Mary Cheney's Privacy

I hate to see so many people of so much integrity giving a pass to what can only be considered gay baiting. Mary Cheney doesn't have to wear the weight of the world on her shoulders, and nothing Dick Cheney has stated justifies the way that family is being treated. Some more evidence for presuming bad motives on the part of Kerry & Edwards:

• August, 2004: "As for Mary refusing to be questioned about her sexual identity, she is not obliged to do so. Nor is she obliged to be a gay rights activist just because she's gay. Her responsibility to the campaign is to support her father - nothing more and nothing less"
  
  
• February, 2004: Now that Mary, 34, is a senior campaign official, the Web site hopes to shame her back into the spotlight. Still, the effort's ultimate target isn't Mary but her dad's boss. This week they plan an e-mail ad picturing Mary's face on a milk carton. HAVE YOU SEEN ME? it asks
  
  
• September, 2000: The position that Mary Cheney finds herself in is hardly unique. Other gay and lesbian children of conservative politicians—from Chastity Bono to Dee Mosbacher—have had to strike a balance between relationships with their families and belief in gay rights. Do one’s loyalties lie on one side, the other, or somehow on both? The same tension has played itself out across thousands of dining tables in families without famous politicians at the head of them.
  
  
• September, 2004: "The absence on stage of Mary Cheney followed a series of attacks on her and the Vice President by Illinois Republican Alan Keyes. The Senate hopeful called Mary a "sinner" and a a "selfish hedonist." "
  
  
• This is just funny: Hard-hitting reporting on Mary Cheney's efforts to get into Baghdad before the Iraq war as a human shield: "American Vice-president Dick Cheney would soon come to the Jordan capital to "give a lecture" to the daughter"
  
  
• August, 2004: "A host of influential social conservatives dropped their collective jaw, with Richard Land of the Southern Baptist Convention saying, "If it were Cheney running for president, it would guarantee the defeat of the Republican ticket"
  
  
• July, 2004: Yet the crushing July 12 defeat of FMA in the Senate -- and the critical role the Cheney family played in it -- warrants a second look at Mary Cheney's political acumen and courage. By avoiding a public spat with her father and playing the insider's role of the loyal opposition, she may have helped bring down an amendment that proposes to write anti-gay animus into the nation's founding document.
  
  
• September, 2004: "It's disappointing - but not surprising that a father would stand up for his daughter," agreed Georgene Rice, spokeswoman for the Defense of Marriage Coalition, the group backing Constitutional Amendment 36. Party leaders described the issue as too private for public debate. "His family situation involving his daughter is very personal and if you ask me, it's nobody's business. Parents don't get to decide the lifestyle of their children," said Kevin Mannix, chairman of Oregon's Republican Party. ... While Republicans are playing down the issues raised by Mary Cheney's presence in a party which opposes gay marriage, proponents have cited her as a weak link in the Republican's conservative armor. Nationally, gay rights groups have attempted to use Mary Cheney as a lever against her conservative father
  
  
• February, 2001: "it’s unlikely that she will make any public statements about the Administration’s positions on gay and lesbian issues—partly, said Witeck, because “activism is just not part of her complexion"
  
  
• August, 2004: "If Ms. Cheney was gratified by his remarks about gay marriage, she has not let it show, two campaign aides said. But aides say she was clearly displeased the next day to find the cameras of the traveling press corps craning for shots of her face. "She does not seek the limelight," said Mary Matalin, an adviser to Mr. Cheney and friend of the family."
  
  
• June, 2004: "A new Internet ad campaign launched on Monday targets US Vice President Dick Cheney's lesbian daughter Mary and her silence about the Bush administration's support for the proposed constitutional amendment to ban same-sex marriage."
  
  
• October, 2004:"Mary Cheney has been a controversial figure, both within the Republican party (for being openly gay) and within the gay community (for being openly Republican, and not the Log Cabin kind). She has been unable to escape the public eye despite repeated attempts to keep a low profile, and her sexuality seems to be a lightning rod for both Democrats and Republicans, as evidenced by conservative Illinois Republican Alan Keyes's recent description of Mary Cheney as "a selfish hedonist" on a radio talk show."
  
  
• Premeditated Gaybaiting:On August 26 Democratic vice presidential candidate John Edwards took Cheney to task on the gay marriage issue using unusually harsh words at a Colorado forum that included undecided voters. Edwards, responding to a question about the Democratic ticket’s stance on civil unions, referenced Cheney’s remarks by noting that “the vice president disagrees with the president on this.” Then referring to Cheney, Edwards said sarcastically “Somebody forgot to tell him what he was supposed to say I guess.”
  
  
• October, 2000: "The Cheneys repeated their assertion that Mary's sexual orientation was a private family matter. When pressed, candidate Cheney was adamant. "I'm simply not going to discuss that aspect of Mary's life," Mr. Cheney said of his daughter"
  
  
• DearMary.Com. Too despicable to merit comment.