Andrew Sullivan has long gushed over Arnold Schwarzengger as the greatest thing to happen to the Republican party since Abe Lincoln. For
example:
AHNULD: No, I haven't seen T-3, but I hope to. The political emergence of Schwarzenegger is a wonderful development, and not just for hacks like yours truly who love a good story. Arnold is an "eagle": he's tough on terror, open-minded on cultural issues, fiscally conservative. He's also a brilliant politician. How do I know? Just rent "Pumping Iron," the legendary bodybuilding documentary of the 1970s. It captures Shwarzenegger's extraordinary ease with people, his irony, his composure, his wit, his gift with strategy and his determination. If I'm not mistaken, it also shows him lighting up a big fat joint after one of the contests. If ever there was a moment for that type of Republican, this is it. Boomshock fills in the details. Arnold's my man.
Or, more succinctly:
Yay! A pro-gay, pro-choice, hard-ass Republican!
And that's just a piece of it. Sullivan basically can't go a week without posting some adulatory essay about Schwarzenneger, who he holds up as the paradigm of the supposedly culturally liberal, tolerant Republican.
Which is why Sullivan is going to be CRUSHED, just absolutely CRUSHED, when he hears the news:
Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger announced Wednesday he will veto a bill that would have made California the first state in the nation to legalize same-sex marriage through legislative action.
Andrew Sullivan has no one to blame but himself. He still hasn't learned that you if you get in bed with the Republican party, you wake up with James Dobson.
For once, Sullivan should listen to his long-time nemesis, Atrios, who says it exactly right:
Arnold proves that like the rest of the variations of the mythical moderate Republican, they only exist as a media fantasy.
Pro-choice and pro-gay Republican governors never actually do anything but pay lip service to the idea in order to obtain fawning profiles in the media in the states (New York, Mass, PA, NJ, California) where such beasts go over well. When it comes to actual policy, they're just as bad as the rest of the haters.
Same goes for Pataki. Same goes for Romney. Same goes for McCain. None of them can break the yoke of James Dobson & Co. and still remain in the Republican party.
This has got to be a rude awakening for Sullivan. I hope for his sake he's actually learned something this time.