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Rest in Piss, Lindsay Graham.

Officially, Graham died of “aortic dissection due to arteriosclerotic cardiovascular disease,” which, translated, means, “his weak, cowardly heart kicked the ol’ stanky boot.”

*Jon Glaser on Parks and Rec, givin’ the ol’ stanky boot*

Graham’s time in power is over, but I’m wary his influence has passed. As the saying goes: If you cut off the head of one closeted hypocrite in Washington, two more will grow back in his place.

Lindsay Graham, in the grand tradition of power-hungry homophobes, long dodged rumors about gay sex on the down-low. There’s an account from a trans woman alleging a paid, off-the-record relationship with Graham, an accusation from porn performer Sean Harding that Graham employed the services of male sex workers who knew him as “Lady G.” Fellow axis-of-evil member, Laura Loomer, even testified about Graham’s closeted sexuality under oath, saying, “Yeah, I called him gay. It’s well-known.” (Not that you can trust anything Loomer says. But hell, even a broken clock is right twice a day.)

“To the extent that it matters, I’m not gay,” Graham claimed.

But what does that mean?

Far-right Republicans (and most American politicians) have, at best, a slippery relationship with reality and fact. Tony Kushner’s Angels in America elucidated on how homosexuality is defined differently by conservative men obsessed with power:

Roy Cohn: AIDS. Homosexual. Gay. Lesbian. You think these are names that tell you who a person sleeps with, but they don’t tell you that.

Henry: No?

Roy Cohn: No. Like all labels they tell you one thing, and one thing only: Where does an individual so identified fit into the food chain…Not ideology or sexual taste, but something much simpler: clout. Not who I fuck or who fucks me, but who will come to the phone when I call, who owes me favors. This is what a label refers to. Now to someone who does not understand this, a homosexual is what I am because I have sex with men, but really this is wrong. A homosexual is somebody who, in 15 years of trying cannot get a pissant anti-discrimination bill through the city council. A homosexual is somebody who knows nobody and who nobody knows. Who has zero clout. Does this sound like me?

Now, some argue that, as long as those involved are adult/consenting, everyone has a right to sexual privacy. You forfeit that right if, while enjoying a private gay life, you publicly work to disenfranchise LGBTQ+ rights. Hypocrisy means no privilege of discretion.

Whether or not Graham was gay - and he was - there’s no denying that Graham was a gutless hypocrite, a well-known sanctimonious bootlicker who would condemn Trump one week and embrace him the next. That Lady G was also “allegedly” closeted while executing cruel, reality-bending politics isn’t unique.
It’s an American tradition.

Graham’s death brought to mind another closeted architect of the far-right movement, whose life’s work is the blueprint for today’s politics: Roy Cohn, infamous lawyer to the wealthy and the man Politico described as, “a Jewish anti-Semite and a homosexual homophobe.”

Roy Cohn came up in the 50’s, making his name as a lawyer during The Red Scare. Working closely with Republican U.S. senator, Joseph McCarthy, he secured the death penalty for Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, in a trial remembered for Cohn’s misconduct. McCarthy and Cohn then architected the Lavender Scare, arguing that Gay men and lesbians were communist sympathizers, demanding the government remove them from state employment.

All this, of course, happened while Roy Cohn himself was hiring hordes of male sex workers.

McCarthy and Cohn’s hypocritical fear-mongering directly led to Eisenhower’s Executive Order 10450, barring anyone gay from working in a federal position. Between 5 and 10 thousand government workers lost their jobs and were forced to hide their identities throughout the ‘60s, ‘70s, and ‘80s, until President Clinton repealed the act in 1995.

After the Senate censured McCarthy in 1954, Cohn moved on from Washington to inflict his poison across the private sector. Still, Cohn maintained close ties in conservative political circles, serving as an informal advisor to Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan. He remained a loyal supporter of McCarthy to the end, writing in his autobiography, “I never worked for a better man or a greater cause.”

Roy Cohn manipulated courts by ignoring facts, never admitting guilt, and relentlessly going on the offensive. “If somebody attacks him, he attacks them back, he says, ten times as hard,” said Peter Baker of The New York Times.

When Roy Cohn met Donald Trump in 1973, Trump was being sued by the U.S. Justice Department for refusing to rent property to black families. Cohn instructed him in tactics that are familiar to anyone in America today: Deny everything, fight mercilessly, and no matter what, declare victory.

