Like Domenech and Yglesias, 48 hours ago I would have sworn Kagan was out. Now I realize that I was the gullible victim of a right-wing “whisper campaign,” launched in its latest incarnation by wingnuts who infiltrated gay advocacy site Queerty and tricked lefty Robert Iafolla into passing on the scurrilous rumors. From April 8:
The mounting speculation about Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens stepping down has triggered the requisite journalistic conjecture about whom President Obama might tap to fill the empty seat, with Solicitor General Elena Kagan topping some of the early lists. While Kagan’s unusual background could shake up the composition of the Court, it would also prove to a high hurdle during a confirmation fight. The gay news blog Queerty describes Kagan as “the lesbian former Harvard Law dean,” claiming she’s out but doesn’t discuss her sexuality with reporters.
This is going to play out like that scene at the end of South Park, where the boys are caught in the middle of a battlefield. Cartman turns to Kyle and says “All those times I said you were a big, dumb Jew? I didn’t mean it. You’re not a Jew.” And Kyle replies “Yes I am! I am a Jew, Cartman!”
Did the WH not get the memo that Kagan’s not only a lesbian, but that she’s not really concerned about who knows it? Two days ago it would have been totally unremarkable if she walked out of a Georgetown or Cambridge restaurant holding her girlfriend’s hand. Now it would be a national event.
Because the Obama administration decided to make Kagan’s sexual orientation a capital-t Thing, she’s now in a position where either it looks like she’s hiding her homosexuality to advance her judicial career or – if she acknowledges she’s a lesbian – it looks like she’s being chased out of the closet. This isn’t as openly insulting as when the White House blasted concerned gay activists for being part of an Internet left fringe. But in a way it’s even more denigrating.
“Don’t worry Elena. This administration will mobilize all of our considerable resources to defend you from these venomous smears.”
“Umm…”
Of course the real losers here are Obama worshiping journalists. Many had already sketched out their hosannas to modern Lincoln, focusing on the bravery it took to nominate “the first openly gay Supreme Court justice.” In their minds the most stirring grafs had already been written, describing how The One had casually dismissed his advisers’ concerns about endangered Blue Dogs, grandly intoning that the eternal cause of equality must not be sacrificed at the altar of petty electoral concerns. Certainly there wouldn’t be a repeat of last June, when reporters had eagerly celebrated – and then had to rewrite – stories about Obama extending robust domestic benefits to gay couples.
If only they had known that the existence of Kagan’s girlfriend is “a false charge.”
References and related after the jump…
References:
* Obama’s Top Ten Supreme Court Picks [Domenech / New Ledger]
* @AdamSerwer Couldn’t it just be a mistake? Until this controversy I mistakenly thought she was, in fact, an out lesbian. [@mattyglesias]
* Elena Kagan ‘Gay’ Whisper Campaign Enrages Rights Groups [Sam Stein]
* Will Obama Pick U.S. Solicitor General Elena Kagan For the Supreme Court? [Queerty]
* Elena Kagan and the professionalized judiciary [True/Slate]
* Does White House See Gays as "Left Fringe?" [CBS News]
* White House Tricks Media Into Reporting Domestic-Benefits Pander to Gays; After It’s Revealed His Pandering is Mostly Symbolic, Media Dutifully Covers Up for Him and Rewrites Earlier Stories, Reducing the Promises He Made to Nothing [Ace of Spades]
Related Mere Rhetoric Categories:
* Law
* Democratic Politics
* American Politics
