DescentBB

Why did both of them feel the need to mention her sexual orientation? I thought it odd when I heard it, but never thought it would dominate the day's news coverage.

My initial thoughts were that it was just a stupid remark and something they would feel they shouldn't have said (when Edwards mentioned it in the VP debate). But then Kerry mentioned it again and seemed almost hesitant when speaking it, like he was unsure of how to word it or if he should say it at all. This makes me think it was purposeful but to what ends?

1.Trying to create the sense of hypocrisy within the administration?
2.Trying to create a wedge issue with gay/lesbian voters?
3.Trying to show that they are compassionate?

I really have no idea how the comment made their answers any stronger. Do any of you have an opinion as to why they felt the need to mention it?

To me it isn't a deal breaker and probably shouldn't be for anyone else. All it shows to me is that they know how to offend people, even their base and a large group of voters who would normally lean to the left.

I don't think mentioning his daughter gave Kerry or Edwards any points. If anything it gave less credibility/ammunition to the "Bush/Chaney are homophobes" crowd.

I'm sure it was planned to be mentioned so they must have thought it would benifit them some how. Or maybe he just felt bad for Bush, at the rally afterwards Kerry was constantly having to step over microphone/news media cords, he said "I'm having a much more difficult time out here then I did in there!"

I'm with you, B, in that each time Kerry/Edwards have gone out of their way to point out that Cheney's daughter is a lesbian I've scratched my head over what they think can be gained by making her part of the national debate. The gay vote is pretty much already in the Dem column so it's strange that they would keep pandering to it. If anything, they may lose a few votes from parents of gays who feel it's inappropriate to keep *outing* someone else's gay child.

Anyone watch the Daily Show after the VP debates? John Stewart was makin fun of Edwards talking about Cheney's "GAY... DAUGHTER!!!"

It was obviously a premeditated 'outing' for political gain. As if Cheney's daughter is the only gay person that would come to mind when Kerry or Edwards was searching their brain for a gay person to reference while making a point?!?

They do it because they think it will lose the Bush team support from the hard core religious base...
The way Edwards dumbtwit wife responded today saying she thought 'Mrs. Cheney's unhappiness with Kerry's mention of her daughters sexuality is a sign that Mrs. Cheney is ashamed of her daughter...' sort of gives away the Kerry teams thoughts on both the Cheney's and the republicans as a whole.

Old news. She's gay. Who cares. Move along, move along.

I thought that it was unnecessary and sort of a cheap shot to mention her specifically, but I thought what Kerry said about the whole gay issue was pretty good aside that.

Will Robinson wrote:They do it because they think it will lose the Bush team support from the hard core religious base...

Exactly.

They're not doing it for the gay vote -- if they were doing that, they'd mention their own gay friends, or at least some gay democrats. The fact that they continue to mention Cheney's daughter demonstrates that they're trying to make people upset at him.

I don't think it'll help them.

ya, Will said it.

it's an easy 'divide and conquer' jab at the right.
since most vocal homeophobes would be on the right, it may make them question their party affiliation.

In the VP debate, Edwards brought it up with a great deal of respect for the Cheney family. As I recall Cheney used his rebutal opportunity for something akin to, "Thank you for the kind remarks about my family." (Not an exact quote.) Kerry's wording wasn't much different in the final debate... Talking points are like that, after all. Suddenly, though, the Cheney family is going apeshit.

Of course, this is another case of an election nonissue getting too much media attention. Sure, gay rights is an important topic, but I think there's a lot more in the way of policy that rightfully sidelines time-consumers like gay marriage ammendments, civil unions, etc.

Politics as usual from all directions.

BlueFlames wrote:In the VP debate, Edwards brought it up with a great deal of respect for the Cheney family. As I recall Cheney used his rebutal opportunity for something akin to, "Thank you for the kind remarks about my family." (Not an exact quote.) Kerry's wording wasn't much different in the final debate...

Why don't we compare the two quotes? Transcripts are easy to find.

From the VP debapte:

John Edwards wrote:let me say first that I think the vice president and his wife love their daughter. I think they love her very much. And you can't have anything but respect for the fact that they're willing to talk about the fact that they have a gay daughter, the fact that they embrace her. It's a wonderful thing. And there are millions of parents like that who love their children, who want their children to be happy.

From the Third Pres. Debate:

John Kerry wrote:I think if you were to talk to Dick Cheney's daughter, who is a lesbian, she would tell you that she's being who she was, she's being who she was born as.

