Embattled Indiana
congressman John Hostettler has launched a new
campaign ad that warns a vote for his Democratic opponent
could trigger a shift in House leadership and advance
a ''homosexual agenda.'' In the one-minute radio ad,
paid for by "Friends of Rep. John Hostettler," an
announcer impersonating Clint Eastwood's ''Dirty
Harry'' character says a vote for challenger Brad Ellsworth
would be a vote for California Democrat Nancy Pelosi
as House speaker. "Pelosi will then put in motion her
radical plan to advance the homosexual agenda, led by
Barney Frank, reprimanded by the House after paying for
sex with a man who ran a gay brothel out of Congressman
Frank's home,'' the narrator says.
Frank, a Democratic representative from
Massachusetts, became the first member of Congress to
voluntarily make his homosexuality public in 1987. In
1989, a gay prostitute and former companion of Frank's,
Stephen Gobie, alleged that Frank knew he ran a gay
prostitution ring out of the congressman's Washington,
D.C., apartment. The House Ethics Committee rejected
Gobie's charges as untrue in 1990. They did find that Frank
fixed parking tickets accumulated by Gobie and that he wrote
a misleading memo for him. The House issued a public
reprimand to Frank for those issues.
The ad, which debuted Saturday across
southwestern Indiana, also accuses Ellsworth of
wanting to ''give amnesty to millions of illegal aliens with
Detroit liberal John Conyers, and raise taxes with New York
liberal Charlie Rangel.''
''I know what you're thinking,'' the narrator
says. ''Is this true? Well, do you feel lucky? Go
ahead, vote for Brad Ellsworth. Make Nancy Pelosi's day.''
Ellsworth's campaign called the ad sensational
and false. ''This race is not about Nancy Pelosi or
San Francisco,'' spokesman Matt Weisman said. ''What
it's about is who's going to do the best job of representing
the eighth district; who's going to listen to people.''
Democrats need to win just 15 seats from
Republicans to regain control of the House, and
Hostettler, a Christian fundamentalist, has been labeled
one of the most vulnerable GOP incumbents in the nation.
Hostettler has never received more than 53% of the
vote in six elections, and the district's voters are
notoriously fickle.
In four successive elections in the 1970s, they
elected four different congressmen. Polls show him
trailing Ellsworth, the Vanderburgh County sheriff,
and his infrequent campaign appearances have prompted many
to question whether Hostettler has resigned himself to
a loss on November 7.
''Eighth district voters are concerned about the
homosexual agenda,'' Hostettler told the Associated
Press on Tuesday. ''Brad Ellsworth himself has said
that he is in favor of granting benefits to same-sex couples
that are now reserved for heterosexual married couples.''
Hostettler has frequently taken unpopular
stances on immigration, gun control, and abortion. In
2004 he drafted the Marriage Protection Act, designed
to prevent federal courts from ordering states to recognize
same-sex marriages permitted in other states. (Ryan Lenz,
AP)
