You seem to want your cake and to eat it as well. Good luck…

My wife is filipino and I am white. She kept her last name, and our son took mine. We have never ONCE had a problem coming back into the US.

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Actually Shannon there are already provisions within the USMCJ (US military code of justice) that punishes any and all soldiers who abuse or attack other soldiers, and the JAG core is quite adept at prosecution of those infractions. Although being openly gay is a violation of USMCJ, violent acts against any soldier even gay ones are punished, often harshly when prosecuted by JAG. And coming from someone who is ex-Army, I’ll tell you, ending DADT will only be a start. Everything in the military is based on rank, to achieve rank you have to be a good soldier, which means you don’t make waves. Even after the end of DADT it will take years before gays are fully integrated into the military and are comfortable enough in their environment to be “open”. Just as it took nearly 10 years after Truman signed the Executive Order 9981 that ended racial segregation in the military. But ending DADT will be a start to gay integration, and as then it will probably take a President who uses the power of Executive Order to do it.

ps. To The Gay Numbers, I served in the military, I have to ask when did youserve? What makes you this expert in the field that you obviously think you are? I know the subject of DADT quite well. You are posting links to wikipedia to support your arguement about Executive Orders? And the Solomon link is just an explanation of the DADT policy, and has nothing to do with the presidential powers of the Executive Order. You are the idiot.

Agreed. Also, as paranoid as it sounds, I’m worried about the idea of having openly gay persons grudgingly accepted in the military, for fear that they’ll just become “cannon fodder”, so to speak.

As a heterosexual female, I would love to see “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” be repealed but not without the necessary precautions and corrective actions in place first.

The piece of paper the state gives you, is called a “Marriage License or Certificate”, not a “Civil Union” License or Certificate. Nowhere in that document is any reference made to the term “civil-union’.

The following link explains in full the requirements of a Marriage License or Certificate. You must obtain one in every state and you may not get married without one. Note the continual and ongoing reference to the word “Marriage”,

http://www.marriagelicense.com/license.html

Marriage is NOT a religious Institution and I am so fucking sick and tired of people, including the Church and all the lying religious bastards who claim that it it and that it has been an institution of their making for some 5,000 years.

Gee, that would take us back to when they also believe the earth was created too, wouldn’t it?

Marriage is a secular institution and the Catholic Church did not get involved with the institution of marriage, which has been around since even before Roman and Greek times, until around the seventh century. Look that up in your Fuck and Wagnalls if you don’t believe it.

You and many others who post on this site, obviously do not understand the many differences between a marriage and a civil-union and frankly, I am worn out trying to explain it to dumb asses like you, over and and over and over.

Do some fucking research before you flaunt your ignorance all over these blogs for the rest of to have to paddle our canoes through.

I m not interested in crazy people rants. Let me know when you are wanting to discuss whether what’s on the table is good rather than perfect (as apparently in your crazy person rant you require).

One superstitious bigot who opposes same sex marriage replaced another. Obama’s bigotry – “god’s in the mix” combined with his rock star popularity fueled the bigot vote that stripped our rights in California and trampled them in Florida and Arizona. Attempts to blame it on others by scapegoating Latinos and African Americans doesn’t alter the fact that Prop 8’s victory is on Obama’s shoulders and those who refused to attack his bigotry or foresee it’s appalling cost.

The Congress remains in the hands of one of the two parties that quite openly and deliberately trashed our agenda for the last two decades: DOMA, DADT, ENDA, hate crimes, etc.

Now the promises are over and the excuses have begun.”Vast right wing conspiracy.” “No veto proof Senate.” ”Be patient.” “Barney knows best.” “Lobby harder.” “Grow up. Don’t be so pushy.” “Wait your turn.” “We know secret stuff you don’t know like He’s secretly on our side but He has to pretend otherwise so He can get stuff done.”

Bullshit. Those who helped elect Obama now share full responsibility for what he and his party do. Excuses aside, ‘progressives’ are going to run up against the usual brick wall of bigotry, war and Wall Street lap dogs like Obama, Biden and the Congressional Democrats. Nor will their excuses slow what the left has predicted for months: hope will become rage as economic catastrophe, imposed austerity, war and bigotry create mass action movements.

The Democrat party won a huge victory promising “change” and that sealed their fate. They cannot deliver real change. Politically they’re goners, dead meat, dinosaurs. Change is desperately needed but it won’t come from piss ant liberal reforms. Fig leafs covering open sores aren’t a cure for endemic maladies like war, bigotry and economic collapse.

