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Thursday, June 7, 2007

Every Child Deserves a Mother and a Father—Mitt Romney Edition!

posted by on June 7 at 14:13 PM

I occasionally link to news stories about horrifying tales of child abuse perpetrated by heterosexual parents—a mother and a father—because the religious right likes to run around screaming that “every child deserves a mother and a father!” Never mind that each news cycle clearly demonstrates that every child needs fit parents, period, not parents with a matched set of His and Her genitalia.

My “Every Child…” posts to Slog aren’t beloved by all—so gory, such a downer, so depressing. But this “Every Child…” post doesn’t include a horrifying tale of child abuse, so those with delicate sensibilities can read on.

All I want to do in this “Every child…” post is quote CBN—a conservative Christian news service—quoting Mitt Romney

Mitt Romney has made his support for traditional marriage a major talking point in his bid for the presidency. Constantly you’ll hear him talk about the fact that, “I think every child deserves to have a mother and a father.” He’s also said before that gay marriage is not right on paper or fact.

Needless to say, CBN supports Mitt Romney’s when he parrots their “every child deserves a mother and a father” line. Because every child deserves a mother and a father, every child deserves a mother and a father, every child deserves a mother and a father—yeah, yeah. Tell it to this guy’s kids.

But the CBN story quoting Romney is a slam, actually, and not a wet Baptist tongue slipped up Romney’s tight Mormon asscrack. You see last night in Concord, New Hampshire, an actual lesbian parent—not an abstract argument about lesbian parents, or gay male parents, or what every child “deserves,” but an actual living, breathing, parenting lesbian parent—had the nerve to ask Matt Romney this question:

“I am a gay woman and I have children. Your comment that you just made, it sort of invalidates my family. I wish you could explain to me more, why if we are sending our troops over to fight for liberty and justice for all throughout this country, why not for me? Why not for my family?”

Instead of striding manfully across the stage and slapping the lesbian across her carpet-munching face—the only right thing to do, according to religious conservatives, under the circumstances—Romney said…

“Wonderful, I’m delighted that you have a family and you’re happy with your family. That’s the American way… People can live their lives as they choose and children can be a great source of joy, as you know. And I welcome that. There are other ways to raise kids that’s fine: single moms, grandparents raising kids, gay couples raising kids. That’s the American way, to have people have their freedom of choice.”

Bolds and italics added willy-nilly by yours truly.

Romney’s answer is making heads explode over at CBN, the 700 Club, the American Family Association, Liberty University, et all. Because gay parents aren’t fine with them—and they certainly don’t want same-sex parenting described as “the American way.” The religious right already mistrusts Romney; he used to support gay rights, and abortion rights, and he wears those Mormon underpanties. And if they can’t trust Romney to keep his pandering straight—he was at that event to pander to Christian bigots, not lesbian parents!—how can they trust him at all?

RSS icon Comments

1

It should be obvious to even the wing-nut crackpots of the far right that Mitt Romney, Rudy Giuliani and John McCain are shameless, compulsive liars who will say anything to anyone to get elected. Yick.

Posted by Original Andrew | June 7, 2007 2:44 PM
2

Why does he hate Dick Cheney's daughter and granddaughter so?

Posted by Will in Seattle | June 7, 2007 2:45 PM
3

I used to be Mormon and it freaks me out that there's a Mormon running for president. It freaks me out further that he flip flops on points that are clearly black and white in the Mormon religious perspective. I can't wait to see what happens.

Posted by Carollani | June 7, 2007 2:45 PM
4

You know, for someone trying so hard to suck up to the religious right, Romney's doing a shit awful job. How hard can it really be to pander to the fearful and the ignorant?

Posted by Hernandez | June 7, 2007 2:46 PM
5

Where's an assassin when you need one?

Posted by Dianna | June 7, 2007 3:13 PM
6

And to think they called John Kerry a flip-flopper.

Posted by east coaster | June 7, 2007 3:18 PM
7

And to think they called John Kerry a flip-flopper.

Posted by east coaster | June 7, 2007 3:19 PM
8

Dan, not to get all Ms. Manners on you (a hell of writer, by the way), but you said "this 'Every Child…' post doesn’t include a horrifying tale of child abuse". Then you just *had* to include the link to the guy who let his wife sexually abuse their kids. ?!?

I don't know if I'm more sad that Romney is such a serial flip-flopper or happy that at least one of those jerkoffs had the nugget of humanity inside them to actually treat that mom as a human being.

Posted by Big Sven | June 7, 2007 3:47 PM
9

I didn't include it in the sense that I didn't copy and past the horrifying tale into the body of the post. You didn't have to click the link, Big Sven.

