Alan Keyes has been described as a master orator, and I must confess that there is something both authoritative and comforting about his voice. Until you pay attention to what he’s saying that is. At that point, he’s either wacky or scary; I haven’t yet been able to decide which. The New York Daily News ran a blurb (which seems to have come from Wonkette) yesterday suggesting that Keyes’s daughter, Maya, might be a lesbian. This on the heels of Daddy Alan’s attack on Vice President Cheney’s daughter’s sexuality. From Windy City Media Group:
Illinois U.S. Senate candidate Alan Keyes made news by calling Mary Cheney a “selfish hedonist” in an interview with Sirius Satellite Radio’s OutQ channel.
“If we embrace homosexuality as a proper basis for marriage, we are saying that it’s possible to have a marriage state that in principal excludes procreation and is based simply on the premise of selfish hedonism,” Keyes told OutQ. He was then asked if that meant Mary Cheney “is a selfish hedonist,” Keyes said “That goes by definition. Of course she is.”
He later told the Chicago Tribune: “I have said that if you are actively engaging in homosexual relations, those relations are about selfish hedonism. If my daughter were a lesbian, I’d look at her and say, “That is a relationship that is based on selfish hedonism.” I would also tell my daughter that it’s a sin, and she needs to pray to the Lord God to help her to deal with that sin.”
Dick Cheney, while supportive of President Bush’s agenda as it relates to gay marriage, doesn’t personally support a federal ban, preferring instead to defer to individual states. (A states’ rights advocate in this administration? Wow, that smacks of real Republicanism!)
As for Keyes, it should only take him a few short years before he comes around and embraces a gay lifestyle personally. After all, this is the same man who is running for public office in a state where he’s never lived not very long after having this to say about Hillary Clinton’s 2000 Senate bid: “And I deeply resent the destruction of federalism represented by Hillary Clinton’s willingness to go into a state she doesn’t even live in and pretend to represent people there. So I certainly wouldn’t imitate it.” Does this constitute a flip-flop? I’d say so, but give it some time and those flip-flops will turn into a pair of 6-inch stiletto heels. For more on Keyes’s soon-to-be ill-fated run, look here. Maybe after he’s soundly defeated, he’ll take his rightful place as the 6th member of the Queer Eye for the Straight Guy team.