That awaits the radical solutions offered by the left, the antiwar movement, the explosive new GLBT movement and unions.

As for your post, I believe that the change.gov site is supporting much of the same changes you are. The site states that Obama supports a Trans-inclusive ENDA, and he supports hate crime laws like the Matthew Shepherd Act.

Is the mere fact that he doesn’t support gay marriage (even though he supports giving us all of the same rights as everyone else – on a FEDERAL level) causing you to question everything else he is trying to do – which is so much more than we’ve been getting the past 8 years – so much more than we’ve EVER gotten?

We should continue to fight for the full realization of our rights (RJB was out in front of our city hall with me on Saturday) but we also need to look at the bigger picture and see Obama’s support on so many issues for what it is – a much better starting-off point than we’ve ever had.

For example, a tax form or insurance paper would read “are you in a civil union” not “are you married.”

Then it would be equality for all. And in the process, we can clearly separate church and state.

The more we separate the better.

Suddenly we have someone willing to stand up and get behind these issues and you have people on this site commenting like whining children. If calling out the few commenters being cranky makes me an “airhead”, Bill Perdue.. well like OH Ma GAWD..

That’s the whole point of human development. If we were always satisfied with what we had before, the whole concept of “progress” wouldn’t make any sense.

Please don’t embarass yourself further by being that odd brand of Democratic Party loyalist/apologist who defends failure before it even happens. Either that or you should change your motto from “Yes, We Can” to “We Promise Nothing.”

Couldn’t disagree more.

Gays shouldn’t be blocked from adoption of kids just because hets produced the kids. That’s a silly concept + leaves plenty of kids without potentially loving, good homes.

As for the marriage thing, it’s about more than just the “name”. Specifically, it’s about all the rights that come along with that name.

Obama’s program is minimalist and if his betrayal on prop 8 is any measure of his support for same sex rights minimal concessions without real equality is what we’re in for. In other words another fig leaf on the open sore of homobigotry.

Keep in mind that Obama outright rejects marriage equality, that he’s spent over a year successfully fighting to make inroads into Rove’s bigot base, and that his first and most consistent message to us was delivered by ex-gay queer hating Rev. Donnie McKlurkin.

If we develop an independent mass action movement with cutting edge demands we’ll stand a good chance of winning much more than the Democrats expediency will ‘give’ us.

1. We need inclusive laws to make it easy to sue and win claims against employers, service providers and landlords who discriminate. The original ENDA is a good start. Barney Frank’s version is watered down to placate bigoted business owners.

2. We need tough laws that harshly punish hate crimes and hate speech. How many more of us have to get killed before the bigots are stopped in their tracks?

3. We need equal rights and privileges for our partnering. If everyone has civil unions or a civil partnership that’s fine but if they’re reserved for us on a separate but non equal basis that’s bigotry. Obama is a bigot.

4. With the recession threatening to become a depression we need a crash program to fund housing, medical and counseling services and job training/educational assistance for the tens of thousands of LGBT children and teens who are throw away by their patents.

5. We need funding for HIV/AIDS services and research on an unrestricted ‘as necessary’ basis, overseen by activists from the GLBT communities, GLBT doctors and nurses and the AFL-CIO’s medical service unions.

Not seperate but equal but a smart move that in one fell swoop ends this argument and moves America forward…

“What is it? A federal civil unions law.

What would it do? A federal civil unions law would say that all the rights and benefits enjoyed by heterosexual married couples under federal law would be extended to same-sex couples whose relationships are recognized under state law.”

Don’t allow the majority to force you to take sub-standard rights. The Mormons don’t own the word “marriage.”

You’ll take your ENDA and Hate-Crimes laws and LIKE it.

maybe you are just ignorant, I don’t know. Here’s a link:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/D.....n%27t_tell

It’s not perfect, but at least it has some relationship to reality versus your post on don’t ask, don’t tell.

I can’t vouche for this but there is also this which seems to break it down from a reputable law school:

http://www.law.georgetown.edu/.....round.html

It’s not merely a matter of executive order.

I wish some of you would do a little research before posting.

Repealing DOMA is huge, as DOMA meant that even in individual states that legalized gay marriage, the marriage had no effect on federal immigration status, so families could still be separated by deportation.

I’m very pleased with this. I only hope he’s not overreaching.