I think if you talk to anybody, it's not choice.

I think there's a clear difference between the two quotes.

In the case of the Edwards quote -- especially the extended quote (which you can read on the transcript I linked to), there's absolute respect shown to the Cheneys. And the quote makes sense as a lead-in to the rest of what Edwards says -- he's highlighting the fact that he and Cheney have differing views about how the gay marriage issue should be dealt with (constitutionally or not), but that the differing views aren't coming out of hatred, just out of differing ideas on what's right. In other words, the mention of Mary Cheney is entirely respectful, and it makes sense in that Edwards is using it to highlight how he and Cheney differ on the issue.

In the case of the Kerry quote, though, there's no statement of respect for the Cheneys. It's like a gratuitous name drop. Kerry puts words into Mary Cheney's mouth -- "oh, this is what she'd say." There really isn't any reason to mention her, unless you just want to put forth the issue of Cheney having a gay daughter.

Again... in the Edwards quote, it makes sense to mention Cheney's daughter, because he's speaking directly in response to Cheney, and because he's highlighting the difference of opinion but showing the respect he holds. There's an explicit statement of respect. In the Kerry quote, the mention of Cheney's daughter is totally unnecessary. There's no statement of respect for her, just a statement that she's lesbian and "she'd agree with me." In the case of the Edwards quote, the statement is integral to the point he's making (difference of opinion, but still loving); in the Kerry quote, you can remove the reference and still make the exact same point that "it's not a choice".

I very much disagree with your assertion that Kerry's wording "wasn't much different". I think the transcripts back me up.

In any campaign, there's a reason for everything. I don't believe that Kerry or Edwards are going to spend any significant portion of time talking about something that will not help their position, or certainly not anything that will hurt it. While Edward's comments were nice, the motives I'm sure were mixed at best. The target in this case is the strong conservative and the swing voter who is uncomfortable with what they might perceive as hypocrisy within the Bush administration.

yea, i thought it was pretty crappy for him to bring her up again. they couldn't have expected that much of a political gain, I mean Bush has been a devout Christian is whole life, you can't try to get the hardcore religious base away from him. i still have yet to figure out why this whole gay marriage thing is such a big deal, if you live your life your own way, why should the way someone else wants to live their life matter to you. lothar, you married your wife, she's female, you're happy, why do you care if one guys marries another and is happy? does that make your devotion to religion less meaningful?

Zuruck thats besides the point!

[Insert 5 page essay here]

I stand corrected, Lothar; the quotes are quite different. I'm still not sure that Kerry's deserved the blowup (or at least not one of this magnitude), but the contrast in the reactions between the VP and final debates does make more sense. Edwards did lead into a point, and Kerry was just name-dropping.

The real problem is evident when you consider Edwards wife's comment that 'the Cheney's must be ashamed of their daughter to be upset over Kerry's words'.

Someone should ask Edwards if he's ashamed of his wifes diarrhea of the mouth and will Kerry be curing that also when he starts laying on hands to cure juvinile diabetes and spinal cord injuries

Good article on the subject, here

Why Cheney's daughter? Kerry knows lots of famous people who believe - as he says Mary Cheney believes - that they were born gay. He could have cited Massachusetts Rep. Barney Frank or New Jersey Gov. Jim McGreevey. Both are public men who could offer personal testimony about the inborn nature of homosexuality.

But that wasn't the point Kerry wanted to make. He was crying Mary to send a message to presumably homophobic Christian voters: Just in case you hadn't heard, the vice president harbors a practicing lesbian in the bosom of his family.

Despite Kerry's angel-faced sanctimony, this was a piece of premeditated gay-baiting (John Edwards used the same gambit in his debate with Cheney) whose transparent purpose was to keep some of the GOP's evangelical voters from turning out on Nov. 2. This was a miscalculation.

Since the debate, the Christian right has been rallying to the side of Mary Cheney. Well-known political preachers like Jerry Falwell and James Dobson have gone out of their way to defend her right to privacy. Conservative radio talk shows and Web sites have been flooded with denunciations of Kerry and support for Mary.

This reaction doesn't mean that the evangelical community has changed its doctrine, or its mind, on the sinful nature of homosexuality. It does reveal, however, that most born-again Protestants are not nearly as extreme - or as politically one-dimensional - as Kerry evidently imagined them to be.

