Here we go again. First Rep. Sally Kern, now an Oklahoma County commissioner.
The latest Republican goofball to find dangerous gay people threatening the Oklahoma way of life is Brent Rinehart, an incumbent Oklahoma County commissioner.
Reinhart, who is facing a tough reelection battle, is so desperate for votes that he played the "gay card," a favorite tactic of the state's right-wing knuckleheads.
Rinehart's election-year gimmick is a crudely produced (and poorly spelled) comic book he's mailing to GOP voters in his district. In it, angels are on Brent's side (of course!) and Satan (who else?) is supporting those evil gay people.
Speaking on CNN, Rinehart claimed that the gay agenda is an issue in Oklahoma County, right up there with roads and bridges. Notably, he provided no evidence of this claim and offered no examples of the gay threat to his district, Oklahoma County or the state. (Apparently, their secret powers will cause us all to turn gay. It happens all the time!)
Asked if he was homophobic, Rinehart said he wasn't sure what sure what that word meant, as if that was a sufficient explanation for his gay-bashing comic.
Let's hear it for Brent Rinehart, yet another example of Oklahoma's conservative leadership, condemning (in God's name, of course) people it doesn't like since 1907.
17 comments:
That comic book of his looks like a Jack Chick tract drawn by a child and written by a simpleton.
With respect, there are times I think you are being "too clever by half," as the saying goes. I don't think you recognize this for the kidney punch that it is.
You've got to remember that you live in Oklahoma, and despite the feeling you get from the crowd that you may run around with, the overwhelming majority of people who live in this state are not at all supportive of homosexuality. What happened the last time it got put to a vote? I cannot stress this too strongly. Remember what happened at the polls!
It does not matter that Mr. Rinehart's comic book looks moronic. It may even have been done that way deliberately, just to draw fire from Democrats. The instant you open up on it, in the minds of quite a lot of people, you've allied yourselves with what they see (I am, of course, well aware that you do not agree) grossly immoral behavior and an aggressive campaign to legitimize said behavior.
All your reaction ends up doing is solidifying the Democratic Party's image as supportive of homosexual marriage and homosexuality in general. I would be willing to bet, were I a gambling man, that provoking responses like yours was the whole purpose of that comic book.
You and all the other Democrats who have criticized it would have been better off at the polls had you wholly ignored it.
Yeah, maybe Rinehart is a Kern-level genius at bringing bad publicity to the state.
Certainly it's an out-of-the-box way to divert attention from the fact that Rinehart goes to trial in the fall on felony campaign finance charges. Maybe the voters really are that dumb. We'll see.
Looks like a "Hail Mary" pass to me.
Rinehart is box of rocks dumb. Exhibit A: this interview on CNN. He doesn't know what the word "homophobic" means. He spent two months on the comic book. Nice suit, though.
Rinehart interview on CNN - YouTube
Sorry, I meant "Exhibit B." The comic book was Exhibit A.
I hope you haven't gotten the impression that my point was to defend Mr. Rinehart; it wasn't. What kind of person he is, or how smart he is, is immaterial to the point I was making: that to mock and disparage his little comic book is to fall into the most obvious of traps.
But shoot, if y'all insist on leaping into it, be my guest...
The poor fellow doesn't possess the wit to lay a trap of the subtlety you posit. His crude attempt to impugn Attorney General Edmondson for indicting him is merely humorous.
Even if the subtlety of the ploy approaches nil.
Dan, you seem to be suggesting that Oklahoma's anti-gay faction will respond like Pavlov's dog when anyone pushes their button, however crudely and cynically it is done. Isn't that an insult to them?
...you seem to be suggesting that Oklahoma's anti-gay faction will respond like Pavlov's dog when anyone pushes their button...
Exactly the opposite. I'm saying that Oklahoma's homosexuality-friendly faction will respond like Pavlov's dogs whenever anyone pushes their buttons, heightening public awareness of their position in the process. :)
Yes, but we can't help it. When someone tells a funny joke, you have to laugh! That's just going to happen.
Given that constancy, the anti-gay group needs to consider whether allowing themselves to be roused by a goof like Rinehart really helps their cause.
Since I'm not posing as a "concern troll" for the anti-gays, I personally hope they do go hook, line and sinker for Rinehart's idiotic cartoons. It will tend to discredit them.
In this particular case, I have no real axe to grind, as Mr. Rinehart doesn't exactly thrill me as a candidate. I was merely pointing out that in Oklahoma, painting your political opponents as pro-homosexuality can be a workable tactic, and getting them to paint themselves as such is even better. Democrats happen to excel at painting themselves in such colors, rising to the bait every time it's cast. Doesn't bother me a bit; just pointing out that that the presence of such bait in the water says less about the intelligence of Republican candidates than it does about the predictability of Democrat writers.
You did not, I hope, get the impression that I was concerned about Democrats' habit of publicly solidifying their pro-homosexuality image at every opportunity or provocation. As I said earlier, be my guest!
No, I didn't get that impression.
You might be interested in a news item this morning. The Washington Post published a poll Saturday, showing that 75% favor allowing gays to serve openly, up from 44% in 1993.
It seems clear to me from observing popular culture that young people are considerably less likely to discriminate against gays than their elders. A hopeful sign, and one that politicians won't fail to take notice of in coming years.
Did you read where Sally got caught trying to take a gun into the courthouse in OKC in her purse? Be careful and remember, Sally is packing heat.
An armed Congress is a polite Congress. Funny, they don't see it that way; guns are banned in the statehouse.
But what if legislators needed to defend themselves against a crazed and angry page or the representative from Big Cabin? Did they think of that?
I see that Sally offered the explanation: "I'm an outdoors girl."
What the hay, does she hunt rabbits with a Sig Sauer pistol?
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