Is Andrew Sullivan lying or did Bill Clinton really run anti-gay ads on fundie radio stations in 96?

[redqueen]

http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2008/03/the-clintons--2.html

[rox63]

1. I don't know about that, but he did

try to convince Kerry to support one of the anti-gay-marriage amendments during the 2004 campaign. Kerry was honorable enough to refuse to do that.

[grasswire]

15. link?

I'd like to see some backup for your accusation.

[rox63]

21. It's in Bob Shrum's book, although that's not where I heard about it

http://www.americablog.com/2007/06/bill-clinton-reportedly-told-john-kerry.html

"Democratic political consultant Bob Shrum claims in his new book that during the 2004 elections, Bill Clinton advised John Kerry to support the Federal Marriage Amendment, i.e., the anti-gay amendment to the US Constitution that would have banned gay marriage and vitiated scores of other rights that gay couples may have, including health insurance, inheritance, child custody, parenting, and more. Shrum reports that Kerry refused to endorse the amendment."

[grasswire]

27. obscure, obscure

....and Shrum ain't too reliable a source, either.

[rox63]

31. Personally, I heard it directly from someone who worked for Kerry's Senate staff

Before it was in Shrum's book, and before it was mentioned in the blogosphere. It is true.

[beachmom]

45. It was in Newsweek. It is true and sounds oh so much like Bill Clinton's cynical politics.

Take gay people's money and then throw them under the bus when the short term politics call for it.

[kenny blankenship]

52. NY Times is obscure too, huh?

[blm]

64. grass, the story was also in Newsweek's recap of the campaign after the election.

It's been posted and referred to here many times at DU for over three years by now.

[rinsd]

29. Bob Shrum also said Edwards was incredibly uncormfortable around gay people.

The only person who comes off well in that Shrum memoir is Shrum.

[kenny blankenship]

42. delete this

[kenny blankenship]

47. Ok.

NYTimes article from 1996 mentioning the ads in question

Archived Press Release from 1996 issued by Log Cabin Republicans group, quoting Presidential Spokesman Joe Lockhart's response to their request to pull the ads

These are contemporaneous references to the ads on Christian radio stations portraying Clinton as standing up for "our values" in signing the discriminatory Defense Of Marriage Act.

[rinsd]

56. Kenny, glasswire appears to be asking about 2004, not 1996.

[MagickMuffin]

57. See my post below #55, there's a link in it

Bill Clinton reportedly told John Kerry to throw gays under the bus during 2004 election. What is he telling Hillary, and is she listening?
by John Aravosis (DC) · 6/07/2007 01:25:00 PM ET

[niyad]

2. if he did, they should be readily available. where are they?

[gateley]

3. Yeah -- I'd like to hear them

before I post a scathing condemnation (which I'm itching to do :7).

[ecstatic]

11. Transcript of one of the homophobic ads:

> CLINTON CHRISTIAN RADIO AD
> :60 SECONDS
> TRANSCRIBED OCTOBER 14, 1996
>
> Protecting religious freedom. It's the foundation of our nation.
>
> When the Justice Department went after a church to gather the
> parishioners' tithing money, the government was stopped cold because
> President Clinton overturned the government's policy and protected us.
>
> It's not the only time he's defended our values.
>
> Don't be misled by Bob Dole's attack ads.
>
> President Clinton wants a complete ban on late term abortions except
> when the mother's life is in danger or faces severe health risks, such
> as the inability to have another child.
>
> The President signed the Defense of Marriage Act, supports curfews and
> school uniforms to teach our children discipline.
>
> The President enacted the V-chip to block out violent TV programs. His
> crime bill expanded the death penalty for drug kingpins.
>
> Bob Dole opposed him and is resorting to untrue negative attacks.
>
> President Clinton has fought for our values and America is better for
> it.
>
> Paid for by Clinton/Gore 96.

http://archives.econ.utah.edu/archives/pen-l/1996m10.c/msg00060.htm

[galaxy21]

23. The problem with the Clinton's is they claim to be against racism and homphobia....

and they probably are in their own lives...however, they have no problem exploiting other people's racism and homophobia to further their own agenda.

[claudew]

24. Right Here

As Rosie might say, Google It! If you did you would find this NY Times article:

In a radio advertisement aimed at religious conservatives, the Clinton campaign is showcasing the President's signature on a bill banning gay marriages in spite of earlier White House complaints that the issue amounted to ''gay baiting.''

The advertisement also promotes President Clinton's work to protect religious freedom and says he wants ''a complete ban'' on late-term abortions ''except when the mother's life is in danger'' or when a woman ''faces severe health risks.''

[Teaser]

4. DOMA maybe?

.

