Insanity on the gay right

Attendees at “Homocon” universally attributed the rise of the gay right to the rising conservative tide generally.

“It really was the economy stupid. There’s a move to the right in general,” said Thiel, who was also an early investor in Facebook and is a prominent supporter of libertarian causes. An awful lot of Republicans want to get out of the gay issue in general.”

Thiel compared the current gay rights’ strategy of allying itself with a single party to “trench warfare” in World War I, and argued that gay rights will benefit from a Republican Party that begins to compete for gay voters and donors.

Coulter’s presence at the event was controversial, as other gay activists pointed out that she’d made a series of anti-gay remark — she called former presidential candidate John Edwards a "faggot" — which she explained away at the top of her speech as humor.

“The people who get gay jokes are gays,” she said, adding that when she talks to Christian audience, “Out of sweetness they don’t laugh at the gay jokes.”

Coulter’s jokes Tuesday riffed on the theme that GOProud doesn’t make same-sex marriage central to its appeal; it considers, Barron says, national security and the economy more important.

Marriage “is not a civil right – you’re not black,” Coulter said to nervous laughter. She went on to note that gays are among the wealthiest demographic groups in the country.

“Blacks must be looking at the gays saying, ‘Why can’t we be oppressed like that?’”

Coulter’s talk drew a mixed response, but her presence marked the increasingly mainstream Republican embrace of gay rights. Coulter had a falling out with a conservative website that has published her, WorldNetDaily, over her attendance. “She’s doing something important – she’s showing her base that it’s OK,” said one attendee, Michael Lucas. (Lucas also confided to a reporter, “I wonder what Ann will think about the fact that I am the biggest producer of gay porn on the east coast and probably in the whole US.")

Attendees struggled to characterize the momentum they feel on the right at large and the gay rights in particular. One, radio host Tammy Bruce, who is on GOProud’s board, said the moment has the “same energy” as the radical ACT-UP protests in the 1980s, which drew attention to the AIDS crisis.

Another, former New York Log Cabin GOP chief Chris Taylor, said people are discovering what he’s always found self-evident: “I don’t see what being gay has to do with being socialist,” he said.

As for Coulter, she told POLITICO the embrace of gays on the right could only be reciprocated.

“Right wingers have always liked gays. Look at all of Ronald Reagan’s gay friends,” she said, proceeding to cite an unverified rumor dating back half a century: “Look at my personal hero Joe McCarthy and his” – airquotes – “special assistant.”