Many of you know that Richard Grenell, Romney's new foreign policy spokesman, was forced to delete over 800 scurrilous tweets slamming various female politicos. As much as those tweets outraged the left, now Grenell's under fire from the right. Why? Grenell is openly gay--and that doesn't please Bryan Fischer at all. Over the last few days, the American Family Association's policy chief has been openly feuding with the Romney campaign over the issue.
Late Friday, Fischer tweeted:
He expanded on this in a lengthy post on Rightly Concerned, in which he suggested that Grenell is a national security risk, and compared Grenell's new post to the Secret Service imbroglio in Colombia. Fischer demanded that Romney prove his conservative bonafides by, among other things, publicly supporting the drive to roll back marriage equality in North Carolina, promise to defend the Defense of Marriage Act and reinstate the ban on gays in the military.
Fischer doubled down on today's Focal Point. He not only repeated his claim that Grenell was a national security risk, but argued that if Romney opposes the Mormon Church's stand against homosexuality, fundies have no business voting for him.
It's safe to say Romney has painted himself into a corner here. He axes Grenell, and he short-circuits his attempt to appeal to independents. He keeps Grenell, and the fundies pull back from him. Pass the popcorn.
4:16 PM PT: Here4thebeer mentions in the comments that Fischer appeared on CNN earlier today, and got schooled by CNN's Kyra Phillips and the Log Cabin Republicans' R. Clarke Cooper. Read all about it!