Do you think we would have all this controversy, if Bush had brought up that Kerry's daughter is pro-life? Pro-death penalty?

It's pretty sad that after three debates of Bush getting handed a new one, all the media will focus on about them is this "story."

Where is a liberal media when you need one?

Gooberman wrote:It's pretty sad that after three debates of Bush getting handed a new one, all the media will focus on about them is this "story."

Where is a liberal media when you need one?

Heh, although many think Kerry out talked Bush in the debate, at least as many also think he didn't really say anything, and then there are all the polls after each debate that show most people think Bush was more truthful than Kerry each time.

And as far as the story the press is focused on, today, just fifteen days before the election, after over a year of campaigning, Kerry's people are reported to be dismayed that he hasn't been able to get the public "to know who he is"!!!

LOL x 10!!! What a bunch of losers, it's not that america doesn't 'know who he is', it's that more and more are realizing for the first time just what he is.

Gooberman wrote:Do you think we would have all this controversy, if Bush had brought up that Kerry's daughter is pro-life? Pro-death penalty?

"Bush is pro-life baiting"?

There wouldn't be any reason for a controversy if either candidate pointed out the *political beliefs* of the other candidate's child. I don't think anybody on either side would care if candidate X's adult child disagreed with candidate X on some issue. Adults disagree on issues all the time.

Now, if Bush said "Kerry is Catholic but his child is an atheist" and furthermore pointed out that "Kerry still associates with that child" that would be a somewhat analagous situation (especially if Kerry had a large Catholic base.) Bush would be hoping people will care that Kerry doesn't immediately denounce his own child. He's hoping Kerry's supporters hate atheists enough that they can't vote for a guy who supports his atheist child.

In that case, he would be attempting to play off of percieved prejudices of the people voting for the other guy. "How can you bring yourself to vote for a guy who associates with -- and even loves -- someone of such deficient moral character?"

The idea here was to put Cheney into a catch-22 -- either he disses his daughter and gets hammered as being anti-gay, or he supports his daughter and his own supporters' prejudice makes them unable to vote for him. That's what Kerry/Edwards wanted to do by mentioning Cheney's daughter -- either make Cheney denounce his daughter (in the first debate) or make all us hateful-anti-gay-intolerant-redneck Cheney supporters back out our support. And frankly, it's insulting to us to think we're so shallow and hateful in our anti-gayness that we wouldn't vote for Cheney knowing his daughter is gay.

If Bush said something about Kerry's daughter's religion or her behavior (other than "she's very well-behaved") -- say, if he'd said she was promiscuous and commented on her clothing at Cannes -- there would be a huge media controversy over it. We'd be hearing the same thing -- "how dare he try to bait people on this issue?" and "how dare he violate her privacy?" And it would be right for the media to make a big deal out of that.

It's pretty sad that after three debates of Bush getting handed a new one, all the media will focus on is this "story."

Why is it sad that the media would focus on this at least a little bit? Because it harms the candidate you want to win? Come on, Goob -- you're the most outspoken gay-rights advocate on this board. Surely you can see the need to take Kerry to task over his obvious gay-baiting and his obvious ploy to use people's anti-gay prejudices for political gain. Yet you can't even bring yourself to denounce Kerry for gay-baiting...

EDIT: I see you edited your response in order to focus on the "liberal media" question and ignore the "gay-baiting" question altogether. HEH.

Why is it sad that the media would focus on this at least a little bit? Because it harms the candidate you want to win? Come on, Goob -- you're the most outspoken gay-rights advocate on this board. Surely you can see the need to take Kerry to task over his obvious gay-baiting and his obvious ploy to use people's anti-gay prejudices for political gain. Yet you can't even bring yourself to denounce Kerry for gay-baiting...

Did you read my first post?

I said that I didn't think it was at all a plus for Kerry/Edwards. Miss that or something? I also made it clear that I didn't understand how they thought it would get them points (I'm sure they thought it would). I still don't, and I don't agree with you that it was "anti-gay baiting", I imagine it had alot more to do with "a plus for Edwards is a plus for Kerry." mind set. They appear to be wrong.

Do you honestly think that they sat down and said, "lets try and get the homophobic vote!" Thatâ??s boarder line â??bush is a Naziâ?

I put it back in right when I saw you quote it. Before you wrote that edit i might add....

It couldn't have been before the edit, because I edited it during my last preview, before I posted it. (I thought it best to label it "edit" and make it clear why that was there, rather than deleting the whole section.) You might have put it back in before you SAW the edit, but you didn't put it back in before I WROTE the edit, because I wrote the edit before I actually clicked "post".

