A Bush in the hand ...

The talk around the dinner table had turned to politics, and the Texans surprised the group by proclaiming their support for the likely presidential candidacy of George W. Bush. The New Yorkers were predictably aghast. How, they shouted, can you support anyone allied with the party of Trent Lott and Dick Anney, to say nothing of Pat Buchanan and Gary Bauer? Normally, a rising decibel level makes me mm away from a discussion, but the fact that I stayed with it made me realize that the question "Whither Bush?" was one I am suddenly curious to sort out.

Like many people, I have a rough sense of why a Bush presidency would be harmful to gay men and lesbians. We suspect that his background of prep-school privilege is incompatible with the politics of inclusion. We fear that his policies will echo those of his CIA-steeped, Gulf War-mongering father. Most of all we sense that in a Bush administration our interests would be sacrificed to the Texas governor's play-to-both-sides politics.

I don't buy the first line of thinking. Al Gore, the likely Democratic candidate, is also the product of elite schooling, and we don't disqualify him for that reason alone. As for the second suspicion, I worry less that the governor will reproduce his father's ideas than that he will mimic those of his "We like to go rich" mother. (On the other hand, in a George W. Bush White House, Barbara Bush, who in her husband's time looked more like the president's mother than his wife, will at least be the materfamilias.)

The third objection is harder to dismiss. On gay issues Governor Bush is indeed the Emperor of Equivocation. Although he has refused to comment specifically on the still-bottled-up ambassadorial nomination of James Hormel, Bush believes no one should be disqualified from a presidential appointment because he or she is gay. But he also thinks that we should not be foster or adoptive parents and that sexual orientation should not be a category covered by hate-crimes legislation.

Given the number of gay men and lesbians who have proved eminently able to give needy children good homes, Bush's family policies strike me as cockeyed, and his opposition to hate-crimes reform, which might be rational if he on principle opposed all such legislation, is also troubling. But are these regrettable views enough for us to shoot down his candidacy before it has been officially announced?

Not, as my Texas friends argue, if you believe economic issues are at the heart of social change and that Bush's fiscal philosophy is the way to ensure the prosperity that makes progress for minorities easier. And not, the Texans would further contend, if you want a president who respects us rather than takes us for granted. Bush, they and the governor's longtime gay friends insist, is absolutely comfortable working with gay men and lesbians--as long, of course, as they share his general political agenda.

If these arguments strike you as too paltry for supporting a Bush candidacy, then you will undoubtedly get behind Al Gore, who has--no question--been a consistent friend to gay causes. But if you are concerned that the vice president's meager charisma quotient makes him unlikely to win a general election and that our failure to support Bush will mean being shut out of his administration, then you might want to wait before dismissing the Texan.

Lest you think I am engaging in Bushlike equivocation, let me say that if I found myself, come November 2000, voting for the Texas governor, I would not be surprised. On the other hand, there is still so much to be revealed about him once the national press takes off its gloves that a year from now I could be as adamantly against him as my PC New York friends are. Maybe gay people are finding themselves in a Bush-friendly mood because of our disgust with the current president and anyone associated with him. Whatever the feeling's cause, however, it should be a little worrisome to the vice president and his advisers. Bush and Gore may both be four-letter words, but for many of us right now, Bush is not necessarily the more offensive of them.