[redqueen]

9. Yeah... that's what the ad is reportedly about.

Not much out there on it...

this is where Andrew seems to have picked it up:

http://www.americablog.com/2007/06/bill-clinton-reportedly-told-john-kerry.html

[niyad]

5. by the way, since when does a president run ads?

[ingac70]

8. He was promoting DOMA. n/t

[redqueen]

10. During a re-election campaign? (nt)

[SunsetDreams]

13. your kidding right?

Every president does it when they want support for an issue.
...President Bush ran ads against Dems who wouldn't budge on the vote to continue his right to eavesdrop on citizens

[Hepburn]

19. 1996....when he was running for RE-ELECTION...

...that seems to be the case here.

[Occam Bandage]

25. When attempting to be re-elected?

[Redbear]

6. Here is the NY Times notice:

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9D03E5DB1731F936A25753C1A960958260

[flpoljunkie]

18. Dole campaign seems to have gotten it right here...

The Dole campaign was critical. "This is a President who signed the Defense of Marriage Act in the middle of the night so it wouldn't be news, but now he does paid advertising to promote it," said a Dole spokesman, Gary Koops. "This is a President who has never supported any restriction on abortion, but now, 20-plus days before the election, he does ads touting the fact that he now says he supports restrictions."

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9D03E5DB1731F936A25753C1A960958260

[cosmicsheep]

7. I sort of doubt he is lying

with something that is relatively easy to fact check, and I think his bigger point is this -

"All I want to remind the next generation of gays about is: don't ever expect anything more than "just politics" from the Clintons."


Jack from The Shining says -
Words of wisdom Lloyd, words of wisdom.

[grasswire]

12. and what should we expect from Sullivan....

...based on his track record? Hmmmmm?

[Occam Bandage]

16. Let's see...endorsed Kerry, endorsed the Dems in '06, called Bush "shallow, monstrous and weak"...

Yeah, he sounds like a total GOP tool.

[cosmicsheep]

17. What is his "track record"

Please fill me in, I am in the dark over here.

[Occam Bandage]

22. He is a gay conservative libertarian and an ex-Republican. After 9/11 he was a total pro-Bush tool,

and argued for the war in Iraq. Around 2003, he started to come to his senses, apologized for his support of Bush and Iraq, started criticizing the Republicans, endorsed Kerry in '04, bashed the administration for its incompetence and arrogance, endorsed the Democratic party across the board in '06, and endorsed Obama for '08.

He's a conservative and a libertarian; he's for Social Security privatization and against health-care reform. At the same time, he's not a crazy knee-jerker either; he's anti-torture, anti-drug-war, anti-war, pro-gay-rights, anti-theocracy (he was especially opposed to the Schiavo intervention), and he recognizes that the Republican party is a malformed and diseased thing.

[MagickMuffin]

60. If you're going to judge Sullivan on being a former Republicon, then shouldn't you hold Hillary

to that same standard, after all she was a Goldwater Girl.

[cali]

14. don't know, but don't forget his comments about Dean and how

he wasn't viable because he signed the CU law.

[newmajority]

20. Well, he told John Kerry to SUPPORT the gay marriage ban amendment in 2004.

Kerry didn't fall for that shit, to his credit. But the sheeple in 11 states did, which helped Chimpy steal the election again.

[malik flavors]

26. Bill "don't ask, don't tell" Clinton? No, he'd never be accused of homophobia...

[Laughing Mirror]

28. He's the only president ever to sign not one but TWO anti-gay bills into law

Yet we still stood up for him over some blow job in the Oval office, and yet he still kept attacking us, years later. For political reasons, only, naturally. He really loves us, of course, he would have us believe.

Why are we even still talking about the Clinton enterprise? They are both of them terrific frauds and are finally being exposed.

[EFerrari]

30. I don't think this is about Andrew. Here's my Yahoo! search:

http://search.yahoo.com/search?p=Clinton+anti+gay+ads+1996&fr=yfp-t-501&toggle=1&cop=mss&ei=UTF-8

[redqueen]

32. Sorry sfexpat...

I didn't come out condemning him for it... or condemning her for not condemning Bill for doing this (if he did)...

But I think this deserves to be more widely known.

Sorry again...

[EFerrari]

33. Oh, not at all! You're doing something I couldn't figure out how to do.

It will lead to where it leads. We need to know, right? :loveya:

[redqueen]

41. I certainly think so.

Thanks.

:loveya:

[rinsd]

34. I found this in the NY Times

In a radio advertisement aimed at religious conservatives, the Clinton campaign is showcasing the President's signature on a bill banning gay marriages in spite of earlier White House complaints that the issue amounted to ''gay baiting.''

