Log Cabin Calls Gary Bauer to Task in The Politico
In a ridiculous piece for The Politico, failed presidential candidate Gary Bauer (now head of the anti-gay “American Values”) calls on the Republican Party to–hold onto your hat–use gay marriage to drum up votes! With fresh ideas like that, it’s no wonder Mr. Bauer’s presidential ambitions fell as flat as he did when he tumbled off the campaign stage in 2000 while flipping a pancake. Remember that?
But, I digress. So, today, Log Cabin’s Patrick Sammon responded in-kind with an editorial in The Politico telling Mr. Bauer why he’s wrong:
In his Ideas piece for Tuesday’s Politico, “Can gay marriage save the GOP again?” former presidential candidate Gary Bauer makes misleading and inaccurate claims.
Bauer argues that the issue of gay marriage helped catapult the GOP to electoral success in 2004 and directly led to President Bush’s reelection. But that theory, long rumored in the aftermath of the 2004 election, has been disproved.
Some analysts inaccurately credited Bush’s 2004 reelection to his use of the marriage issue to improve the turnout of his base. However, Matthew Dowd, Bush’s chief strategist in 2004, says the marriage issue was not the reason Bush won reelection. The New York Times quotes Dowd as saying, “At best, it doesn’t move voters, and at worst for Republicans, it moves them against them. Not so much on the issue, but it becomes, ‘Why are we having a discussion on this issue when we should be talking about things that matter, like the economy, or health care or the war?’”
Even so, Bauer’s argument doesn’t hold water, because 2008 is not 2004. The politics surrounding marriage are changing quickly.
Read Patrick’s entire smack-down.
UPDATE: Not to divert attention away from the issue at hand, but for those interested, here is the YouTube of Gary Bauer falling off the stage while trying to flip Bisquick pancakes.
-posted by Scott Tucker
Posted: July 1st, 2008 under Elections, From the Right, In the News, Log Cabin In Focus, On the Lighter Side.