At the New Hampshire Debate on Saturday Newt Gingrich decided to trot out an old line from the right about "secular bigotry." Specifically he talked about the Catholic church being denied adoption services for refusing to accept gay couples (apparently it doesn't phase him that denying gay couples is a form of bigotry itself).
He went to say "the bigotry question goes both ways" and more provocatively that "there's a lot more anti-Christian bigotry today than there is concerning the other side."
Say what you will about what Gingrich said about anti-Christian bigotry in a predominantly christian country (I don't recall any recent suicides for being christian) but he does bring up the question of tolerance and bigotry which needs to be addressed.
The question of what tolerance is and how far it should go were answered sometime ago by philosopher and anti-authoritarian Karl Popper (recently brought to attention by Chris Hedges).
Assuming we want to live in an open society where all views are tolerated, we should tolerate almost all views, left, right, center, gay, straight, black, white etc. but with one exception, we should not tolerate the intolerant. As Popper points out:
Unlimited tolerance must lead to the disappearance of tolerance. If we extend unlimited tolerance even to those who are intolerant, if we are not prepared to defend a tolerant society against the onslaught of the intolerant, then the tolerant will be destroyed, and tolerance with them.
Of course, not allowing gay couples to adopt is a form of bigotry which is why the state of Massachusetts and DC didn't tolerate it, something which conservatives don't get.
The crux of the problem is that Gingrich, Santorum and the rest of them don't want to live in an open society, they want to live in a society where hatred and intolerance of certain groups is just as legitimate as the others and thus allows for the eventual destruction of such a society.