Mary Had A Little Scam

By Keith Boykin, in sexuality
Friday, May 12 2006, 10:17AM

Mary Cheney is mad. After years of silence, the openly lesbian daughter of Vice President Dick Cheney is fed up and finally speaking up. She didn't speak up when the GOP tried to "write discrimination" into the Constitution. She didn't speak up when her father's friends in the Republican Party tried to use "gay marriage" as a wedge issue to win the 2004 election. And although she has been in a long-term relationship with her partner, she didn't speak up when her father's boss told the world that marriage should be between a man and a woman. But now she has a new book and she's finally ready to speak up.

After years of criticism, it should come as no surprise that Cheney takes off her gloves to fight back. But who is she fighting against? Not against the Republicans who spearheaded the "gay marriage" wedge issue. Nor is she fighting against the party strategists who have worked hand in hand with the religious right to exploit homosexuality as an evil perversion. And she's certainly not fighting against her famous and powerful father or his even more powerful boss. Instead, she's fighting against former presidential candidate John Kerry and his former running mate John Edwards because they called her what she must consider a bad name: "lesbian."

In the category of gay people I don't understand, Mary Cheney has now leapfrogged near the top of the list. Still, she has some prominent gay supporters. This week, former HRC executive director Elizabeth Birch and her partner Hilary Rosen, a former CEO of the Recording Industry Association of America, wrote an op-ed in the Washington Post that described the publicity around Cheney's book tour as a "teachable moment" that "has the potential to be a transforming moment for all Americans." I wish I could be as optimistic.

Cheney's new book, "Now It's My Turn: A Daughter's Chronicle of Political Life," reportedly devotes two chapters to her anger and dislike of John Kerry and John Edwards, but only a few paragraphs about her "coming out" and never seems to find any problem with her father whose administration is pushing the most anti-gay federal legislative agenda in recent history.

Although she publicly differs with President Bush on the Federal Marriage Amendment, she still reserves most of her criticism for the other party. That would be the party that does not control the White House, the Congress or the Supreme Court. So why was she so upset about the party out of power? Because Sen. Kerry and Sen. Edwards said nice things about her being gay, she thinks Edwards is "complete and total slime" and Kerry is a "son of a bitch." That makes no sense. In fact, it sounds like someone hasn't yet reconciled her sexuality with her politics.

With statements like "I think they have done the exact right thing in Iraq," it's hard to take Mary seriously as anything more than an openly gay flak for the GOP. I don't expect her to attack her own father or to criticize the mother who once denied she was a lesbian, but neither do I expect her to harbor resentment because someone said she was gay. And while she's getting angry, could she look around the next White House dinner party before she starts digging up ancient history?

I admire and respect Elizabeth Birch and Hilary Rosen, and I think they may be right that this could be a teachable moment for America. But Mary Cheney seems to be the wrong person at the wrong time to get that message across. Said journalist and commentator Michelangelo Signorile, "I think she ultimately impacts us negatively by coming out and giving cover to her mother and her father, who are both supporting a president who wants to make us second-class citizens."

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