Q Toon: LGBTQ Town Hall Highlights

 

CNN hosted a town hall event last week in which Democratic presidential candidates appeared on stage one by one to take questions from audience members and CNN news anchors.

Senator Elizabeth Warren had the viral moment of the evening, answering an audience member's question about how to respond to someone who believes in defining marriage as exclusively one man to one woman. "Well, I'm going to assume it's a guy who said that," she said. "And I'm going to say then just marry one woman, I'm cool with that — assuming you can find one."

Former Congressman Beto O'Rourke gave a firm answer to a question, sidestepped by Senator Cory Booker earlier in the event, about tax exempt status for religious institutions that oppose marriage equality:

"There can be no reward, no benefit, no tax break for anyone or any institution, any organization in America that denies the full human rights or the full civil rights of every single one of us, and so as president, we are going to make that a priority and we are going to stop those who are infringing upon the human rights of our fellow Americans.”

It was one of many moments of the evening that have been held up as examples of thumbing the party's nose at Middle America and kowtowing to the Gay Mafia.

Senator Kamala Harris echoed the new practice of introducing onesself by adding "My pronouns are she, her and hers," and I really can't fault her for that. It was host Chris Cuomo who stuck his foot in his mouth by quipping "Mine, too." (He has since apologized.)

Former Vice President Joe Biden should hardly have to prove his bonas fides on the issue of marriage equality; most of us remember him getting out ahead of the rest of the Obama administration in advocating the cause. Uncle Joe made a point of demonstrating how comfortable he is palling with The Gays, complimenting a questioner about his outfit, and joking about "coming out" by putting his arm around host Anderson Cooper. In this #metoo era, he probably would have caught hell if those had been a female questioner or Dana Bash.

Frankly, and predictably, none of the candidates said anything that put any daylight between themselves and the mainstream LGBTQ community at large. O'Rourke and Mayor Pete Buttigieg handled protesters with seriousness and respect, as did hosts Cooper and Don Lemon. Warren thoroughly disavowed her 2012 statement opposing taxpayer funding of gender reassignment surgery for prison inmates.

I should note that the Saturday Night Live parody of the forum did a serious disservice to Senator Cory Booker. I've read the 1992 op-ed he wrote for the Stanford Daily, which the SNL sketch characterized as demeaning to gays. It most certainly is not; it is instead a full-throated apology for having ever had any antigay animus.

Finally, I must apologize for not including Julian Castro in this cartoon. Lin-Manuel Miranda's father, however, has assured me that his son is available next time I draw any cartoon about the Democratic candidates for president.