Six months ago, it seemed impossible. Barely three months ago, anyone who even suggested such a thing seemed disturbed.
But today, Council Speaker Christine Quinn, the city’s icon of same-sex power, is suffering an acute gay meltdown.
Quinn, who’s hanging on with fingers and toes to her front-runner status as the go-to liberal Democratic candidate for mayor, once enjoyed the uniform support of the city’s vast left-wing cabal, and a near-lock on the powerful gay vote.
Then, as surely as ambitious grown-ups tend to make a slow and steady turn to the right, Quinn did the unthinkable. She went mainstream.
The first hint that Quinn was losing support from the gay community, as well as from the Hollywood industrial complex, came in January. Cynthia Nixon, the “Sex and the City’’ siren who married her partner, Christine Marinoni, stood outside Public Advocate (and candidate) Bill de Blasio’s Brooklyn house and declared her undying distrust for Quinn and fealty to Bill. Reporters were aghast.
How could you, as a gay woman, go against your sister, they cried in unison.
“To me, identity politics is not really where it’s at,” Nixon snapped.
The issue that drew Cynthia’s ire was Quinn’s opposition to paid sick leave for small businesses (a version of which she has since endorsed). Cynthia hasn’t come around.
Quinn drew the enmity of tennis legend Martina Navratilova, the animal-rights activist and symbol of Sapphic love, by supporting the city’s carriage-horse industry.
It didn’t hurt de Blasio, the city’s new liberal standard-bearer, when it was revealed last year that his wife, Chirlane McCray, was a lesbian in the ’70s, but got over it.
Opposition to Quinn is fraught with feelings of betrayal. “I’m gay, too,’’ said documentary filmmaker Donny Moss. “I said, ‘That’s cool. There’s a gay person in power in New York.’ ” Lately, Moss has made a career of gathering folks to heckle Quinn at campaign stops.
“She has on many occasions betrayed the gay community, sold it down the river when it’s politically expedient,’’ said Moss.
Gay-rights activist Andy Humm has written that, while Quinn boycotts gay-unfriendly St. Patrick’s Day parades in the city, she doesn’t object to the council awarding parades discretionary funds. Unforgivably, she defied voters when she led the council to overturn term limits, giving Mayor Bloomberg (and herself) a third term in office.
What gets me is how downright anti-woman much of the criticism has become. Lefty bloviator Alec Baldwin last month wrote a piece in The Huffington Post, “The Mighty Quinnberg” (get it? She’s just like Mayor Bloomberg!), that slams Quinn as “Bloomberg’s handmaiden” (sexist!) who won’t raise taxes on anybody. He also says Quinn “appears to bat her eyelashes for one man, Ray Kelly, New York’s police commissioner.” (I’d be pilloried for that.) But the lefty stalwart New York Times made me gasp with its coded lesbian stereotypes. The paper sought to destroy Quinn last month, writing that she “has threatened, repeatedly, to slice off the private parts of those who cross her.”
You could say she acts like a man.
Quinn staffers dismissed quibblers as small in number, although polls show she’s lately dropped a few points.
“Being a strong leader requires making tough decisions, brokering compromise among competing interests, and doing what’s right for all New Yorkers,” said spokesman Mike Morey. “Sometimes, that means small groups of people won’t be happy.”
I like the new, centrist Quinn better than the old, dependably liberal model.
If only she’d drop her pathological hatred of Walmart. Then, we might talk.
Oh, deer! Shooting ‘Bambi’ backfires
Matt Lauer didn’t destroy the “Today’’ show alone. Bambi helped.
A tone-deaf NBC exec was so hellbent on pushing out beloved “Today’’ show anchor Ann Curry, he dubbed the sinister removal plot “Operation Bambi,’’ referring to the gentle Disney fawn, a new book says.
But the get-Curry plan hatched by former “Today’’ executive producer Jim Bell didn’t save “Today.’’ It cemented the morning dominance of ABC’s “Good Morning America,’’ according to “Top of the Morning: Inside the Cutthroat World of Morning TV.’’ (Bell denied he Bambied Curry.) Triumphant Lauer then publicly dissed a sobbing Curry on her final show last year, disgusting viewers. Can Lauer’s job be saved?
Time to move on, Matt.
Weiner sticks up for himself
You can’t hold a good Weiner down. Disgraced ex-Congressman Anthony Weiner placed an astonishing second when his name was included in two polls of Democratic mayoral hopefuls, behind Council Speaker Christine Quinn. Don’t get too cocky, Anthony.
In a NY1 interview last week, a supremely arrogant Weiner tried to talk about the issues, not the sexting. He refused to say precisely how many babes got tweets of his manhood, insisting that he was being fuzzy about his online harem because he wants to “protect’’ the women. Clearly, he’s protecting himself.
Even Bill Clinton, he said, has given him “support.’’
Weiner strategically dropped the name of the revered, if unfaithful, ex-president, as if to say: I’m not as bad as he was! It was a brazen move by a bona-fide creep.
Weiner’s naked ambition is too much to take. If he runs, he will lose.
America at its best
The Boston Marathon monsters tried to plant fear and panic into American hearts. They failed.
First responders stormed the scene. Carlos Arredondo ran to the finish line, using his hands to prevent a stranger, whose legs were mangled, from bleeding out. The man, Jeff Bauman Jr., then helped authorities ID the suspects. Former Patriot football player Joe Andruzzi of Staten Island carried a woman blocks to safety. I am humbled by the heroism, but not surprised.
Our spirit will never die.
They should be holy ashamed
For one ultra-Orthodox Jewish boy, justice is sweet.
In January, I told the story of Mordechai Jungreis, whose mentally disabled son was sexually abused from age 14 inside a ritual bath by another Jew. Members of his insular Bobov sect were outraged that the father complained to cops.
The boy, now 17, was kicked out of two yeshivas and summer camp. His family was forced to move from their Williamsburg apartment. Jungreis was cursed on the street by former friends.
Then last week, after three years of obstructionist legal moves, filthy abuser Meir Dascalowitz, 29, suddenly pleaded guilty in Brooklyn Supreme Court to having sex with a child. He’ll serve five years in prison, and register as a sex offender.
Those who tormented the boy’s family will have to live with their consciences.