When Bob McDonnell was governor of Virginia, he and his rabidly homophobic attorney general Ken Cuccinelli made no secret of their disdain for the LGBT community. McDonnell not only opposed marriage equality and anti-discrimination laws on principle, one of his first acts as governor was to rescind the executive order enacted by his predecessor, Democratic Governor Tim Kaine, which prohibited discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation. Governor McDonnell replaced the order with one that left Virginia's LGBT citizens unprotected.
At the time, Hari Sevugan, a spokesman for Governor Kaine, commented on Governor McDonnell's move:
"It says a lot about the Republican party that they would anoint as their 'rising star' someone who in 2010 is actually stripping away from Americans legal protections against discrimination. Bob McDonnell is proving his critics right. He said he'd focus on creating jobs, not social issues. But, one of his first acts as Governor was to make it easier for a fellow citizen to be denied a job and he did so as an adherent to a right-wing ideology that allows for such discriminatory behavior. McDonnell's decision is just plain wrong in any context, but especially so in this economic climate."
Given his open hostility to all things gay, there is some delightful irony to be found in the situation Governor McDonnell now finds himself in. McDonnell and his wife Maureen are facing charges that they conspired to use the governorship to enrich themselves. Their unusual defense has been to claim they could not possibly be part of a conspiracy because their marriage is completely dysfunctional. They barely even spoke, much less colluded.
Gary Legum over at Wonkette sums up the irony quite well:
So Bob McDonnell, the right-wing former governor who wrote a master’s thesis at Regents University (founded by longtime Wonkette lust object Pat Robertson) in which he essentially called for gays to be cast out of society, is living with a Catholic priest who once was arrested for going all George Michael on another man in a public park. The aptly named Father Ball later blamed his behavior on a recurrence of the depression he had suffered from in the past, which is an easier excuse to latch onto than just admitting you like the sexxxytime with dudes. Anyway aren’t we all sinners or some shit?
Sweet Irony: Virginia's Former Anti-Gay Governor Is Living With A Gay Priest - The New Civil Rights Movement
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