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In the spring of 2000, as Texas Gov. George W. Bush was cruising toward the Republican presidential nomination, he invited a dozen gay Republicans to Austin. That sent a powerful message to the independent voters Bush needed in winning the White House: He would be a different kind of Republican -- tolerant and respectful toward gay Americans.
"These are people from our neighborhoods, people with whom all of us went to school ... and I appreciate them sharing their stories with me," Bush said after the cordial 90-minute meeting where he heard about hardships faced by gay parents, gay soldiers and gay workers. Bush declared that listening had made him a "better person," adding, "And I'm mindful that we're all God's children."
Fast-forward seven years. Bush hasn't lifted a finger to end anti-gay discrimination. He's the first president to advocate writing it into the Constitution.
And in a sad and bizarre twist, the men competing for the 2008 Republican presidential nomination act as if the contest is over who can show the most hostility to gay rights -- even though their party desperately needs to win back the moderates and independents who've abandoned it, largely over the war in Iraq.
Take Mitt Romney, for example. In 1994, he boasted that if Massachusetts elected him to the Senate, he'd do more for gay people than Ted Kennedy could. These days, Romney never seems to meet an anti-gay policy he doesn't like.
And take Rudy Giuliani. He was the gay-friendly mayor of New York City who moved in with a gay couple while getting a divorce. Now, he no longer supports civil unions.
The gay Log Cabin Republicans' online overview of where these presidential wannabes stand is full of lines like "he has made his opposition to basic fairness for gay people one of the pillars of his campaign" (Sen. Sam Brownback of Kansas) and "an ardent opponent of gay and lesbian rights" (former Virginia Gov. Jim Gilmore).
Yet the nation is getting increasingly comfortable with gay rights. Big majorities favor outlawing anti-gay job discrimination and ending the military ban. Sixty percent support civil unions or gay marriage, a New York Times/CBS poll found this March.
And a new poll conducted by GOP pollster Tony Fabrizio suggests that even self-identified Republicans may be warming to basic gay rights: 77 percent of self-identified Republicans say employers shouldn't have "the right to fire an employee based solely on their sexual orientation"; by 49 to 42 percent, they want the military ban lifted; and although 51 percent oppose legal recognition of gay couples, 43 percent favor civil unions or gay marriage.
So the GOP's lead elephants are stampeding in a risky direction, mistakenly thinking that their shrinking party is wholeheartedly against gay rights.
Yes, the Republican brand has lost a lot of customers. Just 35 percent of voters say they're Republican or lean Republican; 50 percent are Democrats or lean Democratic, according to a March Pew poll. In 2002, the parties were evenly divided.
But those who remain in the GOP aren't uniformly against basic gay rights. And primping to be the choice of the most out-of-the-mainstream Republicans is going to make the sales job for the eventual nominee much tougher in the general election.
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Deb Price of The Detroit News writes the first nationally syndicated column on gay issues.
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