The advertisement also promotes President Clinton's work to protect religious freedom and says he wants ''a complete ban'' on late-term abortions ''except when the mother's life is in danger'' or when a woman ''faces severe health risks.''

It refers to Mr. Clinton's support of the Defense of Marriage Act, which the President signed into law last month, to the dismay of many gay rights advocates. Mr. Clinton signed the law early on a Saturday morning, minimizing news coverage. He said he had long agreed with the principles in the bill but hoped it would not be used to justify discrimination against homosexuals.

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9D03E5DB1731F936A25753C1A960958260

Though I'm not sure why you're looking at Sullivan's archives :shrug:

The post you link to was referencing this post about Bill Clinton being on Rush Limbaugh's show (turned out not to be true, Texas guy interviewed Clinton for his own show then played the interview while subbing for Rush)

http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2008/03/clinton-went-on.html

[redqueen]

36. I saw this linked elsewhere. That's beside the point.

Why the double standard?

Is it only pandering if Obama's campaign does it?

[rinsd]

46. It was just odd to see an old article.

That and I was unaware of a recent fight here about DOMA (though it comes up from time to time).

"Is it only pandering if Obama's campaign does it"

Let's you and I come to an agreement as we usually get along.

Feel free to assail me for any comments I make directly. They are afterall my own comments and I am responsible for them even if I am irresponsible in uttering them.

I should only have to defend/explain comments made by Hillary Clinton, her campaign, her campaign surrogates, DU Clinton supporters, trolls on DU claiming to be Clinton supporters when I have stated my agreement or support of said comments.

My failure to police those comments from all those people does not equal my support.

I believe the same should apply to you, the Obama campaign & DU Obama supporters.

[redqueen]

49. Of course...

if you weren't one of the many engaged in jumping all over the McClurkin "issue" then you need pay no mind. :)

[EFerrari]

39. I posted that link when I was first trying to sort this out.

If it's a problem, it's the fault of my early search. Sorry.

[rinsd]

40. Not at all. I was posting while you were posting.

[EFerrari]

53. Imnsho, we really need to take a different tack.

We need POSITIVE statements instead of always to be reading the tea leaves for a sign.

[1776Forever]

35. I have lost a lot of respect over the years for Pres. Clinton - Just one more to add to the list....

:wow:

[TheWraith]

37. He's not lying, unfortunately.

Clinton ran both radio and TV ads targeting religious voters advertising Clinton's support for banning gay marriage.

[endarkenment]

38. Well Sullivan is a known liar, but that doesn't mean much.

[newmajority]

58. So are the Clintons.

n/t

[EFerrari]

61. What do you mean, endarkment?

For those of us who don't know.

[endarkenment]

62. He pretends to be against the war.

"We have learned a tough lesson, and it has been a lot tougher for those tens of thousands of dead, innocent Iraqis and several thousand killed and injured American soldiers than for a few humiliated pundits. The correct response to that is not more spin but a real sense of shame and sorrow that so many have died because of errors made by their superiors, and by writers like me. All this is true, and it needs to be faced. But it is also true that we are where we are. And true that there was no easy alternative three years ago. You'd like Saddam still in power, with our sanctions starving millions while U.N. funds lined the pockets of crooks and criminals? At some point the wreckage that is and was Iraq would have had to be dealt with. If we hadn't invaded, at some point in the death spiral of Saddam's disintegrating Iraq, others would. It is also true that it is far too soon to know the ultimate outcome of our gamble.

What we do know is that for all our mistakes, free elections have been held in a largely Arab Muslim country. We know that the Kurds in the north enjoy freedoms and a nascent civil society that is a huge improvement on the past. We know that the culture of the marsh Arabs in the south is beginning to revive. We know that we have given Iraqis a chance to decide their own destiny through politics rather than murder and that civil war is still avoidable. We know that the enemies of democracy in Iraq will not stop there if they succeed. And we know that no perfect war has ever been fought, and no victory ever won, without the risk of defeat. Despair, in other words, is too easy now. And it too is a form of irresponsibility."


http://www.time.com/time/magazine/printout/0,8816,1169898,00.html

But it is a liar's apology. He can't help pointing at Saddam's head on the spike with the glee of the armchair warrior, he can't help but brag about the phony elections, and if you read further upwind of this crap, all that went wrong is the neocon's whipping boy of bad intel and 'who would of thunk them muslims would hate us'.

He's against the war because it is unfashionable to support it anymore.

Here, this guy says it better than me:

And Sullivan’s crimes are even worse than this: it was Sullivan (along with many other warbloggers) who fatally poisoned the cultural atmosphere after 9/11, with his interminable rants about the “fifth columnists” who allegedly are enemies as dangerous to us as foreign terrorists. Recall that those “fifth columnists” included anyone at all who failed to embrace George Bush and his program for world domination in the manner that Sullivan himself did. But now—now that everything that many of those opposed to the Iraq war predicted before the fact has come to pass, and now that the details of abuse and torture have surfaced—now Sullivan is having a few second thoughts.

