Mehlmania: Did He Jump, Or Was He Pushed?
The Blue State isn’t sure, but the timing seems a little too conveniently co-incidental to me. Mind you, I was born wearing quite a fetching tin-foil hat.
Mehlman to retire, one day after outing by Maher
Conveniently following Bill Maher’s outing of Ken Mehlman as a gay Republican last night on Larry King Live, a source confirms that Mehlman will likely step down as Chairman of the Republican National Committee:
Two sources, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Mehlman has made clear to close associates for some time he was likely to leave after the 2006 elections — and that there is no dissatisfaction with his performance in the midterm cycle. A third source confirmed Mehlman’s leaving is a good possibility but said a final decision has not been made. “It would be wrong to call it a done deal,” this source said.
Although it seems like Ken Mehlman was going to leave anyway, it is really interesting that this comes just one day after Maher said this about Ken Mehlman.
I don’t blame Bill Maher for saying that about Mehlman last night because he was really put on the spot by Larry King, if you listened to the context of the interview. At the same time, it might be a dangerous precedent to set if we use people’s sexuality, gender or race as tools to attack one another. I have no idea what it is like to be gay, but I know some people who are and want it to be their own business. Yeah, some, including myself, already heard that Mehlman was gay a long time ago, so I am don’t really condemn Maher for saying that. In fact, I find myself agreeing with Bill Maher these days more so than in years past when he had his show on ABC. I just think that we need to be careful about what kind of precedent we set, especially if we want to change the tone in Washington.
It’s satisfying to see Mehlman go, though I disagree with Blue State completely about being careful what precedent is set in outing gay Republicans: they set the precedents for hypocrisy, by all means let’s see them hoist by their own petards. ‘Sunshine is the best disinfectant’ and all that.
Your mileage may vary, of course.
Read more: US politics, Gay Republicans, Outing, Mehlman
