Anti-gay Senator, with ties to Mark Foley, to head up Republican party

Well, isn't this an interesting pick. The Republicans have chosen Senator Mel Martinez (R-FL), a man who openly embraced homophobia during his Senate race, as the new head of the Republican National Committee (RNC), making him the putative head of the Republican party.

It's probably no surprise that the GOP chose someone anti-gay after rumors had swirled for years about the exact sexual orientation of outgoing RNC chair Ken Mehlman (Mehlman publicly avoided the question for years).

But even more interesting is that a top staffer on Martinez's Senate campaign, Kirk Fordham, was also the former chief of staff to child sex predator ex-congressman Mark Foley. Foley represented Florida in the House. Martinez represents Florida in the Senate.

I'm just saying...

Also of note, it was Martinez's office that sent around the hideous memo about Terri Schiavo in which they bragged what a great opportunity Schiavo's near-death status was for the Republican party.

Of course, in the end, the joke may be on the religious right base of the Republican party.

Martinez didn't just have the openly-gay Kirk Fordham as a top aide on his Senate campaign, he also had a second top aide who was gay. Mr. Martinez may play a homophobe on TV, but he doesn't have a problem having key advisers who are openly gay. Which is great. But it also means that Martinez's personal commitment to the anti-gay agenda is more than just a little suspect.

But I'm not complaining. Washington needs more Republicans who secretly like gay people and help our cabal slowly seize the reins of power in DC. (And with George Allen now gone, someone needs to take over the gay affirmative action office in the Senate.) Having gay people in these kind of senior positions makes it that much harder for the elected officials, and their staff, to do the bidding of the religious right - after all, some of their best friends are gay. And the religious right knows it.

Same gay circus, different gay clowns.

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