Editorial: Does the real GOP boo gay soldiers?

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Updated: May 9, 2012 9:50AM

It happened again on Thursday.

For the third time, the most memorable moment in a Republican presidential debate was an ugly response from the audience.

And, for the third time, every candidate on stage stayed mum.

That sort of thing may thrill the party’s more reactionary wing, but it does nothing to win the allegiance of more civil and tolerant members of the GOP and independents.

This time, at the debate in Orland, Fla., members of the audience booed a gay soldier, Stephen Hill, when he asked the candidates if they planned to reinstate the military policy of “don’t ask, don’t tell.”

Since when do Americans boo a young man who has volunteered to take a bullet, if necessary, for his country?

At a debate two weeks ago, the audience whooped it up when the moderator pointed out that Texas Gov. Rick Perry had signed off on a record 234 executions.

At a debate last week, when the moderator asked whether an uninsured young man who badly needed medical care should be allowed to die, somebody in the audience shouted, “Yeah!”

President Barack Obama is on the ropes with the bad economy. The Republicans stand a real chance of defeating him in 2012. But to do so, their candidate will need money and votes not just from the party base, but from moderate Republicans and independents.

Two things, then, need to happen:

Organizers of the next debates should do a better job of seating an audience more representative of the entire Republican Party. We like to believe they’ve failed at this so far.

And the candidates should show a little spine and speak up when the audience gets crude.

To our mind, the high point of the debate came when Perry showed just this kind of class — refusing to pander to base sentiments — by unapologetically defending his state’s decision to allow the children of illegal immigrants to attend state universities at in-state tuition rates.

“We need to be educating these children because they will become a drag on our society,” he said.

To his fellow candidates, he said, “I don’t think you have a heart.”

Some folks in the audience cheered, which was nice, but our money says they weren’t the same folks who booed an American soldier.

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