But there is a deeper problem here—namely, that Sullivan’s second thoughts do not go nearly far enough. Sullivan has not given up the program he endorses at all—or even seriously questioned it. He still believes "in this war as a war of liberation and increased security." This, too, fails to pass the sanity test. Sullivan apparently has never read the numerous articles by any number of experts on terrorism (genuine experts, I emphasize, not dilettantes who blog in between jaunts to Provincetown and walking the dog)—all of whom have pointed out at great length that the invasion and occupation of Iraq, as well as every other aspect of Bush’s “War on Terror,” have only served to increase the actual dangers we face.

http://thesacredmoment.blogspot.com/2005/12/on-torture-ii-of-means-and-ends.html

[EFerrari]

63. That's fair. n/t

[cbayer]

43. I am sad, but not surprised, that you have chosen to do this.

I don't think this will help anyone. It's the same thing calling a candidate a racist or sexist. Just leads to long and useless wars over issues that have no validity.

Neither Obama nor Clinton are racist, sexist or homophobic. I believe that. They are both Democrats with political ambitions which sometime cloud their judgment.

That's all. I just wanted to say it.

[redqueen]

48. I don't like double-standards.

If one campaign is going to be raked over the coals for using a surrogate to pander to anti-gay bigots, then we should also be condemning Bill for personally engaging in that behavior.

[EFerrari]

50. It can only help us to know the lay of the land.

There is no benefit in attributing support where there is none except when political expediency demands it.

That's no way to get ahead of this debate.

[kdpeters]

44. It's true. I remember it being a story in the gay press at the time.

[Ichingcarpenter]

51. Bill Clinton honored 'The United Daughters of the Confederacy' in 94

The White House

Washington

June 21, 1994

I am delighted to honor the United Daughters of the Confederacy as you celebrate your 100th anniversary.

One of the most rewarding of human experiences is the coming together of people to share common experiences and interests. For 100 years, the United Daughters of the Confederacy has maintained and built upon the wonderful legacy of your founders. The strength of your organization today is a testament of the vision of your founders and to your commitment to your shared goals.

I congratulate you on your achievement, and I extend best wishes for many years of continuing success.

Bill Clinton

[redqueen]

54. How can people romanticize the confederacy? Weren't they terrorists?

[MagickMuffin]

55. Here's some interesting info

To get a sense of whether this "sounds like Clinton," let's look back at Clinton's record on federal bans on gay marriage. Go back to the Clinton re-election campaign in 1995. Clinton hired Democratic strategist Mark Penn as his pollster and political adviser along with now-conservative pundit Dick Morris. (Mark Penn is also Hillary Clinton's chief strategist for her current presidential run - more on that later). Penn, Morris and Clinton had decided that Clinton was going to win the re-election based on his support for "family values." And family values meant "bashing gays."

From TIME:

By the time Clinton arrived in Chicago for his party's convention in August, nothing that hinted at liberalism was left hanging on him. When the President, who had begun his term advocating the rights of gays in the military, came around to supporting the Defense of Marriage Act, which barred federal recognition for gay and lesbian unions, Dole was wide-eyed. "Is there anything we're for that he won't jump on?" Dole asked. The answer, essentially, was nothing...
It's no coincidence that after hiring Penn, Clinton signed the anti-gay Defense of Marriage Act and then ran radio ads on Christian radio touting his support for DOMA.

From the Associated Press, October 17, 1996:
After angry complaints from gay-rights advocates, the Clinton campaign on Wednesday replaced an ad running on religious radio stations that boasted of the president's signature on a bill banning gay marriages....

The Clinton spot also touted his signing of the Defense of Marriage Act, in spite of earlier White House complaints that the Republicans' use of the issue amounted to "gay baiting."

MORE: http://www.americablog.com/2007/06/bill-clinton-reportedly-told-john-kerry.html

In the link above Americanblog, mentions how Bill wanted John Kerry to throw the gays under the bus. Kerry's camp claims it DID happen, Clinton's camp denies it.

But we ALL know to well that the Clinton's have a problem with TRUTHINESS.

[Hamlette]

59. thanks for the interesting post...and discussion

I never could understand why Sully thinks the Clintons are anti-gay. I thought it had to do with don't ask don't tell (and it still might be part of it, I thought Sully believed Bill threw gays under the bus with that compromise while I thought the compromise was the best "we" could do at the time) but I didn't know about these ads.

No wonder Sully hates them.

I'm beginning to see some tarnish on the Clinton halo.