Posted by Dan Savage | June 7, 2007 4:05 PM
10

Really, how is it that people take Romney even remotely seriously? The man has no convictions. None.

Posted by arduous | June 7, 2007 4:31 PM
11

He must have thought she (and the rest of us, for that matter) was stupid... oh, you are against gays having kids, but gay families, that's different. Mit ain't dumb enough (no one is, technically speaking) to pull off Bushism and Bush-Logic.

Posted by phenics | June 7, 2007 4:40 PM
12

Cognitive Dissonance, meet Shameless Pandering. Dissonance, Pandering, Pandering, Dissonance.

Posted by Geni | June 7, 2007 5:06 PM
13

I applaud the woman who asked the question in the first place, putting Romney in the position of having to attack her to her face (and thus look heartless) or flip-flop (and thus lose the support of the haters.) This is a textbook illustration of how to sway public opinion on these sorts of contentious issues -- putting a human face on the argument and seizing the moral high ground.

Well done, Cynthia Fish. You are a badass.

Posted by flamingbanjo | June 7, 2007 5:33 PM
14

She is a badass and hopefully more people will put all politicians in similar predicaments, since journalists don't seem interested or capable of it.

At Pam's House Blend, Romney is quoted as saying: "Marriage is an institution which is designed to bring a man and woman together to raise a child and that the ideal setting for society at large is where there is a male and a female are associated with the development and nurturing a child.''

Apparently he doesn't think that childless couples deserve to be married either. I hope someone presses him further on his ongoing inconsistencies.

Posted by patrick | June 7, 2007 5:43 PM
15

Are we sure he's changing his tune, or is he really just being an anti-pussy (weak and shameful - a podcast reference)? I mean, if it was a gay father, particularly one in a tight shirt with a slight lisp, would Romney sang that tune? Either way, who isn't used to political double speak? I'll chalk it up to saving face.

Posted by Midwest | June 7, 2007 10:07 PM
16

Are we sure he's changing his tune, or is he really just being an anti-pussy (weak and shameful - a podcast reference)? I mean, if it was a gay father, particularly one in a tight shirt with a slight lisp, would Romney sang that tune? Either way, who isn't used to political double speak? I'll chalk it up to saving face.

Posted by Midwest | June 7, 2007 10:29 PM
17

Its not that he is anymore tolerant of gay rights than before. And its not that he is a liar. Its that he a huge, fucking, coward.

Like most people who believe they have a right to oppress others, he is all about slamming people until he has to deal with someone he puts down. Then you see the back pedaling.

But trust me, you put him in power, and he'll try to make it illegal to identify ourselves as 'gay'.

Posted by Some Guy | June 8, 2007 8:32 AM
18

Are we sure he's waving his beliefs, or is he just saving face in front of a, perhaps, confrontational lesbian? What would his response been had he been approached by a lispy gay man? Gay parenting is certainly a hot button issue, but are people shocked that a politician is engaging in double speak?

Posted by midwest | June 8, 2007 8:49 AM
19

Welllll, I'm never going to vote for Romney, but he could have said

"we're the party of inclusion... civil unions... we help working moms by keeping taxes low... we're keeping your family safe by keeping the terrorists out of america..." and every other bullshit Republican trope that they like to come around to when answering any question.

The fact that Romney appears to have formerly been an actual human being, and the fact that his second answer on this question was actually somewhat graceful, makes me think that he is really a moderate at heart. And that when he got into this race he had no idea what a asshole he'd have to become if he was going to have any hope of getting the nomination. So I suspect he is a tragic, doomed character- it will be interesting to see if he can actually continue to contort himself into a full blown right wing prick, or if he falls to wayside as more rabidly conservative hounds (f. thompson, gingrich) enter the fray.

Posted by Big Sven | June 8, 2007 9:28 AM
20

Does it really matter? For several reasons. The religious right isn't exactly keen on Mormans in the first place. I forget the guy, but some hard line right winger wrote a VERY critical book on the mormans. The whole politicing of god is terribly terribly grating for me. It's the only thing that makes me miss the northeast, in that the majority of republicans there are only "fiscally" conservative ie. Guliani, and that's it! I may not agree with their views, but I can at least respect it. If the religious right gets their way, they are eventually going to eventually but heads over their denominational differences and then we will have a real mess. Personally I'm not against religious. If you find peace of mind doing what you do that is great, but for the love of god stop shoving it down our throats! THAT is the only reason why Mitt Romney became governer of Massachusetts, he wasn't politicing his god stuff, what he did on Sunday was his business and what he did with policy and tax dollars was the peoples, and that is the only way it should be, and what our forfathers truely intended.

Posted by Matt | June 8, 2007 12:13 PM
21

MSN I NIIPET
MSN

Posted by Bill | June 12, 2007 2:25 PM

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