Gooberman wrote:I said that I didn't think it was at all a plus for Kerry/Edwards.... I also made it clear that I didn't understand how they thought it would get them points

Yes, I saw that. And I agree, it didn't give them points -- they wanted it to, but it didn't.

Now, I think I *do* have a good idea why they did it. You disagree, and that's OK. But, given that Kerry *could have* chosen to name any number of gay people he personally knows but *happened* to name a gay person related to a Republican candidate... that tells me he was trying to hurt the Republican vote.

Do you honestly think that they sat down and said, "lets try and get the homophobic vote!"

No. I think they -- or someone in their campaign -- sat down and said "I think Cheney's gay daughter is a liability for him. Let's see if we can get the homophobes to stay home." I don't think Kerry expected to gain any votes -- he just hoped to cause Bush/Cheney to lose some.

none of this was my gripe (yet I remain convinced that 90% of your next responce will have to do with the above)

If you respond to it, why shouldn't I?

My gripe is that you say "at least a little bit." You have to be f-ing kidding me! A little bit? I have heard polls of "who won" and I have heard this "story." Thats it!

You must be consulting different news stories than me. I get all of my news online -- I don't watch TV or listen to the radio -- and at least in the major news online, it's not being reported any more, and in the major commentary it's only a small part of the discussion.

In terms of commentary it has been repeated quite a bit, though again, on most of the commentary sites I visit it's only a small part of what's being discussed (it's one of about 15 entries on LGF today, and gets only a small mention on opinionjournal, for example -- far more attention is paid to Yasser Arafat's endorsement of Kerry.) That's pretty reasonable, since it was a big blunder by Kerry. When you try to use homophobia for political gain and you get caught, expect your face to get rubbed in it. It's as simple as that.

As far as I know (again, only online) it's not running as news anymore. It's running as commentary, and I'm glad for that.

If Kerry insulted her... that would be a great story. If his actual words offended her in any way... we can turn that into a week long story!

What if he was really trying to use homophobia for political gain?

Do you agree that, if that was his motivation, he should be slammed for it?

If so, then does it make sense why people keep slamming him for it? It at least *appears* he was trying to use homophobia for political gain, and he hasn't given us any reason to doubt that. Mrs. Edwards' "ashamed" comments certainly didn't help him.

This is very important. If you only answer one thing from my post, answer this paragraph: Don't you agree that, it at least appears Kerry might have been trying to get homophobes to stay home instead of voting for Bush/Cheney? Given that it appears Kerry might have been gay-baiting, shouldn't we push the issue until he either gives a legitimate explanation or admits he made a mistake?

bad move, but so was Bush saying that he never said "I truly am not that concerned about Osama," when in fact he did.

Again, there's a big difference -- the Osama quote was being taken badly out of context. As far as I can tell, Bush hasn't denied the quote, he's only denied the sentiment people are trying to take from it. The essence of his quote was "Osama is on the run and his power base is gone, so I'm not too worried about what he can do."

The reason the Bush "controversy" isn't getting a whole week of airtime is because, when it comes down to it, it's a totally manufactured controversy. There's no substance to it. It all hinges on the fact that people took a Bush quote about Osama being on the run and therefore not a huge threat, and misinterpreted / misrepresented it as though Bush thought Osama was unimportant. They're essentially trying to catch Bush in a technicality -- he technically did use the words "not concerned about Osama" even though the sentiment was entirely different from what they pretend it was. The reason the Kerry "controversy" is getting a whole week of airtime from the commentators is because, when it comes down to it, there's a legitimate question, and there's legitimate reason to think Kerry was intentionally trying to exploit the rampant homophobia he thinks is present in the Bush/Cheney base.

Now, I think the story *should* get some airtime, because I think it has some basis in reality. I haven't heard a single plausible explanation for why Kerry would've chosen to mention Cheney's daughter otherwise. The "gay-baiting" explanation fits with all the data -- with Edwards bringing it up, with Kerry bringing it up, with Mrs. Edwards' "ashamed" comments, with Mary Beth Cahill's "fair game" comment, etc. The "I didn't mean anything by it" explanation doesn't really fit, especially when you factor in the "fair game" and "ashamed" comments. The "I meant it in a respectful way" explanation doesn't fit either, for the above reasons as well as because Kerry, unlike Edwards, didn't preface his statement with any comments about respect. Given that, I think it's perfectly reasonable that the story got a day of news time and a ton of commentary time.

