Long live Queen Sofia...The journalist?...not so much

Queen Sofia granted a Spanish journalist (Pilar Urbano) a series of interviews resulting in…well…honesty and something far worse…Conservative values. But, the real story is how the journalist for the International Herald Tribune throws in her own little agenda driven opinions to the story.

Victoria Burnett (International Herald Tribune):
In the most notorious gaffe in the book, the queen said that she respected people's different sexual tendencies but did not understand why "they should feel proud to be gay."

"That they get up on floats and parade in the streets? If all of us who are not gay were to parade in the streets, we'd halt the traffic in every city," she said. She then added that while gay people had a right to unions, they should not be permitted to call them marriages.

I’ll help Queen Sofia out here to make the point in third grade terms so that Victoria of the Tribune can get a grip. Just about every leader of the Homosexual lobby spouts out the mantra of “just wanting to be treated equally…just like everyone else.” Then, in the next breath the gay community, led by these same lightning rods make demands for “gay rights,” “parade permits,” and the like so that they can highlight their differences. It’s hypocrisy pure and simple. Queen Sofia presented it for what it was, and somehow that’s a gaffe?

Incidentally…her Majesty is no demure and fragile flower:

Born Princess Sophia of Greece and Denmark in November 1938, the queen converted from Greek Orthodoxy to Catholicism when she married Juan Carlos, then the future king, in 1962. Elegant, circumspect and fluent in several languages, she became popular in part because of her role in helping to steer Spain toward democracy after the death of Franco in 1975.

Long considered a paragon of royal reserve, the queen emerges from the book as the 70-year-old observant Catholic that she is, rather than the sweet, demure figure that the Spanish public apparently wants her to be, people who follow the monarchy said.

The Palace later apologized for the comments...but that seems to be reflective of the standing tradition of the Spanish Monarchy not commenting on social or political issues of the day.