WSJ digs up 17-year old photo of Kagan playing softball to announce her nomination [View All]

A spokeswoman for the Wall Street Journal said today its cover art was not intended as innuendo about Supreme Court nominee Elena Kagan's sexual orientation after the paper's front-page use of an image of Kagan playing softball provoked a mixture of irritation and amusement from gay and lesbian advocates.

"It clearly is an allusion to her being gay. It's just too easy a punch line," said Cathy Renna, a former spokesperson for the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation who is now a consultant. "The question from a journalistic perspective is whether it’s a descriptive representation of who she might be as a judge. Have you ever seen a picture of Clarence Thomas bowling?"

The vintage of the image, released by the University of Chicago, was a particular source of questions in the context of persistent, public chatter about the nominee's sexual orientation. This isn't exactly a whispering campaign, as the question -- no longer particularly scandalous -- has made it to the Washington Post and widely-read websites. White House officials have denied, on background, that Kagan is a lesbian.

"I think it's strange that you'd go back 17 years to dig up a photo of someone who's one of hte most photographed women in the world today," said Jenna Lowenstein, communications director for the National Stonewall Democrats.

"Personally I think the newspaper, which happens to have the largest circulation of any in the U.S., might as well have gone with a headline that said, 'Lesbian or switch-hitter?'" grumbled the Dallas Voice's John Wright.

http://www.politico.com/blogs/bensmith/0510/Softball_question.html?showall