March 8, 2010

Anti-Gay Marriage Senator Is Gay — And His District’s Paper Knew It

Crime, News, Politically Erect 1 Comment

In case you’ve been living under a rock or having the kind of epic sex we’ve been having, you know that Roy Ashburn, a Republican senator from Bakersfield was arrested last week for a DUI after leaving a hip Sacramento gay haunt with a younger man.

Ashburn “has a flawless record of voting against every single LGBT bill during his long tenure in office. He has raised countless wads of campaign cash by cuddling up to the right wing of the Republican Party and has spewed out hateful anti-gay rhetoric to his conservative constituents,” writes the editor of the San Diego Gay and Lesbian News.

And now he’s caught drunkenly cruising with gay men. Oops!

Juicy, juicy political sex scandal — just the way we like it.

But it gets juicier: apparently, the mayor of West Sacramento, Christopher Cabaldon (who came out during his State of the City dinner in 2006) tried to out Ashburn about six months ago on Facebook — which is either really hip or really juvenile. We’re leaning toward juvenile.

Cabaldon posted: “It wouldn’t bother me so bad to see Roy Ashburn at Badlands (a gay bar) with a boy if he didn’t have such a bad voting record on gay rights.” Nobody noticed.

According to Cabaldon, Ashburn frequented gay bars often and “everyone” already knew he was gay. People have their panties up in a bunch because The Bakersfield Californian — which, by the way, is the largest newspaper in the senator’s district — decided that Ashburn’s merrymaking with the gay community was not relevant to readers.

“The Californian has asked Ashburn about his sexual orientation in the past,” writes Christine Bedell, the paper’s government editor. “He has either questioned the relevance of the issue or dodged it altogether. The newspaper did not report the comments at the time, also deciding it was not relevant.”

Should the paper have reported it?

Image and information from The San Diego Gay and Lesbian News, via Riese.

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