Ahem, I believe you mean a "rent boy."
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Marijuana bubbler

I can pretty much assure you that it came as a surprise to lots of people who've known him for a long time.

At least I can't be on the list,
For I'd certainly be missed.:D

Not only that but the angle I am looking at this from goes like this:

On a long enough timeline, things that we do in life as well as choices we make tend to come back and meet at some point. Him being the head of a conservative party and gay weren't going to mix and at some point was going to catch up with him.

So either he was about to be outed or by the fact that he is no longer in such a high ranking position that his outing could hurt him, that he deemed it ok to come out.

Us avergae laypeople may never know! :)

What I believe is probably going to work in his favor are 2 things.

1.) He came out in a good (or as good as it's going to get) climate where homosexuality is a more open subject than it was years ago.

2.) That he didn't do this while he was still the chairperson.

I think with his situation, it may close some doors but due to the climate of the subject and our country's tolerance for at this point, it may open others.

I think it would be fair to say, had anyone done this 40 or 50 years ago, their political career would have gone straight to hell.

And one thing to think on is we can say what we want, but let's remember, Barney Frank came out in 1987 (or was it 86?) and he's still serving now, right?

OK. So again, with today's climate, it's not all that surprising seeing this in the news.

But I'm open to suggestions for the list. ;)

How nice of you to lump homosexuality with all of this deviant behavior. Maybe THIS is why he waited to come out. Maybe he wanted to be able to concentrate on his job without having to assure people in D.C. that he wasn't molesting little boys.

The fact that you even use words like that just shows me that some gay people wait to come out not because they aren't ready to but because you (general) are not ready for it.

and you hit it right on the head.

This is why legislators have such a hard time passing laws for gay marriage and so many people rail against it.

There are still a lot of people who are unaccepting of homosexuality and even go as far as being against any laws that help advance thier cause. Look no further than the decision in California and what kind of uproar it's causing.

Look at Virginia who repealed civil rights law for gays.

PiKA...no matter how you cut it, there are segments of the population that still find homosexuality reprehensible and it riles these people (because they <ex. Fred Phelps> find it a deviant behavior) up more when they find out that officials in any high ranking postion not only supports this but that is part of their backgorund...we both know this, right?

And that same reasoning that you made in the beginning may also have been the reason why Barney frank came out also...it's just one less 'scandal' to deal with.

Not only that, when he had folks like Karl Rove who by some counts, anti-gay, Mehlman coming out would definently have been bad timing.

Question now is, what does Karl Rove have to say now after all this time, that the guy at the 'top' of their food chain was gay...hehehe.

SLOW. CLAP.

I was just making sure you weren't one of those people... you're posts had me thinking otherwise.

No problem dude. We are cool. But you brought some other rereal issues to the floor.

Daemonseid is one of "those people." Hehe.

Who you callin' 'those people'?!?!?

If you read pretty much any article about him, (which I'm guessing you didn't ;) ) you'd note that he apologizes for working against same-sex rights in his past positions and hopes that people will instead see what he is working on now.

You know, afaict that is mostly a British term. But yeah I couldn't think of the right phrase.

I don't really think any of this is a "gay issue." These are issues of equal rights. And it's not like people can't work on/support/vote based on more than one issue at once.

Right. Thanks again. Mostly what I read was recent articles since he came out. I have not read what his thoughts were say, from an article five years ago.

Right. Thanks again. Mostly what I read was recent articles since he came out. I have not read what his thoughts were say, from an article five years ago.