As part of the research for our Gay-Baiting '08 article, AfterElton.com interviewed various television commentators about their opinion on the role of gay issues in the upcoming election. These are their responses.
AfterElton.com: How much have things changed since the 2004 election when the Republicans used anti-gay sentiments to increase turnout for their party?
Keith Olbermann, Host, Countdown with Keith Olbermann: When nobody can afford to go to a gay wedding, a straight wedding or a protest of a gay wedding, [the issue] is not going to make any difference. This is the danger of values, if you will, and that's used as a facetious term, values politics – when that's all you've got, when reality intervenes, like nobody can afford to keep their home or put gasoline or home winter heating oil in it this winter, people are going to say, "You're serious? You want me to vote for you when you've ruined the economy, ruined our place in the world, haven't stopped terrorism, made us kind of the bullies of the world, and I'm supposed to vote for you because you have some phony baloney belief that gay people shouldn't have the right to be just as miserable as all the straight married people?" Really, I sense in the country a strong sense of incredulity to a lot of this and it's not just gender or sexual orientation issues, but all these other things are just being trotted out and thrown out and nobody's responding to them.
Joe Scarborough, Host, Morning Joe: Well, Karl Rove's job was to get George Bush elected. I'm sure Rove looked at it and people who worked for Bush looked at it as a wedge issue to drive evangelicals out. And if you look at the results of 2004, it was an Evangelical base that ended up making the difference to George Bush in Florida and Ohio and in a lot of other states that really mattered. As far as the strategy they employed, it worked. But the world has changed, I think, at least, when it comes to social issues like gay marriage being used as a wedge issue.
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