As long as Kerry / Edwards can't give a reasonable explanation that fits with what they, Mrs. Edwards, and Cahill all said (which should probably include an apology for Mrs. Edwards' comment) I think the story deserves to be discussed. It's no longer news, but it is an important story to be discussed.

It was a premeditated attack on Cheny's daughter, and pretty shoddy of them to do. But I don't see why it should get any airtime other than the post-debate laughing at Kerry.

why would you write a novel debating whether or not dick cheneys daughter eats cat?

So this story got a segment yesterday on Bill O'reilly, Day Side, and Hannity and Colmes. One week after the comment was made, all three of them still feel the need to bring in guests to talk about this. I have said throughout the thread, it was a poor choice of words, but a week long story!?!?1?

The interesting thing was that the conservative pundant on Oreilly brought up the exact same points that you did Lothar, that it was just done to â??keep the homophobics from votingâ?

Gooberman wrote:would it bother me if they were just trying to influence the "homophobes." Yes it would

Good to hear.

But it just isn't logically sound, where would the anti-gay people go, vote for Kerry? :roll: Or not vote (which they would know is basically a vote for Kerry)?

I agree with you, it isn't logically sound -- but I don't think Kerry understood this. I think he greatly overestimated the amount of homophobia in the Republican party, and greatly underestimated the overall desire we have for Bush to win regardless of his or Cheney's thoughts on homosexuality.

The reason I think this is reasonable is because, aside from you and a few others on this board (who I've discussed gay marriage and other issues with at length), most of the people I talk to on the left are under the impression that people on the right absolutely hate gays. It wouldn't surprise me one bit if Kerry was under this same impression. It wouldn't surprise me if Kerry thought he *could* get the homophobes to not vote.

All that is to say, I understand your objection to the "gay baiting" position, but I don't think Kerry would've agreed with you beforehand. In this case, I think you're far better informed on the attitudes of the right (at least on this issue) than Kerry and his advisors. And that makes sense to me, because Kerry seems to have misjudged the general attitudes of the right several times so far this cycle.

my decision to vote is completely separate from my decision on who to vote for. That is the way it works for almost everyone.

This would be an interesting thing to take a poll on. I would think people would be far more likely not to vote (or to make a protest vote -- a vote that's not really "for" anyone) if they don't have anyone they want to vote for. That is, I think the two decisions are pretty heavily tied together -- if there's someone they want to vote for, they'll vote, but if not, they're probably strongly split between staying home, making a protest vote, or voting for the guy they lean slightly toward. So, if you can take someone who had a definite desire to vote "for" someone, and take away that desire, that's probably worth about half a vote for you (between protest votes and staying home).

In particular, if someone was strongly religiously anti-gay (to the point where they think gay people should be shunned or worse) I could see them deciding they just *can't* vote for Bush/Cheney over this. I just happen to know that the number of people who are like this is a *very* small number -- but if you and I hadn't already discussed these issues, you might think I was like that, and overestimate the number of people like that.

If you can only get a few people to not vote, it's probably not worth the risk -- but it wouldn't surprise me one bit if Kerry expected to be able to take out at least a couple percent of Bush's base by making his remark. After all, if all you knew about me was I was Christian and against gay marriage, wouldn't you think I might be so homophobic as to not be able to vote for Cheney?

it "makes sense" that those on the left will believe that Bush just went to war for oil. It "makes sense" that Michael Moore can have a blockbuster documentary. It "makes sense" that the right is putting out a counter-movie to it. It "makes sense" that the rest of the world dislikes Bush. But that has absolutely nothing to do with the truth

Yes -- but in this case, it "makes sense", and furthermore, I haven't heard a very strong counter-explanation. Nobody -- from Kerry to you -- seems to have any idea why he chose to reference Mary Cheney instead of someone else, except for the hand-waving "well, it worked for Edwards" idea (even though the Kerry quote and the Edwards quote are remarkably different.) In the case of "war for oil" there is a reasonable counter-explanation ("war to get rid of Saddam"). The other 3 cases you cited do indeed demonstrate that people are biased... but I don't see why that matters. Yes, people are biased. What does that have to do with whether or not Kerry was gay-baiting?

It "makes sense" that Kerry was gay baiting -- and, as far as I can tell, it makes A LOT MORE sense than any other explanation.

