallow, mass-market "morality" that is much too popular in this country (and in others, I'm sure) that has lost sight of morality as a guiding force that comes from firmly held values and sees it as a checklist of dos and don'ts that dictate behavior, not attitude. Remember, these are among the people who would want to burn me at the stake for being a Witch, while I consider Paganism as a religion to be a very tough one, requiring constant engagement if you're going to live your life by its Rule. There are no easy outs here. Consequently, who you sleep with is irrelevant, as long as it's someone who can make an adult decision to participate. How you treat them is the most important thing.

So why all the screaming about hypocrisy? That's not so easy to figure out. In Sanchez' case, I'm not going to even try -- I have no idea as to what his thought processes are, although this post is illuminating. It's just as self-serving as his OpEd, and revealing of the mindset that I mentioned immediately above:

I don’t like porn, it reduces the mind, flattens the soul. That’s not hypocrisy talking, that’s experience. If I started off with liberal leanings, being on a gay porn set should have been heaven. In porn, everything taboo is trivialized and everything trivial is projected. How does a conservative trace his roots to such distasteful beginnings?

Fine -- he doesn't like porn. That's "experience" talking. His experience, but it does, of course, apply to everyone, because if you're a red-blooded, flag waving 100% American (especially if you're a Marine, the most American of Americans), then you get to decide what everyone thinks.

I can't honestly call that "hypocrisy," just moral blindness with a big helping of arrogance. The Greeks called it "hubris" and felt it as great a moral failing as I do.

The hypocrisy, of course, rests firmly within the movement that Sanchez seems to think is the answer to all our problems. Sanchez's comment equating porn with liberalism (and I do take it as such, considering that the contrast is with porn and "conservatism" in its current warped incarnation) is hysterically funny. See my comments about mass-market morality if you want my take on projecting the trivial. So Sanchez feels our salvation is tied up with a movement that wants to use him but not acknowledge his basic humanity. How is this not hypocritical, on their part if not on his?

I will say that I see one area where Sanchez is a hypocrite, and that's playing the victim card. For the reasons I've noted, I don't see all the hatred and vitriol that he's claiming from the left. It appears to me that there's a lot of projection here, not only on his part.

(No, I'm not going to link to his escort page or any of the photos that are more revealing than the one on his blog. They're easy enough to find if you follow the links other people have provided. Besides, I don't find him all that attractive, although it might be different if I actually met him. Probably not -- I find his politics, at least what I know of them, repellent, but you never can tell.)

Update:

Finally, a post that could, if you really, really wanted it to, be characterized as "vitriolic." From TRex at Firedoglake:

You know, people like Michelle Malkin seem to think that progressive writers like me who are reporting on the sordid gay porn past of CPAC's 2007 Hate Camp poster-boy Matt Sanchez are "gleefully" dragging this story out into the light, and you know, for me, that couldn't be further from the truth. Last night on MSNBC's "Countdown With Keith Olbermann", I got name-checked by Max Blumenthal (Thanks, Max!) as someone who has been following the stories that keep emerging about highly-placed gay Republican operatives, but I can't say that these stories make me happy at all.

I have to slam TRex on the sordid issue, as well. Sorry, guys, this is not a no-brainer. I wish I were still sexy enough to make money from it. I truly do.

Update II:

Chris Crain gets one thing right:

But if you believe that gays should be able to serve in the military, and that there's nothing wrong with adult entertainment, then it's Sanchez service in uniform, not his servicing out of uniform, that should matter.