Free Republic

In the 1980s, when life in New York City was an endless struggle to die of natural causes, Donald Trump thought he was on top of the world. It took the presidency for him to learn that he’d always been a citywide joke. It’s unfortunate that no one told him so back then, not even the true legends of New York: In 1983, when I worked for ABC Sports, I was with Howard Cosell as he interviewed Trump. When we left Trump Tower, Cosell said, “I’ve never met anyone luckier to be born rich.” To this day, Trump recalls Cosell...

As the Supreme Court considers overturning California’s ban on same-sex marriage, gay people await a ruling that could change their lives. But the case has already transformed one gay man: Ken Mehlman, the once-closeted Republican operative who orchestrated President George W. Bush’s 2004 re-election on a platform that included opposition to same-sex marriage. Now Mr. Mehlman, a private equity executive in Manhattan, is waging what could be his final campaign: to convince fellow Republicans that gay marriage is consistent with conservative values and good for their party. His about-face, sparked in part by the lawyer who filed the California lawsuit,...

Ken Mehlman, the former Republican National Committee Chairman who last summer announced he was gay, says it's time the GOP publicly support same-sex marriage. Mehlman's new position – once all but unthinkable from the man who ran former President George Bush's 2004 reelection bid – comes more than three months after he shocked many in Washington with his announcement. But in an interview with the website The Big Think, Mehlman says he has come to believe that supporting gay rights is a logical extension of the principles the GOP seeks to advance. "I do hope the Republican Party in the...

When Sen. John Cornyn (R-Tex.) agreed to attend a fundraising dinner in Washington for the Log Cabin Republicans, many social conservatives were outraged. The group has long urged the GOP to be more accepting of gay rights, and some Republicans worried that the appearance by Cornyn, a party leader in Congress, would further legitimize its views. The senator not only attended the Log Cabin event at the Capitol Hill Club last Wednesday, he also accepted an award from the group, becoming the highest-ranking Republican to do so. After his speech, though, the group's president, R. Clarke Cooper, privately told Cornyn...

Suddenly, it's becoming less of a stigma for bigwigs to associate with gays in the Republican Party. Not only has former RNC chairman Ken Mehlman's 9/22 fundraiser for gay marriage rights attracted numerous high-octane Republican donors and activists, but Sen. John Cornyn, the chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, and Rep. Pete Sessions, the chairman of the National Republican Congressional Committee will help the Log Cabin Republicans, a gay GOP group, raise money for its political action committee. A glossy pamphlet advertising the Log Cabin Republicans' national dinner at the Capitol Hill Club highlights an hour-long cocktail gathering with...

The Treachery of the Perverse- by billrandles Wisdom crieth without; she uttereth her voice in the streets:She crieth in the chief place of concourse, in the openings of the gates: in the city she uttereth her words, saying,How long, ye simple ones, will ye love simplicity? and the scorners delight in their scorning, and fools hate knowledge?Turn you at my reproof: behold, I will pour out my spirit unto you, I will make known my words unto you.(Proverbs 1:20-23) As the Proverbs tells us ,Wisdom is crying out in the public concourse. However it is only accessible to those who...

Ken Mehlman, George W. Bush's 2004 election campaign manager and a former Republican Party Chairman, has just revealed he is gay, according to Newsweek and a variety of other media outlets. His disclosure has angered some gay and lesbian same-sex marriage activists, upset by his tacit support and silence during the "values" political drive of 2004, when Republican strategists like Karl Rove pushed same-sex marriage bans across 13 states that year, as USA Today reported. Others are hailing his recent self-outing as being potentially helpful to the efforts to end Proposition 8 and the court case being driven, in part,...

NEW YORK – Will the Republican Party follow Ken Mehlman’s lead and step out on gay rights? Historian Timothy McCarthy imagines a future where the GOP starts talking like Harvey Milk. Every queer knows that some of the biggest homophobes are closet cases. Simply recall the names of Mark Foley, Ted Haggard, Larry Craig, or George “rent-boy” Rekers. The latest Republican to move from the closet to the Log Cabin is Ken Mehlman, the architect of George W. Bush’s successful 2004 reelection campaign and former chairman of the Republican National Committee. Judging by the current political climate, Mehlman’s coming out...

Ken Mehlman is gay? Most right-leaning political junkies probably responded by asking, ‘Who is Ken Mehlman?’ or ‘Yeah, but who cares?’ Conservative bloggers either ignored the topic or pointed out that conservatives aren’t necessarily surprised or outraged by the news. “I had absolutely no idea Ken Mehlman was gay, or existed,” wrote the Daily Caller’s Jim Treacher in response to the New York Times piece that marveled at the “muted reaction” of Republicans to the announcement. The former RNC chairman and President Bush’s 2004 campaign manager announced that he was gay to the Atlantic’s Marc Ambinder, and also announced his...

There were other things I wanted to write about this evening, but now I feel like I’m obligated to write a society-page feature because the Drama Queen (Ken Mehlman) decided to make her debut at the cotillion. (...) Excuse my derision, and denounce me as suffering from “homophobia” — Can I get an SSI disability check for that? Would Medicaid pay for treatment? — if that satisfies your craving for a sense of moral superiority. You’re not going to guilt-trip me into pulling punches. I’m heaping the most vicious ridicule I can on this twerp for a reason: To discourage...

