LGBTQ issues: Are Democrats too extreme?
“Anyone wondering why religious people still support Donald Trump, despite his flaws” should have watched the Democrats’ LGBTQ town hall held on CNN last week, said Miranda Devine in the New York Post. When Elizabeth Warren was asked what she would say to someone who believes marriage should be between one man and one woman, she had a zinger ready. “Well, I’m going to assume it’s a guy who said that. And I’m going to say, then just marry one woman,” Warren said—and then snidely added, “assuming you can find one.” The liberal audience guffawed at this “cheap insult.” But the third of Americans who believe in traditional marriage just heard Warren mock Christian men as unmarriageable incels. And that was nothing compared with
Beto O’Rourke’s promise to strip any church that opposes same-sex marriage of their tax-exempt status. “The illiberal Left is not even hiding its desire to impose its will” on people of faith.
Democrats will undoubtedly come to regret these comments, said John Inazu in TheAtlantic.com. O’Rourke’s in particular will be used by the GOP to turn out white evangelicals in swing states such as Michigan, Ohio, and Pennsylvania. Such extremism will also turn off members of black churches, who are often socially conservative. While I personally believe that anti-LGBTQ teachings are wrong and damaging, said Sarah Jones in NYMag.com, it’s blatantly unconstitutional to punish believers for exercising their First Amendment rights. O’Rourke will never be president and this proposal has no chance of becoming law. “He’s simply handed the Christian right a talking point it’ll use to bludgeon the Left for years to come.” Thanks a lot, Beto.
It doesn’t matter that Beto is “scraping the bottom of the polls,” said Rod Dreher in TheAmerican Conservative.com. Democrats are moving left so quickly that “if this belief isn’t already held by all the Democratic candidates now, it will be.” Soon, people of faith will either have to affirm LGBTQ ideology or face mockery and punishment. Actually, it’s LGBTQ rights that are under assault, said Christina Cauterucci in Slate.com. The conservative Supreme Court is currently debating whether it’s legal to fire someone for being gay or transgender, while the Trump administration is busy banning transgender troops. At least the Democrats believe we actually have rights. As one CNN audience member asked, “When do you think the Republican LGBTQ town hall will be?”