The pitchforks are out again — are they ever really put away, anymore? — and this time the mob is calling for the head of the editor of The New Republic, who turns out to be Chris Lehmann, a name that requires a little looking around to find, editor of The New Republic being a rather more low-profile position today than it was in the days of Andrew Sullivan or Michael Kelly.
The offense is the magazine’s decision to publish “My Mayor Pete Problem,” a sophomoric essay by Dale Peck, a gay writer who finds the gay mayor of godforsaken South Bend, Ind., not quite gay enough. Pete, sniffs Peck, never had a proper gay adolescence, publicly acknowledged his homosexuality only a few years ago, and — angels and ministers of grace defend us! — got married without acquiring a very long or varied curriculum venereae. How could such a man ever hope to shoulder the burdens of leading the free world? The author suggested that “Mary Pete” be adopted as the homosexual answer to “Uncle Tom.”
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