Emerging trend: Democrats insinuating that Republican politicians are gay.

I'm saying this is a trend to watch, because I'm seeing the second example of something within one week.

Last weekend, I noticed that the Alec MacGillis hit piece on Scott Walker in The New Republic, which was mostly racial politics, had some material that I believe was intended to float the rumor that Scott Walker is a closeted gay man.

And today, here's CNN reporting that Former Montana Gov. Brian Schweitzer recently said in an interview:

"If you were just a regular person, you turned on the TV, and you saw Eric Cantor talking, I would say — and I'm fine with gay people, that's all right — but my gaydar is 60-70 percent."

"Don't hold this against me, but I'm going to blurt it out. How do I say this ... men in the South, they are a little effeminate... They just have effeminate mannerisms."

Now, I had to Google Schweitzer's name to find out that he's a Democrat, so that CNN article is also an example of another much more well-documented trend: mainstream media omitting the party affiliation of a Democrat who says or does anything bad or stupid (or submerging the party affiliation under enough boring paragraphs that it's as good as omitted).

Anyway, why would Schweitzer say something so stupid? It makes no sense. Should non-gay people be talking about their "gaydar"? Who brags about 60-70% gaydar? That seems like a high fail rate. And if he's not himself looking for sexual adventures, how does he know whether he's right or not, especially as he's purporting to detect gayness in men who are not openly gay? And, worst of all, if he thinks Southern men are just effeminate, doesn't that imply that Cantor would fall within the 30-40% who set off Schweitzer's gaydar but are not gay? I guess Schweitzer — who admits he knows he's just blurting crap out — just wanted to say that Cantor seems gay and then to take it back by saying, oh, but he's Southern, and Southern men always seem gay to me — which gratuitously insults both Southern men and gay men (and, in a way, women!).

How could Schweitzer go that badly wrong? Where did all that come from. Here's my suspicion. He operates with a backroom culture where people really do talk like that. The idea of floating the rumor that a Republican politician is gay comes up all the time, as does the idea that Southern men seem gay because they are effeminate. But the strategy would be to say something that puts the idea in our head without actually saying it. It's not the talking point, but the secret notes behind the talking point. Schweitzer just blurted out the secret notes.

Schweitzer seems to be really dumb. The trick is to do it in a smart way, so it's deniable and the person calling you on it seems delusional or weird. For example, back in 2005, I blogged about how I thought that the NYT tried to create the impression that Supreme Court nominee John Roberts was gay. I pointed to a lot of things about the NYT's presentation, including a photo layout that included Roberts wearing plaid pants. I got pushed back, ridiculed for talking about plaid pants. The NYT had the deniability it sought if, in fact, it sought to put that idea in my head.

This is a technique that requires some skill and subtlety, so if there is an idea in that Democratic Party backroom to screw up Republicans with gay rumors, they'd better take care who they let into that room. They've got to keep that kind of strategizing in the closet. They'd better have some good radar about who's too dumb/inarticulate to work that game. They've got to filter out the Schweitzers.

Meanwhile, you've got MacGillis (on Walker) and the writers and editors who put together that John Roberts piece. These are people who are capable of playing a subtler game, and that's the game I'm watching... in case it's really happening.

I need a good tag for this trend watch, but for now I'll revive the old "plaidgate."

ADDED: I think Obama used this technique on Romney back in April 2012.

AND: I've decided to make the new tag "homophobia politics."

"The people of Iowa are a whole lot like the people of Montana. And, of course, New Hampshire’s a lot like Montana."

"We don’t have a sales tax. 'Live Free or Die' — we understand that notion in Montana."

Thinking out loud about running for President.

That thought, expressed by Brian Schweitzer — ever heard of him? — reminds me of the discussion we were having last month about "national psychology" — "the (real or alleged) distinctive psychological make-up of particular nations, ethnic groups or peoples, and... the comparative study of those characteristics in social psychology, sociology, political science and anthropology."

The assumption of national psychology is that different ethnic groups, or the people living in a national territory, are characterized by a distinctive "mix" of human attitudes, values, emotions, motivation and abilities which is culturally reinforced by language, the family, schooling, the state and the media.

It's out of fashion:

Politically and morally... it is conducive to racist generalisations about people... [and] may lead directly to ascriptive discrimination against foreigners, meaning that one's own people are regarded as naturally superior....

Scientifically, because... [even if] generalizations and distinctions drawn are valid, they may be too general, or require too many qualifications, to be useful. There is an intrinsic difficulty involved in verifying national-psychological characteristics scientifically in any positivistic sense.... 

But when we step down a level of generality and talk about the psychology of the people of the various states of the United States, we somehow lose the sense that we're doing something wrong. Why?

1. Because this is a type of thinking that springs quite naturally to the human mind, and so much of it is forbidden. What little access to the relief of spewing such notions remains is so valuable to people that they self-protectively inure themselves to the problem.

2. Because even consciously thinking about it now, stereotypes about people from particular states don't seem too harmful. We're fortunate as Americans to have inherited these strange internal borderlines with charming names like Iowa and Montana, and our various thoughts about the people in these places gives texture and dimension to our concept of the people of America. It's not one big mass, it's We the People of the united STATES of America. It's a helpful visualization, even if it's pretty dumb — a map, with farmers standing on Iowa and so forth.

3. ???