In today’s Cavalier Daily, columnist Mike Slaven does a fantastic job of critiquing the meaning, origin, ethics, and effects of this week’s dust-up over Kilgore’s voice. His best point — and I agree strongly — is that the Kaine campaign ought to have nothing to do with any buzz about Kilgore’s speaking style. It’s beneath him, and it’s beneath a proper campaign. Secondarily, I very much agree with his point regarding claims that Kilgore is gay: it’s not just morally wrong for Democrats, but it’s plainly factually wrong, what with his being married with kids. (To be fair, I’ve seen very, very little such speculation, most of it on Free Republic, ironically.)
Why can’t any of the commercial dailies provide analysis this good?
Mike is a blogger, too — he runs News Thoughts, where he wrote about this today.
the voters know who supports the homosexual agenda, and its the communist democratic party. they will not be fooled.
I usually delete trolls, but this is just so funny that I have to leave it.
I think you answered your own question, as they are the commercial dailies and they are not looking to rock the boat. I think Kain’s team would be wise to include Kilgore’s voice in various advertising, as it is a liability, but I’m glad they aren’t making an overture about it.
… this comment coming by way of the People’s Republic of Charlottesville. That was a good troll from Pastor John.
Uh oh, does this mean there’s going to be discord in the Jaquith household on the morality of using The Kilgore Sexuality? (Sounds kind of like The Fourth Protocol, The Odessa File, or some such Frederick Forsyth novel.)
There’s always political discord in the Jaquith household on the matter of politics. :)
keep raising taxes you demo communists. hell fire will strike charlottesville, the sources of heathen breeding and the homosexual agenda that threatens to sweet through our elementary schools and capture our children within lucifer’s grasp. i demand that you take this blog down.
Oh, I see, it really is a troll — just somebody having a little fun.
Dude, you should start your own blog. I’d read it every day. Seriously.
you lib jane fonda lovers might laugh now at my true christian values but how would you like it if i was elected to office and taxed homosexual acts like sodomy with gophers? then you wouldn’t be laughing
i’m out working trying to protect the institution of marriage from the satanists, secularists, humanists, paganists, homosexuals, grabassers, nambla-ites, masons, and the rappers by going door to door speaknig the gospel and let me tell you god is angry. god is full of range. he can’t stand to watch the baby killers, the orphanage robbers, the unwed teenage bimbo queens, and especially the sodomites run wild with their wicked ways on gods green earth. please begone with the bunch of you or repent.
It is satire, isn’t it? It must be.
I’m confused – you’re saying you agree that Kilgore’s voice shouldn’t be an issue. You say it’s beneath the Kaine campaign. At the same time, you’ve seemed to enjoy all the negative press about Kilgore’s voice, to this point.
Correct: I’m saying that the Kaine campaign should not make Kilgore’s voice an issue. I am not the Kaine campaign.
Had somebody been running against Ed Schrock when he was outed, I don’t think that said fictional candidate should have made Schrock’s sexuality an issue. But you can’t be bloody well sure I would have done so, and I hope that many others would have done the same.
I agree. The Kaine campaign just needs to focus on getting debates set up and and running on fiscal responsibility and technological progress and let Kilgore’s voice and other shortcoming drive down Republican turnout on it’s own.
See, that’s exactly the difference — bloggers were saying “Isn’t it funny that Republicans might vote against him because they’re homophobic.” — But when the official campaign does it, they’re endorsing the idea that people should vote against someone who fits those stereotypes.
What I would love to see come out of this is Republicans becoming more tolerant of homosexuality. To many Republicans, the adjective “gay” is akin to “inferior,” whereas to many of my fellow Democrats, it’s more like “tall” or “red-haired.” I’d get a real kick out of seeing closed-minded individuals being pried open a little.
Waldo hit it on the head. It’s hard to explain our non-homophobia to conservatives. They compare us calling someone gay to us calling someone an alcoholic. We see it as no big deal. So we taunt them with the charge repeatedly, knowing they’ll be put in the position to either (a) awkwardly defend gay people or (b) awkwardly defend themselves against charges of homosexuality.
Personally, I find it all very amusing.
Waldo, I think you would be surprised at the quality of analysis coming out of Virginia’s university newspapers. I know when I was at The Breeze at JMU, our editorials were often much better than the local Byrd-owned paper, the Daily News-Record. Sometimes it is hit-or-miss, and often you get kids just spouting off about nonsense, but there are some sharp thinkers writing for the papers and they deserve more attention. Thanks for drawing attention to Mike’s Slaven’s piece, and I’d encourage you to check the college papers this fall for more quality writing.
Peace,
Adam
I’ve read the Cavalier Daily every day (while school’s in session, of course) for at least the past five years or so, and the Collegiate Times each day since I started at VT in the fall of ’03. (I have to admit that I only read The Breeze occasionally, probably once every few months.) While the CT is generally only mediocre, the Cav. Daily is really quite good — it’s generally well above the standards of college journalism, and regularly runs opinion pieces and news articles that are superior to those of the Daily Progress.
Waldo, you make an important point about Republicans needing to become more tolerant of homosexuality. While I am not advocating efforts to use the perceived sexual orientation of an Ed Schrock or a Jerry Kilgore against them, it strikes me an rather hypocritical for them to be outraged by this while both have fought tireless against legislation that would protect people from employment discrimination based on their PERCEIVED or real sexual orientation. It remains legal to fire someone in VA for being gay… but also for SEEMING gay… or even for NOT being gay. I’d hope that the Republican party would learn that it is time to pass an employment non-discrimination law to stop this once and for all.
i’ve set up a “blog”. please take this one down. it is not neccesary anymore.
Dude, you’ve got to give us the URL.
my nephew tells me that if you click my name you will me sent away from this place to my “blog” please take this down now.
“It’s hard to explain our non-homophobia to conservatives.”
Paul, it’s so interesting that you say that. It’s hard for us conservatives to explain our non-homophobia to liberals. Seems there may be a mutual misunderstanding.
*Laugh*
Jon wins. :)
sorry, my mistake. I meant “social conservatives”. You can’t be a social conservative without fearing gay people.
that’s probably the best blog i’ve seen since
http://ifuckedanncoulterintheasshard.blogspot.com/
(which is EXTREMELY “Not Safe for Work,” if you couldn’t guess by the URL)