Right Wing Watch has a story about the shameful Republican smear campaign being used to try to recall Daniel Hernandez, the hero intern who saved Gaby Giffords' life. The headline to this post is the top line of one of the fliers promoting a recall, the rest of which reads:
Daniel Hernandez is LGBTWe need someone who will support Sports and cares about our kids.We don't need someone who hates our valuesRECALL Daniel Hernandez TODAY
This isn't just homophobia, it's outdated homophobia straight out of the 1970s, the kind of bullshit that imagines all gay men as sports-hating ladyboys. It's hate speech. And I don't think that Hernandez's sexual orientation, at this late date, is any kind of a surprise. I find it hard to believe that these posters will make much of an impact beyond the small, rabidly homophobic Republican base that already exists in Arizona.
There's another flier that chastises Hernandez for being pro-gun control, which, if you ask me, takes a whole lot of nerve. Let's leave aside the creepiness of promoting the widespread proliferation of guns on a flier about a school board election. The most important thing is this: Hernandez was on the ground during a mass shooting, and he basically held his boss's bullet-riddled body together until emergency services arrived. I think his opinions on gun control are probably pretty well-informed.
