Remember when you used to drive with your family on a long road trip that seemed to have no end? Sitting in the back seat of the station wagon you would constantly ask, “Are we there yet?” The refrain from the front seat was an unbelievable “Just be patient, we are almost there.” Neither our hearts, souls or bladders believed our parents. That is, I believe, exactly the current state of relations between the Obama administration and LGBT rights.
How bad is the situation? Really bad. We are not anywhere near there yet. By any stretch of the imagination.
All we have to do is think back to June 17th, 2009. In the Oval office of the White House, the president sitting at his desk signed a Presidential Memorandum giving equal rights to Federal Employees. With great fanfare he signed it on CNN with Joe Solmonese, (HRC) Congresswoman Tammy Baldwin and Congressman Barney Frank standing smiling behind him. The president also declared strongly that he would push for the repeal of the “Defense of Marriage Act.” Quite a moving moment except there was one problem. The Presidential Memorandum did not give health insurance or pension benefits (among the most important!) to those employees. Yet with calm assurance we all were told that the “Domestic Partners and Benefits Acts” would be quickly passed to correct this situation. All would be well.
Well, folks, here we are nine months later and the Obama team and national organizations haven’t birthed this harmless piece of legislation granting health and pension benefits to Federal Employees through Congress. This should have been a slam dunk to get passed. As far as DOMA, not one action has taken place by the administration to repeal it. If our national organizations can’t pass such benefits for federal employees, what are they capable of getting passed? Nine months for this piece of legislation? Say what?
How about we take this to the next level?
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Fast forward to the HRC Dinner in Washington and the president eloquently and movingly promising to repeal DADT, ENDA and DOMA. He proclaimed he had heard and understood our impatience. In the State of the Union message, we shouted with glee when he mentioned that DADT would be repealed this year and that the time had long passed to end this apartheid-type law. It was a brilliant moment, relished by those who stood on the side of equality for all. Yet, the only actions so far are by Pentagon leaders asking for a study, the Marine Commandant asking for separate but equal quarters for gay and lesbian soldiers and the Department of Justice filing a powerfully anti-gay brief on behalf of DADT. The words in the brief would bring a smile to the smarmy Rev. Pat Robertson’s face.
We were told by our Congressional representatives that ENDA would be passed by the first of March. Now we are told it might be April but they are not sure it will pass the Senate. Democratic leaders begged us to wait until after healthcare was successfully passed. Done and brilliantly done. Kudos to all. But now they are telling us – uh-oh – they used up all their ‘chits and clout’ with healthcare and now is not the time. ENDA is right up there with the federal employees legislation and should be the least controversial legislation of all. After all, it has been basically hanging around for over – hello – thirty years!
As for DADT, even the administration’s cheerleader in chief Congressman Barney Frank is not so sure we will see progress this year on it. Now you know if Barney is losing faith, then things are getting bad. The military wants some sort of offensive study for a year (to study what???). There doesn’t appear to be the votes to attach the repeal to the Defense Authorization Act. Now even some our friends are asking us to wait until just after the elections in November. Even if we lose seats in Congress, the new members won’t be seated until January.
If I remember correctly the same promise on marriage equality was made to Garden State Equality in New Jersey by the Democrats in last year’s elections. Yes, the Democrats lost and we got totally screwed by the them. Do they expect us to believe it will be much different in Washington? While we are hopeful, we are not stupid.
For the last year, over and over again in the blogosphere, we have written about how 2009 was our year. We understood never again would we have the kind of margin the Democrats had in Congress in the future, that it wasn’t an election year and that the time to act was then. The Obama team, and yes HRC, told us to wait; that they had a grand plan and everything would take place in time.
Well the time is over for poetic words and empty promises. Our patience has run out. If HRC has a master plan and time schedule, we at this stage, have a right to know what it is and what the Obama team promised them last year. Simply put, enough of these political games and giving our friends permission to take detours, prolong the trip and deny us our freedom.
As our president memorably said a while ago, “Enough.” Really and seriously – enough.
This post originally was originally published on DavidMixner.com. It is reprinted here with permission.
