InterstateQ.com

Can the Clintons be trusted?

It is no secret that I’ve made a few enemies over the way I’ve treated the Republican Party, at least publicly and in my writings.

Truth be told, most of my best friends are Republican - some of them more conservative, some of them more middle of the road. What the Republicans have in regard to LGBT equality that the Democrats don’t have, however, is honesty.

I don’t have to guess and wonder where my friends stand politically or ideologically or religiously when it comes to the issues surrounding my civil equality. They don’t lie to me and they tell me what they think without trying to sugar-coat it. Have I gotten frustrated with some of my friends before? Well, yes, but again… I never have to guess what they are thinking; I already know.

The same is not true of the Democrats and especially of the Clintons.

Bob Shrum’s new book has caused quite the stir over supposed comments made by my darling John Edwards. Almost a decade ago back in 1998, according to Shrum, Edwards said he “wasn’t comfortable around” gays. I’m able to forgive this - I hope. Look at how much America has changed in the past decade. And Edwards certainly is the most outspoken Democratic favorable toward our issues.

Shrum’s book, however, now gives us a revealing look into the advice Bill Clinton gave John Kerry:

A version of this story is already in print. In 2004, Newsweek reported, without a named source, that Bill Clinton had suggested Kerry “to back local bans on gay marriage.”

Shrum has more, and different, detail:

“Clinton, Kerry reported at the time, did suggest blunting Bush’s appeal to cultural conservatives with a reprise of Clinton’s Sister Souljah moment in 1992 when he’d denounced her call for violence against whites — and done it as conspicuously as possible in front of Jesse Jackson’s Rainbow Coalition.

“Kerry, Clinton ventured, should consider defying Democratic interest groups by endorsing the Bush proposal for a federal constitutional amendment banning gay marriage.”

Shrum reports that “this was a flip-flop too far for Kerry.”

I have never really trusted the Clintons. I don’t know exactly why, but I just never have. There is something about them I just find to come off as untrustworthy.

I understand that under Bill Clinton’s administration in the 1990s, America was so much better-off than we are now, but still: Clinton was also the one who promised to get rid of anti-LGBT discrimination in the Armed Forces and then turned his back and signed “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.” Clinton also signed the Federal Defense of Marriage Act.

I get this little feeling that the Clintons only say and do what is politically expedient for them at whatever time they need to say it or do it. It frustrates me.

But it is just a “feeling.” I have nothing to really back it up. Am I over-reacted? Do I have a legitimate concern? I don’t know.

I do know, however, that I will be voting for John Edwards in the North Carolina primary. I’ll figure out what I’ll do for the General Elections when they hit, because I have a good feeling that Edwards won’t be there. Oh well.