Welcome, Baby Scheer

If The Nation is, as they themselves put it, "The Left's Flagship", Robert Scheer sounded off recently like a drunken sailor from it's crow's nest. His latest article, 'Welcome, Baby Cheney', is irresponsible, borderline moronic, and very much delighted with itself despite being both of these first things. If this is what the left has in mind as journalism, at publications such as The Nation, to push their "progressive" causes, then it looks as though the flagship has sprung a leak and won't be back to shore. Or maybe it's just Scheer who has sprung a leak. From the sound of it, he most definitely has.

The article in question is sort of a 'hip hip hurray, in your face Republicans' piece in regards to the recent birth of Mary Cheney's first child. That's right, Mary Cheney, lesbian daughter of Vice President Dick Cheney. Samuel David Cheney was born on May 23rd of this year even, apparently, to the delight of his new grandfather. A spokesman for the family has said, "The vice president and Mrs. Cheney are looking forward with eager anticipation to the arrival of their sixth grandchild." And more importantly, Mary Cheney is quoted as saying "This is a baby," and "This is a blessing from God. It is not a political statement. It is not a prop to be used in a debate by people on either side of an issue. It is my child." My apologies to Ms. Cheney for the blog; however, I'd rather see it as a response to Robert Scheer, who neither had respect for your wishes nor any intention of keeping your pregnancy out of the political arena for anything other than left wing posturing and back-slapping from his colleagues at The Nation (and probably Salon).

Scheer begins the article by thanking "The Almighty, whatever that might mean, for planting the seed of life in the lesbian body of Mary Cheney..." Vulgar? Yes. Respectful of Cheney's request that her baby not be used as a political prop by either side? In no way. You can almost hear Scheer rubbing his hands together with delight in having brought the irony of this particular story forward. He goes on to say, "The message, carried prominently in news reports throughout the world, is that America has come of age in recognizing, as do most truly modern countries, that homosexuality is indeed normal." Now the whole country must wake up and acknowledge that homosexuality is "normal" because Dick Cheney smiles when he holds his daughter's baby? According to Scheer: absolutely. The sight of VP Cheney embracing the newborn apparently "Was a milestone in the nation's struggle for human rights for all. Never again will it be possible for conservative Republicans to shun homosexuals in any facet of American life without appearing outrageously hypocritical." Won't be possible? Or won't be allowed by Scheer and his fellows at The Nation? What was Cheney supposed to do, throw the baby down on the steps of the Capitol and shout to the Heavens that he will never accept the homosexual lifestyle? Grandiose as that would have been, none more grandiose than Scheer's pompous declaration based off of what actually did happen (in reality, he most likely expected something more like a Mayan sacrifice of the child at the hands of ruler Cheney).

If anything, Mr. Cheney's reception of his own daughter's child is a laugh in the face of all the liberals that just assumed people like the President and Vice President were nothing more than a pack of rabid dogs, milling around waiting to tear apart the nearest homosexual and their offspring. Here's an interesting quote from George Bush when asked about his VP's new grandson, "I think Mary is going to be a loving soul to her child. And I'm happy for her." What? Not, "Me no like lesbians. Me like war. Arrgggh." I know what Scheer's response would be to my rhetoric, he'd say "of course they aren't going to say what they REALLY believe in public." Why not? They haven't yet made a statement for the opposite. Kids do a lot of things their parents don't approve of, but at the end of the day they're still their kids. And like I said, their positive reception only proves that, at the very least, they're caring human beings who can smile in the presence of a baby.

What it comes down to is, any one of us can love and admire the introduction of a child into the world (yes, even us Conservatives), but at the end of the day it doesn't mean we forget our beliefs. Just because Dick Cheney coddled his newborn grandson doesn't mean I'm going to change my stance on gay marriage and homosexual parents. And I don't believe it will change his stance either; he just happens to be a decent, caring human being who doesn't accept homosexuality as "normal" (much to the dismay of Scheer). Scheer asks,

"Does not the life of Mary Cheney, born to God-fearing parents in a home of presumably high moral tone, and herself an activist in the Republican Party that has exploited homophobia for temporal political advantage, definitively answer the argument that homosexuality is not a fickle choice but a facet of the natural order of things?"

He slipped the bit about the Republican Party "exploiting homophobia for temporal political advantage" in there quite nicely, didn't he? But I think that tag on the Republican Party requires more analysis. First of all, isn't the entirety of the article, 'Welcome, Baby Cheney', an exploitation of, what Ms. Cheney would request not to be, the birth of a child? Isnt' Scheer's article a champion of the homosexual agenda for "temporal political advantage?" And if the left can continue to use the outdated, nonsense term "homophobia" in just about everything they do, then I can point out that if a Republican such as Dick Cheney is "homophobic", then I'd like to think his condition is cured. Holding a child born to homosexual women, while standing next to them, is no small task for someone afflicted with such a disease. My assertion of that last part of Scheer's quote is where I might lose some of the mystics, but coming at this thing from a strictly scientific standpoint, a statment, such, that would refer to homosexuality as "a facet of the natural order of things" would have someone like Charles Darwin spinning in his grave. Ms. Cheney did, in fact, deliver little Samuel, but the seed was most definitely not that of her partner's. I wouldn't go so far as to call homosexuality a "fickle" choice (I understand it takes a great deal of dedication), but I'd be blind to equate it to the evident goings on of the natural world. In my experience, the "natural order of things" has no time or business for things that can't get together and reproduce.

But I'm getting off on a political diatribe here, and I'd like to avoid, as much as possible, going where Scheer went with little Samuel Cheney. If you happen upon the article (don't bother), he uses the remainder of it to bring up what liberals of his ilk tend to bring up under any circumstance and equates the entire thing to the War in Iraq. How he does it, and why, is the opposite of masterful but he eventually comes back around to a lofty conclusion and in it says,

"Yes, baby Samuel, even in the care of far less famous gay couples, would be more likely exposed to the best family values, not to mention a higher level of art, music and croissants, than he would had he been born to a heterosexual family."

As a heterosexual man who hopes to one day have children and expose them to the "best family values": I'd like to go on record as saying that I enjoy art, music and croissants very much, and have no intention of depriving them from my children. If the term "heterophobic" existed, I'd utilize it now for Mr. Scheer. But he miscalculated Cheney and Bush's response to a homosexual family, so why should we take what he has to say about family values seriously anyway?