JIMMY
i for one am shocked! SHOCKED!!! i tell you that a pawn of the system does nothing but promise everything and deliver nothing… oh except the projected increasing in the fed deficit by 40%. resign the patriot act. put more troops into war, give more money to the corporations who bought him.. meet the new boss, same as the old boss…
AndrewW
HRC has nothing. Obama has nothing.
It’s amazing that David Mixner doesn’t understand that.
Lobbying (HRC) and Politics (Democrats) are what Mixner said would lead to our equality. We can all agree they won’t, but that doesn’t excuse Mixner’s endorsement. Now, he’s angry. We should be, too – at Mixner.
After 40 years of “the same old song” from Mixner and others, it’s time to figure out how to win. Mixner has had decades to produce a strategy – just like HRC – and he never has. He asked us to “trust the Democrats.” Great advice. Now, please retire.
Baxter
Maybe the gays will finally learn what the blacks and evangelicals have been seeing for years: if your voting bloc is locked into one political party, you’ll rarely get anything you want. Democrats don’t gain anything by working on gay rights because they already have your vote. Republicans don’t gain anything by working on gay rights because you’d never vote for one anyway.
Politics is all about making meaningless promises to your base, while actually doing stuff for those pivotal swing voters. Gays need to take a page from the Jewish/Hispanic book and stop kissing the Democrats’ collective asses.
Steve
@Baxter:
Actually, gays and lesbians together are not a big enough number to get anything, even if we could vote together as a swing voting block. Most estimates of the number of G&L people say there are between 2 and 3 percent. The number of so-called “Christian” people who absolutely hate gay people is far greater than that. Anything that almost any politician does to help G&L people will lose more votes than it gains.
Politics is local. Each individual politician makes a calculation before every vote. The calculation is, how many votes will be gained or lost if I vote yes, versus no. Voting “for” almost any gay issue might gain 2%, but it would lose more than that, in almost every district across the country.
Of course they make meaningless promises to the base, while trying to move the swing voters in the middle. But, even then, gays just don’t have enough numbers to matter.
The lobbying and PR campaigns are necessary. They will eventually help most people to realize that gays are not evil, and deserve to be treated fairly. When gays win a right in court, that public opinion will be needed to prevent the judge from being immediately impeached. But, be clear on this, the rights will be won in court, not in the legislature.
It might take another generation to repeal DADT. We will very likely win the right to marry before DADT repeal actually happens. The reason is simple — the right to marry is a right that can be won in court. But no judge in the land will declare DADT unconstitutional, at least until after gays win equal rights in almost every other area.
J
@AndrewW: I am convinced you are an HRC croonie. Each and everyone of your posts defend HRC like they are your god. Anything negetive about HRC or Obamamama, you defend until you’re blue in the face and attempt to twist the story via your comment into blame for the “offender”.
Show me where Mixner said to lobby. In fact almost anything I have seen from the man in (at least) the last year tells you to do anything BUT lobby, because lobbying is ineffective.
You’re an asshole. Go put your face in a toilet already. Might you, please, retire already.
J
Who else thinks AndrewW is just Joe Solomnese commenting in these and other sites comments..? Go check ’em out and compare for yourself.
Whats any other logical explaination for the constant defense of Obama Inc. and HRC? He’s attampting to protect his livelihood.
I swear its him.
Oh, to hide behind a computer screen, Joey-Baby. We’re gonna get you sooner then later!
AndrewW
@J: Amazing. I’ve never defended HRC and I have consistently said they were a waste of $550 million – money used primarily to “lobby.” Lobbying doesn’t effect LGBT-issues. Never has, never will. They are based on morality and constituent beliefs.
Mixner has endorsed lobbying efforts and his “team,” the Democrats for a long time. Mixner is as bad as Aravosis, they both make a living in politics and they endorse and condemn it at the same time. Weasels.
Mixner has had decades to come up with a strategy to obtain our equality. His latest campaign was to support Obama and now, instead of accepting responsibility, he is bitching about Obmama and the Democrats.
He has also repeatedly endorsed lobbying and now, finally is admitting that it is ineffective. HRC is useless. Self-proclaimed “activists” that make a living playing politics are pretty useless, too.
