I came across the following line in an opinion column by Joan Walsh:
Buchanan kept insisting Craig wasn't a hypocrite, preaching anti-gay "family values" while cruising for sex in men's bathrooms; Craig actually believes those values, the conservative pundit contends, but is just having a hard time living them.
Buchanan's quote tracks exactly with what I think is a major misunderstanding between the conservative and liberal mindsets. My thoughts on this after the jump.
It's a different definition of hypocrisy. Liberals tend to believe that actions must align with values; otherwise it's hypocrisy. Conservatives tend to believe that it's only hypocrisy if they don't actually believe what they're preaching.
Liberal definition of hypocrisy: Say one thing, do another.
Conservative definition: Say one thing, believe another.
All these "wrong" things that society does in life - it's not so much that people do them that conservatives have a problem with. It's that people defend them as being right instead of wrong. It's a variant of love-the-sinner, hate-the-sin.
(I know I'm totally painting with broad brushstrokes with conservatives/liberals here but it's to be conceptual.)
I think part of the reason Vitter wasn't thrown under a bus, while Craig was, is that Vitter admitted and took accountability for his "wrongness", while Craig didn't (he never admitted personal demons in having gay urges). Now, there are a lot of homophobes in the GOP so it still might not have been enough anyway, but the point is that I think many in the GOP believe Craig is a hypocrite, GOP-definition.
So anyway, that's why I think the political arguments between liberals and conservatives get so easily hung up. No one even sees each other's points. In terms of the debate about homosexuality, the GOP believes that homosexuality is wrong. But the liberal side never quite takes it head-on and argues that homosexuality is right. They'll talk about personal choice and individual liberties, or that we should be talking about something else instead, but as far as the GOP believes, that's just avoidance, or liberals standing up for someone's right to act wrongly, free of government interference. So this will just keep going around in circles until the national debate eventually becomes about one side arguing it's wrong, and the other side arguing it's right, on equal footing.
This is why I think we missed an opportunity with the gay marriage debate when that crested back in 2003 and 2004. Here in Oregon, I was struck with how much of the debate was about legal technicalities - no one visible enough was standing up and saying that gay marriage was the right thing to do. If that is done, then it's far easier to shine a light on the actual bigotry behind the conservative argument. And the only way to shrink bigotry is to shine a light on it. Until that point, the "wrongness" of homosexuality is not being directly challenged enough, which only prolongs the kind of furtive "the behavior is wrong but my values are not" actions that we see coming from Craig and other closeted gay Republicans. In that sense, I think that liberals are partially responsible for enabling the kind of "hypocrisy" that we decry on the GOP side.