“Pat Robertson, Jerry Falwell, Charlton Heston, Trent Lott, Gary Bauer, Reggie White, Operation Rescue, Dick Armey, and the whole sleazy GOP right wing are attacking Clinton and the gays and they’re unwilling to either obey the law, nor to unite America under any banner but “Hate” as their family value,” said Kunst. 

Even so, many Americans seem aware as never before of political demagoguery disguised as anti-homosexual politicking and posturing.  

The Religious Right and the Republican Party, as a result, are both at an impasse over electoral strategies. The fundamentalist groups are demanding the demonization of gay men and lesbians, knowing instinctively the truth expressed by Eric Hoffer in his landmark book, The True Believer.  Mr. Hoffer noted that dangerous mass movements, such as any kind of fundamentalist represents, can exist without a God, “but never without a devil.” Attacking homosexuality has become the 1990s religious fanatic’s equivalent of  1920s attacks that were made on “demon rum”. 

The Religious Right itself is bitterly divided, with its wonder boy-strategist, Ralph Reed, counseling pragmatism while ideological purists under the leadership of James Dobson demand that all Republican candidates promote—first and foremost—his favored anti-gay, anti-free-choice messages. 

These messages, however, have become harsh and hoarse since the beginning of June. Dubious and repetitive exercises in foot-shooting are now endemic among both GOP bigwigs and their buddy-buddy “religious” leaders.  

Their self-inflicted wounds, widely reported since June 6 by the media, include the “fizzled” failure of Operation Rescue in Orlando’s Disney World during Gay Days; Pat Robertson’s bizarre “weather report” and his terrorist bomb prediction- threat leveled at that same area; a series of absurd dogmas publicized about gay men and women’s equality by the benighted constituents of the Southern Baptist Convention; the well-publicized ill-treatment of gay GOP members at a GOP conclave in Texas;  the support for religious buffoonery in medical matters and the calling of same-sex love a “sin” by Republican Senator Trent Lott, the Senate Majority Leader, and the Republican House Majority Leader, Dick Army, and the resultant fiery rebukes of these same “leaders” by the observant White House Press Secretary, Mike McCurry. 

Internet reports indicate that Fate has thus far spared Orlando from the unseemly weather patterns Pat Robertson has prophecied but that James Dobson, leader of the more impatient wing of the fundamentalist “religious” cause, has suffered a mild stroke. Fortunately for the demagogue no paralysis, say these reports, presently affects his 62-year old frame. 

Ralph Reed, former spokesperson for the Pat Robertson-sponsored Christian Coalition, is now treated as an accommodationist by “Christian” purists in the evangelical/fundamentalist movements. Mr. Reed, a pragmatist, has concluded that Republican candidates will be unable to win elections by talking about  singular issues like abortion or homosexuality.  “I think you win elections by talking about a range of issues that people are concerned about,” he told the New York Times. 

Marc Lacey of the Los Angeles Times reported Thursday that “when it comes to homosexuality, the Republican Party is tied up in knots.” 

Senator Alfonse D’Amato (R-New York) concerned because Senator Trent Lott has held up the nomination of openly-gay ambassadorial appointee James Hormel, has said, “I fear Mr. Hormel’s nomination is being obstructed for one reason, and one reason only: the fact that he’s gay….”  D’Amato continues: “On a personal level I am embarrassed that our Republican Party, the Party of Lincoln, is seen to be the force behind this injustice.” 

The GOP is wrestling to keep its fundamentalist “Christians” as loyal troopers, but the leaders of the Religious Right, particularly Dobson and Robertson, have been threatening of late to bolt the Republican Party unless it puts opposition to homosexuality and abortion at the top of its agenda.  

Trent Lott and Dick Armey have thus fired—on two consecutive days—shots in a cultural and political war they’ve started amid a virtual hail of ignorant commentaries with which the fundamentalist extremists have steadily—through June-- been bombing their gay and lesbian targets ineffectually.  

GOP strategists are faced with a dilemma.  Should the whole of the Republican Party condemn homosexuality outright to show its commitment to “family values” or should it tolerantly accept gay men and lesbians into the GOP to emphasize its “ Everybody’s Welcome in the Big Tent” approach to American voters. 

Thus far, candidates running on anti-gay platforms in recent Republican primaries have not succeeded in persuading voters that they are, in fact, the best choices in the race. 

Worse for the fundamentalist cause, Pat Robertson, while petitioning the Republican Congress earlier this month, succeeded with his anti-gay “weather report” in making a kook-like caricature of himself the brunt of a variety of jokes—not only in Orlando but on nearly every late-night nationally-televised talk show. 

Senator John McCain (R.-Arizona) said, “It’s a very tough issue…We have a large party, a majority party.  We have lots of facets to our party and lots of interests. The Log Cabin Republicans should be part of our party. The Christian Right should be part of our party.” 

Inviting gay Republicans and Christian Right Republicans to share the same quarters, however, is proving an impossible feat.  

The gay Republicans (Log Cabin) represented by spokesman Kevin Ivers, admits that “a good number of the leaders are pandering to a small, extremist minority of the party.” 

Meanwhile, the ailing  James Dobson’s support has been given former Operation Rescue activist Randall Terry who is running as a Republican for Congress in the 26th district of New York. More than 90% of Terry’s campaign moneys, say Log Cabin sources, come from outside New York State. 

Randall Terry’s “religious”  rhetoric has a frightening edge: “I want you to just let a wave of intolerance wash over you. I want to let a wave of hatred wash over you.  Yes, hate is good!  We have a biblical duty, we are called by God to conquer this country.”