Something sort of good about Sensenbrenner

For the most part, Sensenbrenner's take on gays is he's anti-marriage but pretty much live and let live when it comes to domestic partnerships; it's nice of him to offer second-class citizenship, don't you think? He has spewed some of the usual rhetoric about "the gay invasion" into Americans' marriages. Still, anti-gay initiatives have never taken center stage in his platforms. Please correct me if I'm wrong here, but my research says no.

I know he helped pass the House statute to "protect" the rest of the U.S. from recognizing Massachusetts marriages.

Considering this, here's a scenario I'd like your opinion on. The right will take swift action here in Wisconsin, if the State Legislature passes its anti-rights bill targeting the lgbt community. It looks like it will win. And this time there won't be any gray areas, i.e. allowing basic civil rights such as domestic partner benefits. They want it all: no hospital visits, no inheritance rights, no d.p. arrangements, and certainly no adoptions.

They even came up with these nifty pink triangles for us to wear. You know, separate but equal.

What's going to be interesting in this election year is how Sensenbrenner will bring this state initiative into the fold of his reelection campaign. He certainly won't be able to ignore it. When I asked his staffer in D.C. for my article if he'd be running with this on his platform, I got the standard, "No comment."

The right is on the run this year, even if smug conservatives or cynical progressives don't want to admit it, and they'll try and sway voters their way using this tactic, just as they did in 2004. In addition to immigrants, gays will be on the right's whipping post. Sensenbrenner won't be able to ignore the issue, because he needs the right.

Is he really for this take-no-prisoners approach to the lgbt community?

Maybe they're correct about the 5th District being untouchable, and I'm in la-la land. But I think even WI Republican voters will ignore this hate-filled approach because they know they're not getting any return on investment from extremely high taxes. (Bryan Kennedy has a lot of information on that, bk2006.org) And those are just the people who are still working, or haven't been devastated by a serious illness in the family, or from chronic un- and under-employment.

I forecast Republican burnout at the polls. Even among people who secretly hate gays.