Dean’s honesty

This entry was published at least two years ago (originally posted on January 15, 2004). Since that time the information may have become outdated or my beliefs may have changed (in general, assume a more open and liberal current viewpoint). A fuller disclaimer is available.

One of the things I’ve found that I like a lot about Howard Dean in interviews is that, at least when you can find an article not focusing on his supposed anger, how straightforward and honest he comes across as. Much was made a while ago about how even though he signed Vermont’s civil unions bill giving homosexual couples the same rights as married heterosexual couples, he admitted at the time that he wasn’t entirely comfortable with the idea of gay marriage. While most of the spin about this has been trying to paint some form of double-standard, or accusing Dean of signing the civil union bill purely for political gain, the most recent issue of Rolling Stone has an interview with Dean where they actually asked him about his comment.

What makes you think you won’t just get steamrolled once you are in Washington?

The Democrats just need a president who’s going to support them. That’s what I did on the civil-unions bill in Vermont. I came out in favor of civil unions about an hour after the [Vermont Supreme Court] decision came out. I knew it would give cover to a lot of legislators who would want to do the right thing but just didn’t have the nerve.

Didn’t you also say at the time that the whole idea of legally sanctioned gay relationships made you feel uncomfortable?

Sure. Look, I didn’t know anything about the gay community when I signed the civil-unions bill. I grew up in the same homophobic milieu that everybody else did. I was told the same thing about gay people that all heterosexuals were. And most gay people were told the same thing themselves — by parents, ministers and everybody else. I was uncomfortable, and I said so. And I got a lot of flak for it. But I still thought it was the right thing to do.

You don’t allocate civil rights by who makes you comfortable and who doesn’t. I believe that civil unions was a masterful way of making sure that every gay and lesbian Vermonter was entitled to the same rights as everybody else — without getting into the business about telling churches who they could marry and who they couldn’t marry. I think what we did was the right thing. Others may do it differently.

Equal rights under the law is a fundamental part of everybody’s thinking in America — which is why I don’t think civil unions is going to be a big issue in the election for me.

Is this an important enough issue to have it be one of the main issues of a presidential campaign?

Well, civil rights is an important issue. Gay marriage is not. Karl Rove will make it that way. Because he’ll claim that everything is gay marriage, and this and that and the other thing.

So you are just going to change the subject?

Yeah. If we allow the Republicans to run the campaign based on divisive issues — like prayer in school, gay marriage and gun control — then we lose. The right wing will try to make a big issue of it, and they’ll get some votes from some people who would have voted for them anyway.

Most people do not want to traffic in hate. And this election is going to be about whether we cater to the worst in us or cater to the best in us, and I intend to do the latter.

Answers like that are exactly why I support Dean. Straightforward, honest, not pussyfooting around the issue at all. Even if and when I don’t entirely agree with his answers, he always seems to have justifiable reasons for the decisions he makes, and he doesn’t make excuses for them. I’ll take that honesty over Bush’s lies any day.

iTunes: “Rescue Me” by Madonna from the album Immaculate Collection, The (1991, 5:31).