Did you ever see one of those cartoons where a tiny devil is talking in one ear and an angel in the other? That actually happened to me — when I was interviewed by Gay City News.
Back when James E. McGreevey was Governor, I’d been running a series of anti Web Sites, e.g.
http://PoliticalPredator.com
The day McGreevey announced his intention to resign, I was barraged with emails that mostly split into two camps: curses and congratulations. One message was different. “Please call me.” In the signature was the title, Reporter, Gay City News. I got out the cell phone and gave the number a ring.
Reporter: Did you know that McGreevey was gay?
Me: Well, I don’t know what you mean by “know.” It wasn’t like I was standing there holding a candle or something, but yeah, I knew. Everybody in New Jersey politics knew. As far as that goes, when I asked my next door neighbor what she thought about McGreevey leaving she said, “What’s the news? The year before the election, he rented a house on the same block as my sister in Wildwood. Everybody called the place ‘The Gay Brothel.'”
Reporter: I saw your Web Site. You didn’t like McGreevey.
Me: There was no like or dislike. I thought that he’d brought a degree of venality to Trenton that had never before been seen at that level. That’s what I was criticizing.
Reporter: Why didn’t you put in your Web Site that McGreevey was gay?
Me: The issue was that he had tried to give a sensitive job to an unqualified individual because of a personal relationship. The nature of the relationship was unimportant. It wouldn’t have mattered if it was a girlfriend or a nephew or an old college chum.
Reporter: What do you think that it was about Golan Cipel that McGreevey found so irresistible?
I took the phone away from my ear. I closed one eye and squinted the other while staring at the cell phone. In one ear I heard a voice saying, “It’s hard to put a finger on it. At least it would be for me, anyhow.” At the same time in the other ear I heard, “DON’T SAY THAT! DON’T SAY THAT!”
Me: Gee, I don’t know. Who can say what it is about one person that attracts another . . .
# # #
