Professional unsmiling emoticon Barney Frank says “there’s zero chance” of any LGBT equality legislation happening in the next year and instead it “will be a status quo,” with Republicans unable to take rights away while Democrats will be unable to pass new ones. Whew, ’cause I could really use a nap.
the crustybastard
Barney Frank. Wow. Is he still alive?
Rick Gold
He died long ago.
We all just forgot to tell him.
Caleb
He isn’t saying that is because the Democrats are to blame. God, please read the context. He’s saying that with a Republican majority in the House, you can forget anything good happening. As if we did not already know this.
He’s not letting anyone off the hook.
If you want to jump up someone’s ass, jump up the 30% of gays who voted Republican last week.
Adam
@Caleb: TRUTH
Ealan
You can make your Barney Frank jokes, but for those of us paying attention, he just gave us the low-down on how it’s going to be with a republican run Congress. And that “emoticon’s” work got us further than anyone in the Senate did with pro-LGBT legislation.
Markie-Mark
@Caleb: That 30% of gays that voted republican voted that way because of Obama. And I feel certain that number is going to increase in 2012 unless that bigot is removed from the ticket.
Markie-Mark
@Ealan: Are you referring to the way Frank through trans people under the bus with the help of the HRC? Nice.
Pip
what the fuck. on one hand, its ludicrous to throw all the burdens of gay rights on one congressman (in the house no less), but on the other it seems like Barney Frank just has no fucking balls. I don’t understand what he’s so skiddish about. He’s an older gentleman and he has the opportunity to be a leader on such an important issue that is so softball.
He spends his time writing Kathy Griffin bitchy little notes, but he’s apparently too much of a coward to call DADT blockers out on being bigots.
Baxter
So it’ll be exactly the same as when the Dems had the House. The more things change…
JustWatching
That 30 percent of gays might have voted Republican because of economic concerns, etc. Since the Dems aren’t doing anything gay-helpful, gays might as well vote for those they agree with on other issues. You weigh all the issues and decide.
jason
And what, pray tell, did Obama, Barney and the other Democrats do when they had a supermajority for much of the past 2 years? I can only think of one pro-gay piece of legislation that got through, and that was the largely symbolic federal hate crimes law.
Barney should realize that his Democrats treated us appallingly and that’s why we’ve turned. We won’t be going back to you, Barney.
cls
The Democrats stalled on repeal of DOMA and DADT knowing full well that their stalling would kill the the repeal measures. They can point their fingers at the Republicans all they want but the facts show that when they had the ability to repeal they didn’t do so. And Obama has the power, as Commander in Chief, to repeal DADT any time he wants.
VagrantMan
Barney Frank has run his course. He’s a old man who’s out of touch with reality. Just listening to him makes me cringe that this person is legislating. Thank you for your years Barney, but retire already.
JusticeontheRocks
Good.Now he can go back to his primary constituents: Fannie Mae.
Cam
@Caleb:
Sorry but he is letting the DEMS off the hook, just like he tried to do last year until gays started boycotting his fundraisers.
There is a lame duck session, The House already approved the Pentagon Budget Bill with the DADT repeal included. Since it is a budget bill and it’s already been approved by the House Reid could force the bill through in REconciliation, JUST LIKE HE DID WITH HEALTHCARE. All he needs is a simple majority in the Senate which they have.
However, why isn’t Frank suggestion that? Because Frank is a politician first. He Will ALWAYS try to provide cover for his party over doing anything for gay rights.
Meher Zaman
Why would some of us even bother voting for the Republicans? With Obama, at least we have a chance. With the Republicans, we have 0% chance almost guaranteed. We shouldn’t have voted the Republicans just because Obama hasn’t done enough because the Republicans are probably going to do half as much Obama did.
Markie-Mark
@Meher Zaman: But, Obama is a republican. Hadn’t you noticed?