*excerpt* As a matter of public policy, the issues on which Ken Mehlman exerted his retrograde influence within the GOP are not about his personal behavior. They are about the truth or falsity of the great principles, the self-evident truths, from which the liberty of the American people derives. If there is no natural right, no natural family, no ways of God reflected in the nature of mankind, then there are no unalienable rights; no principle of justice that requires their security; no authoritative basis for the rightness of government based on consent; no claim to self-government, of, by and...

Former Bush II operative and RNC Chairman Ken Mehlman is gay. People are talking about it from almost every imaginable angle. Why was he Republican? Why did the Republicans want him? How did such an allegedly anti-gay party as the GOP ever allow him to reach such high office? But they don’t ask the important question: Why is this a news story? In these United States, around one or two percent of the public is gay. So one or two of every hundred people isn’t straight. Why on earth should an announcement about one of them – someone whom less...

Ken Mehlman, President Bush’s campaign manager in 2004 and a former chairman of the Republican National Committee, made a shocking confession today in an interview with The Atlantic’s Marc Ambinger: Privately, in off-the-record conversations with this reporter over the years, Mehlman voiced support for tax increases and told of how, in private discussions with senior Republican officials, he beat back efforts to support the Bush tax cuts. The reaction by conservative pundits and leaders was praise for Mehlman following his conscience and being true to himself. Okay, not really. Maybe in an alternate universe that would happen, but in D.C....

Former Republican National Committee chairman and Bush-Cheney campaign manager Ken Mehlman has announced publicly that he is gay, CBS News chief political consultant and politics editor for The Atlantic Marc Ambinder reports. "It's taken me 43 years to get comfortable with this part of my life," Mehlman said. "Everybody has their own path to travel, their own journey, and for me, over the past few months, I've told my family, friends, former colleagues, and current colleagues, and they've been wonderful and supportive. The process has been something that's made me a happier and better person. It's something I wish I...

Ken Mehlman, who was President George W. Bush's campaign manager in 2004, has come out as gay - and wants to be an advocate for gay marriage. Mehlman, also a former Republican National Committee chairman, told the Atlantic magazine "It's taken me 43 years to get comfortable with this part of my life." He said friends, family and colleagues "have been wonderfully supportive." When rumors of Mehlman's sexual orientation circulated years ago, he told several reporters that they were false. Mehlman and his aides went to considerable lengths to conceal his sexual identity, arranging "dates" with women and photos of...

Ken Mehlman, President Bush's campaign manager in 2004 and a former chairman of the Republican National Committee, has told family and associates that he is gay. Mehlman arrived at this conclusion about his identity fairly recently, he said in an interview. He agreed to answer a reporter's questions, he said, because, now in private life, he wants to become an advocate for gay marriage and anticipated that questions would arise about his participation in a late-September fundraiser for the American Foundation for Equal Rights (AFER), the group that supported the legal challenge to California's ballot initiative against gay marriage, Proposition...

Ken Mehlman, President Bush's campaign manager in 2004 and a former chairman of the Republican National Committee, has told family and associates that he is gay. Mehlman arrived at this conclusion about his identity fairly recently, he said in an interview. He agreed to answer a reporter's questions, he said, because, now in private life, he wants to become an advocate for gay marriage and anticipated that questions would arise about his participation in a late-September fundraiser for the American Foundation for Equal Rights (AFER), the group that supported the legal challenge to California's ballot initiative against gay marriage, Proposition...

Former Republican National Committee chairman — and the man who reportedly advised President Bush in early 2001 not to regulate carbon dioxide — has switched sides and is now being paid to lobby for greenhouse gas regulation on behalf of the eco-activist group Environmental Defense. According to Greenwire’s John Fialka (Feb. 21), ED board member and hedge fund tycoon Julian Robertson is putting up the cash to hire DC lobbying powerhouse Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld. Ken Mehlman and former Democratic congressman Vic Fazio will lead Akin Gump’s efforts. "Their first mission is to find the right political formula...

Miami, FL – RNC Chairman Ken Mehlman addressed the Republican Governors Association this morning in Miami, Florida. The following is a transcript of his remarks as prepared for delivery. ************ Thank you, Governor Romney, for that kind introduction. And thank you all for inviting me here today to talk with you about the last month … and more importantly, about the next two years. Let me start by talking a little bit about November 7, and what it means for our party. Obviously, no one in this room is pleased with the election results. We knew going into 2006 that...

DORAL, Fla. -- The sting of Republican electoral defeats still fresh, the GOP chairman suggested Thursday the party has strayed and challenged it to refocus on core principles and reform. "We work for the people," Ken Mehlman, the outgoing chairman of the Republican National Committee, said in a speech to a meeting of GOP governors. He reminded the crowd that "good policy makes good politics -- and, for Republicans, this must be a time for self-examination when it comes to our policy." [Snip] "Our nation is stronger and better when Republicans are the party running the government. But, ladies and...