Cohn continued to deny his homosexuality and lobby ardently against gay rights. During the debate over New York’s first gay rights bill, Cohn aligned with the Archdiocese of New York, stating, “homosexual teachers are a grave threat to our children.”

Finally, In 1984, Roy Cohn claimed to be sick from “liver cancer.” A lie. Cohn had AIDS, a fact he aggressively denied right up to his death.

“Say: “Roy Cohn, you are a homosexual.” And I will proceed, systematically, to destroy your reputation and your practice and your career in New York State. Which you know I can do.”
- (fictionalized) Roy Cohn, Angels in America

Trump, a longtime close friend of Roy Cohn’s, knew he had AIDS and turned his back on him. After Cohn’s final dinner at Mar-A-Lago, Trump allegedly fumigated the silverware.

Cohn died alone, disbarred and lying with his last breath. His funeral service concluded with the singing of ‘’God Bless America.” His former law partner said it was Cohn’s favorite song.

*The patch for Roy Cohn on the AIDS quilt, his legacy. Children, if you say “Roy Cohn” three times in a mirror, you will die from an incurable case of being a little bitch.*

Why did Roy Cohn take such a violent, vitriolic stance against gay rights, when he himself was a gay man? What’s the point of so much cruelty?

For some gay men, “Hiding and passing as heterosexual becomes a lifelong moral hatred of the self; a maze of corruptions, petty lies, and half truths that spoil social relations in family and friendship” (Herdt and Boxer, 1993). Research shows there are many gay men who, before coming out, were “gay-baiters/bashers” themselves.

Roy Cohn certainly fits that bill. And Lindsay Graham followed in his footsteps.

Throughout Graham’s career, he consistently cozied up to power, flip-flopping depending on the Republican Party line. Yet, one of the few positions he never wavered on was his fervent opposition to LGBTQ+ rights. Graham voted against the Employment Non-Discrimination Act, confirmed anti-LGBTQ+ judges, co-sponsored the Defense of Marriage Act, and opposed adoption rights for LGBTQ+ people. Graham voted against including LGBTQ+ people in federal hate crimes legislation, saying that would “divide Americans.”

Really? In the past 30 years, American public opinion has dramatically shifted in favor of gay rights. Still, Graham and his party refused.

It will come as no surprise that studies find those with the most anti-gay hostility ofttimes have same-sex desires themselves. A “confirmed bachelor” obsessed with condemning gay rights?

A few days ago, Hunter Biden spoke about the effects of closeted politicians on our government. “I believe that the biggest problem in Washington DC is…not the oligarchy, it’s the closetocracy, as I call it,” Biden said, referring to many prominent, self-hating MAGA men. “There is this closeted gay mafia, largely Republican, that exists in Washington…and everybody knows every single one of them, who’s gay. And what I believe, the only reason that is relevant, is…that internal conflict creates so much vitriol inside of a person that they take it out on the rest of the world.”

This, unfortunately, makes sense. Often, a narcissist’s behavior isn’t driven by self-love – rather, self-hatred.

“Narcissistic individuals are actually really hamstrung by insecurity and shame, and their entire life is an attempt to regulate their image,” says Ramani Durvasula, a licensed clinical psychologist and professor at California State University.

Self-loathing fuels a desire for power and control. Narcissists in positions of power, as we are reminded daily, are are warped, black holes of emotional need, never in service to anyone but themselves. When the late homophobe Lindsey Graham was mentioned as an example of self-hating, closeted MAGA men, Biden simply said: “Of course.”

As Matt Bernstein said, Graham is:

“...Just another closet case in a lineage of men who’s self-hatred ran so deeply, they punished the world for it. Men who decimated every last shred of their dignity in exchange for a crumb of power, and whose only legacy is their cowardice.”

Trite as it may sound, Cohn and Graham’s lives are reminders of enduring truths: Kindness takes bravery. Love takes courage. Self-hatred is like drinking sea water, poisoning you with never-ending thirst.

Small men like Roy Cohn and Lindsay Graham take their place in history as ugly, pathetic footnotes. Until, one day, we move so far beyond their influence that their names are, finally, left behind in the dark.

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