wojtek
At 10:25 AM 8/8/00 -0400, you wrote:
>[on the one hand, on the other...]
>
>Congressional Record, July 10, 1998
>BEYOND THE CULTURE WARS: HOW WE CAN REDISCOVER COMMON MORAL GROUND
>Senator Lieberman (D-CT)
>...The conflict over homosexuality's place, the place of homosexuals in our
>society, I think, offers a contemporary example of this tension that is very
>real in our lives and in our discussions and debates. Let's start with the
>reality that many Americans continue to believe that homosexuality is immoral
>and not just because the Bible tells them so.
> In fact, Professor Wolfe's research showed that this is one of the few
>areas where Americans of all religious inclinations feel so strongly that
>they are willing to risk the tag of intolerance to express or hold to their
>points of view, although most of the people he interviewed tempered their
>disapproval by making clear that they did not support discrimination against
>gay men and lesbians. It is unfair, when you think about Professor Wolfe's
>research, then, for anyone to automatically conclude that people who express
>moral reservations or even disdain about homosexuality are bigots, or to
>publicly attack them as hateful. These are sincerely held morally based
>views.
> Yet the suspicions and concerns of the gay community are understandable
>when one considers the Senate's treatment of James Hormel's nomination as
>Ambassador to Luxembourg, which is now being blocked by multiple holds by
>Members of this Chamber. If we truly believe in the claim of equality and the
>universal principle of fairness of the Declaration of Independence, and if we
>want to talk more broadly about values with true credibility in this Chamber,
>I think we owe Mr. Hormel a chance to be evaluated by the same standards we
>have applied to other nominees. We owe him a chance to be judged by his
>career and competence, not by his sexual orientation. We owe him a vote on
>this floor.
>