If Clinton Had IMed Monica, You Know They'd Be Calling For His Castration

My brilliant friend Elizabeth sent me this article by Dan Savage about the weird Republican response to the whole Mark Foley Mastrugate scandal. Savage begins: You know how after each Bush-administration scandal—male prostitutes running amuck in the White House, "Bin Laden Determined to Attack in U.S.," domestic spying—you sit there thinking, "Shit, if Clinton had done that he'd be impeached!"

I felt something similar this week listening to Republicans attempt to excuse or minimize the Mark Foley scandal. When White House spokesman and former Fox News hack Tony Snow dismissed the conversations as "naughty e-mails," or when Matt Drudge called the teenage boys "beasts" and accused them of egging Foley on, I sat there thinking. "Shit, if I had done what Foley did, I'd be in prison!"

He goes on to note that, given his line of work, he often gets suggestive e-mails and pictures, not to mention offers of sex, from readers who may well be in their teens. And what do I do with these e-mails? I delete them. Responding—to say nothing of taking any of these kids up on their offers (offers most would surely withdraw when they saw me in person)—wouldn't be right. Because the last thing gay teenage boys need in their lives, in my opinion, are gay middle-aged men. He notes that, of course, if someone turned up e-mails or IM chats in which I asked a kid to measure his cock for me—or asked him for details about his masturbation habits, or whether I made him horny, or if he just came—I don't think Dennis Hastert, Tony Snow, Matt Drudge, and Rush Limbaugh would launch a cover-up to protect my skanky ass or, failing that, rush to my defense, pointing out that it was just, you know, a few naughty e-mails or the fault of some dirty-minded teenage beasts. They would call for my head.

Me, I'd just attribute that to the fact that intellectual honesty and consistency were two of the first concepts that these folks repudiated when they decided that they could "create their own reality." That's the point we're reallly making when we say, "If Clinton had done that . . . ." But Savage has another explanation, one that my own orientation probably prevented me from seeing off the bat: So why would they bend over forward to accommodate Foley?

Because, in their eyes, Mark Foley was doing everything right. The religious conservatives in the GOP's base don't seriously believe that gay men can become straight. (Wanna stop a straight person from making the ex-gay argument? Ask him if he'd let his daughter marry one.) What they believe in—what they demand—are closeted homos, homos like Mark Foley, a single man who refused to answer direct questions about his sexual orientation. (Has any straight man ever refused to reveal his sexual orientation?) The religious conservatives in the GOP's base want all gays to be like Mark: deny who we are, live our lives alone, refuse to answer any questions about our sexuality. To them, Mark Foley was a good, closeted homo, deserving of every consideration.

The GOP was willing to cover for Foley because Foley, by being closeted, covered for them for years. So what if closet cases act out in sexually inappropriate ways? A few raped altar boys and skeeved-out pages are a price the gay-haters are only too willing to pay if it means fewer out homos.

Savage may be right.