Again, there's a big difference -- the Osama quote was being taken badly out of context....

Bush denied the "sentiment", that's not what he said. The "essence of his quote", what I quoted was direct copy/paste.

[Note that this section is relevant, not for its own sake, but in terms of how it relates to the next section of my post.]


Right, what you quoted was direct copy-paste, but it was stripped of context. When it comes down to it, the way the Democrats (particularly Kerry in the debate) are using the quote is as though Bush quit chasing Osama, like he no longer wanted to catch him -- but the way Bush intended it was that he was no longer particularly *afraid of* Osama because his power base was gone (note that he's answering a question about "the threat that bin Laden posed" not "where is Osama".) So of course Bush would deny having ever said what Kerry claims he said -- Kerry Dowdifies a quote and lies about the question it was a response to (notice what you said vs. what Kerry said in the debate vs. what Bush said in my link above.) Kerry's manufactured quote seems to imply Bush had lost focus, while the actual Bush quote you're giving is all about the fact that Osama is out of power and therefore not a huge threat.

Do you have any doubt that if you put this effort towards defending Kerry, you could explain this issue away immediately?

You mean, the effort to look up the original quote, and try to understand how it relates to the surrounding material?

That's what I did with the original Kerry quote, back in my response to BlueFlames. I did the same with the Edwards quote. That's why the Edwards quote doesn't concern me but the Kerry quote does -- because the Kerry quote, when viewed in context, looks like gay-baiting. The Bush quote, in context, isn't controversial... the Edwards quote, in context, isn't controversial... but the Kerry quote, in context, is controversial.

I'm not trying to "explain away" the quotes, I'm just trying to understand what was actually said. In the "not concerned about Osama" quotes, what Bush originally said was pretty sensible, and Kerry misrepresented it in the debates (in such a way that it wasn't really recognizeable.) There's no controversy there -- the original statement by Bush wasn't a "bad choice of words" by any stretch. In the Edwards quote, he's using Mary Cheney to highlight a policy difference, and again, there's no bad choice of words or any sign of malicious intent. There isn't any controversy over the Edwards quote -- when you look at what he's saying, it's immediately obvious how it fits into what he's talking about. But in the Kerry quote, it's not clear how referencing Mary Cheney fits into what he's talking about. At best, it's a really bad choice of an example -- but you have to wiggle quite a bit to dismiss the alternative "gay-baiting" explanation.

With the Bush quote and the Edwards quote, I don't have to wiggle or fudge at all -- just display the original context. Once I do that, the controversy completely falls away -- JUST by looking at the original statement in the original transcript. But with the Kerry quote, looking at the original transcript doesn't get rid of the controversy. Looking at Kerry's explanations after the fact doesn't get rid of the controversy. Listening to your response after the fact doens't get rid of the controversy. Adding Elizabeth Edwards' statements the next day makes it worse. That's why this controversy lasted for a week while the "Bush said he wasn't worried about Osama" controversy lasted for about 30 seconds -- when you actually do the research, there really is still a controversy here.

do you think the republican party, Even Dick and Mary Chaney, are absolutely thrilled to death that this is what is being focused on after those three debates?

I think the party, in general, has mixed feelings -- most people have some level of gladness that it bit Kerry, and some level of sadness that it happened in the first place and is being carried on. The Cheneys are probably less happy about it than the average Republican. I won't presume to compare how happy vs. offended they are, because I simply don't know.

arn't they just pro-gay baiting those on the left by pretending to be offended when they are probably delighted? Look how easy this is! :wink:

LOL... it is easy, when you give it such a surface-level treatment. But try digging deeper.

There might be a little pro-gay-baiting going on here. But most of what I've seen is simply Kerry bashing. The emphasis has all been on "Kerry did something boneheaded in trying to take advantage of a stereotype" rather than on actual homosexual issues that would draw your average pro-gay person into the discussion -- so the counter-baiting argument doesn't really hold water. If it did, I guarantee you wouldn't have been the first one I heard it from.

The amazing thing about all of this, is that Kerry said nothing offensive, and nothing that Mary Chaney has since denied.

The content of his statements wasn't offensive, I agree. But I think the intent of his statements -- using homophobia for political gain (and with it, the character assumptions Kerry made about the "religious right" in thinking we'd fall for it) -- was offensive. I'm glad to see it backfired, but if I've judged his intent even remotely right, it's still offensive.