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    NJ hasn’t given up on McGreevey

    This is just what we need (via Gay Orbit):

    This morning’s Newark Star-Ledger reports on a new Zogby poll the paper headlines as a “shock”: it shows that nearly half the residents of the Garden State would consider voting again for former N.J. Gov. Jim McGreevey for some other office, like Congress or the legislature (and 30% of those saying so were Republicans).

    Still wonder why the rest of the Mid-Atlantic looks down on New Jersey? Anyway, it’s important to note that this poll was of NJ residents, not just gay voters; I wonder whether they liked McGreevey’s policy platform despite his corruption? Or maybe standards for politicians are low in this post-Lautenberg world?

    Whatever the case, Doug Ireland and Michael are right: even if you’re the most amorally opportunistic gay advocate imaginable, sheer pragmatism should tell you that making McGreevey into a hero is a monumentally bad idea. Of course, it’s hard not to sympathize in gut terms with someone who’s been closeted for decades–even Jonathan Rauch couldn’t resist half-playing the pity card (though I think this guy takes the cigar band). But life tests everyone’s character; it’s not as if gays were the only Americans who had ever experienced hardship. It’s beyond comprehension why every gay man and woman who’s made a practice of living honestly isn’t mad as a hornet at McGreevey’s manipulativeness.

    One final note about Ireland’s post: I’m not sure that someone who tacks on a story about a woman’s execution as a parenthetical in the title and a by-the-by add-on in the body is really in the position to be getting all uptight about whether other people are treating Afghan women’s rights with sufficient gravity. I don’t think anyone had any delusions that bringing the rule of law to every last ravine of Afghanistan was going to be easy. With the new constitution, civil rights as we see them in the West are at least partially codified; the task of changing minds in the hinterlands–even Bibi Amena’s parents said she deserved death for being in the company of an unrelated man–will take longer than writing a document in the capital. In a world in which we can’t prevent every injustice, it’s the direction of change that has to matter.

    2 Responses to “NJ hasn’t given up on McGreevey”

    1. Eric Scheie says:

      Might it be that New Jerseyites now realize they had the best governor money can buy?

    2. Sean Kinsell says:

      That was a thought I had, too: does the interim governor suck that much? Is it possible for anyone to suck that much?

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