Ed (Dispatches from the Culture Wars) comments about statements by various conservative and Republican spokesmen. They believe Kerry's intention when he mentioned that Cheney's daughter is gay was to shave a few points off Bush's vote totals in the rural areas. The theory is that homophobes, hearing that Cheney has a gay daughter, would switch their votes to someone else.
Ed considers this an admission of an anti-gay bias in the Republican party.
Of course, given the Elvis factor (In one poll, 12% of people believed Elvis was still alive, and 10% believed if you mailed him a letter, he'd receive it), you will probably find in any given group at least one subgroup that believes just about anything. It's quite possible there are Republicans who would be affected that way. It's also quite possible there are Democrats who would be affected the same way.
As it happens, though, these statements are not necessarily indictments of Republicans. At most, they are statements of belief about what sort of cynical motive Kerry might have had for bringing up the sexual orientation of a family member of the opposing team.
That Kerry had a cynical motive is an assumption, though I suspect it's well supported. If he did have a cynical motive, how would he have expected the comment to go down?
Given the stereotype of Republicans as Neanderthals, who aim to keep women barefoot and pregnant in the kitchen, keep Blacks in the back of the bus, herd gays into concentration camps, and poison the air, water, and food supply, it's not hard to guess the intended effect of playing the gay card.
If this is what happened, it illustrates once again how dangerous it is to believe your own propaganda.
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