FAMILY AFFAIR: There's still, apparently, something about Mary.
The lesbian daughter of Vice President Dick Cheney was conspicuously absent when her parents introduced Mary's sister, husband and four children to the Republican throngs after Dad's big speech Wednesday night. Mary sat instead with her partner, Heather Poe, in the VIP box across the hall, a choice she reportedly made herself.
Mary's stage fright might be forgiven. A few hours before, the delegates had cheered Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, who led a fight in his state against same-sex marriage, touching off a national brawl that landed squarely in the party platform. On Tuesday, the delegates cheered Sen. Elizabeth Dole, R-N.C., for heralding traditional marriage.
Not to mention that on Monday, Alan Keyes, running for a Senate seat in Illinois, called Mary Cheney a "selfish hedonist," and Rep. Edward Schrock, R- Va., announced his swift departure from Congress after a posting on a Web log said he was gay.
The vice president recently stood up for his daughter in public, departing from Bush's call for a constitutional amendment to ban lesbian and gay marriages. "Lynne and I have a gay daughter, so it's an issue that our family is very familiar with," Cheney said.
But Chris Barron, political director of the Log Cabin Republicans, said the party platform and personal attacks from Keyes "have created a hostile environment in which Mary Cheney was either unwanted or uncomfortable on stage with her family. This is a prime-time example of the far right dividing American families."
-- Carolyn Lochhead,
Chronicle Washington Bureau
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