There’s nothing wrong with “Patrick Forrest’s gay and his partner is a great guy.” But “Patrick Forrest will promote the homosexual agenda in our schools” is homophobic bigotry.

And it looks like it’s backfiring big time. While she’ll probably still win, she now has lost face and has been exposed.

Families and children
Equitable Taxes
Job Creation
Legislation
Personal Decisions
Quality Education
Transportation

Nope, no mention of gay rights or discrimination or even diversity. So I thought perhaps we are “personal decisions”. But that is abortion, genetic information, and end of life decisions.

It appears that issues such as marriage equality, DADT, the Gay Tax and the like just didn’t make it onto her radar. So you’ll just have to forgive me if I’m skeptical about Howell being a big supporter.

Which makes me wonder if there was anything at all other than party registration that qualified Howell for Equality Virginia’s endorsement.

Jim, I’m not aware of ANYONE under such an illusion.

Nor am I, and while I question that any regular visitors to BTB believe it, in these moronicly hyper-partisan times, I can believe that the kind of person who uncritically frequents the more vociferous and intellectually sloppy left of center websites might.

Then I read the Blade’s article. Jim, you left this admission by Imarti out of your column: “I do not have any knowledge of anything either campaign is doing, any strategy or anything like that,” Imarti said. “I was speaking for myself as a Democrat, as a person.” By only putting in her admission that she was intoxicated, without the preface I quoted above, you leave the impression that she might well have acted with the implicit or explicit consent of the actual Howell campaign. Moreover, you didn’t bother to inform your readers that Frank Kowalski, the Howell campaign manager, said the campaign has sent a message to the coordinated campaign of Fairfax County that Imarti has “no further association — volunteer or otherwise — with our campaign.”

Still, if that were all, you might be excused for being suspicious that Imarti and Kowalski and Howell were merely doing what politicians do best –lying after being caught cheating– and I wouldn’t have bothered with this comment. The part of your column which makes me suspect your own agenda in reporting this is your use of the accusing Republican’s statement that GOP legislators were also targeted with this tactic, without pointing out something the Blade itself was careful to state: The names of the two antigay legislators who the candidate named as having been targeted, and the fact that neither legislator has agreed to comment to the Blade about this alleged targeting of them with this tactic against the candidate. I guess that would have clashed with your lede, Mr. Burroway.

Apparently, I was the first BTB reader to actually click on your link and read the Blade’s article before commenting, and I’m ashamed to say that (until now) because I’ve had such confidence in your integrity, I’ve felt it unnecessary to double check you. This time I did, but only because I was about to raise a big stink about a politician I’ve liked for years.

The Blade’s article clearly reveals that Imarti, a Democratic precinct captain, used gay baiting, and if she did it is very likely that the canvassing team she would have fielded were instructed by her to do likewise. To stretch that infama into an implication that the Howell campaign itself was behind the tactic is a bridge too far, especially in the face of Howell’s stellar record on our issues. Shame on you.