Mixner needs to retire. He’s had 40 years, 10 more than HRC. Neither has ever presented a strategy to win. They’re both too busy – making a living.
MikeSLCq
AndrewW has actually been pretty critical of HRC from the post that I’ve read. Who hasn’t noticed their colossal failure?
Bill Perdue
A Republican is a rightwing joke with a christer theocrat attached at the hip. A Democrat is a Republican in drag.
Homohating is a disease endemic to leaders of the Democrat and Republican parties. Those who can’t comprehend that condemn themselves to an endless round of political hysteria at election time in support of the newest ‘saviour’, the shiniest ‘lesser evil’, followed inevitably by betrayal after betrayal.
Clinton and Obama were both touted as ‘leaders’ who’d get on board the fight for LGBT rights. The truth is no Democrat ‘leader’ gives a rat’s ass about us. Their contribution to us is limited to a few very minor sops to garner votes and give front groups like HRC and EQCA talking points.
The mindless hysteria surrounding the election of right centrist presidential and congressional ‘liberals’ is largely generated by partisan Democrat front groups operating in our communities. They rely on thoughtless voters to fall for the ‘lesser evil’ scam and encourage them to project their values on slimy political hustlers like Clinton and Obama.
That’s a losers strategy. In the case of Clinton it pushed us backwards. His campaign promise to end military discrimination and violence backfired and produced a law codifying that discrimination and its attendant violence. Later he championed a Republican idea, DOMA, and strong armed Congress into passing it, signed it immediately and then boasted about it on redneck christer radio stations to get the redneck vote.
From the beginning Clinton, far from being a ‘lesser evil’, was a rancid Dixiecrat. He led Congressional Dixiecrats and Republicans to pass union busting laws like NAFTA, deregulate predatory lenders, push us under the bus and embargo food and medicine for Iraq, murdering half a million Iraqi children. He may have been a disappointment to some but most of us see him as a disaster.
Obama has a worse record on the questions of economic collapse and the looter classes attack on our standard of living, on promoting the oil wars and the deaths of American soldiers and Palestinian, Iraqi, Afghani and Pakistani civilians. In terms of our struggle we’ve gotten little and probably won’t get much more. At best we can hope he won’t play and cards like Clintons DADT or DOMA against us.
These betrayals aren’t based on personality faults in Clinton or Obama – they’re based on the fundamentally rightist nature of the parties they lead. The central leaders of the Democrats have only one strategic goal and that’s to do what it takes to get money from the looter rich and votes from the christian right.
Lacking any semblance of decency or principle they’re in lock step with Republicans in an endless whirl of allemande rights. Supporting Democrats, any Democrats, is as suicidal as supporting Republicans.
With Democrats like these who needs Republicans.
Bill Perdue
@J: J is an even greater idiot than AndrewW. He forgot that April Fools Day is the first.
AndrewW is a blowhard troll without a substantive thought in his airy little head. He huffs and he puffs and he huffs and he puffs.
Our little Andy claims that he and hundreds of others have done massive research and are about to reveal the road to salvation for LGBT folks. He’s been hinting about it since he started trolling a year ago.
All we know for sure is that he wants to leave our fate in the hands of christers.
He’s delusional and suicidal.
Lanjier
The gay elite fawn over Obama like fourteen-year-old Japanese girls watching their hero in an anime movie. Fuck those bitches.
AndrewW
@Bill Perdue: I agree with your assessment of both Clinton and Obama.
David Mixner sent us down both of those paths.
I don’t engage in childish personal attacks, Bill. You do, and that says a lot about you.
Josh AZ
Thank-you for sending us down these two losing paths David Mixner. Any more bright ideas?
Baxter
@Steve: I’m not buying the claim that our numbers are too small. Jews manage to be a major force in American politics and they only make up about 2% of the population. And there are plenty of Americans who hate Jews too.
sacgary
To me this is ammunition for more acts such as Lt Choi chaining himself to the White House fence and activists taking over both of Pelosi’s offices.
Enough with the ineffectual HRC and pandering to either side of Congress.
With the same grassroots efforts that called 200,000 people to the Equality March last October, we can organize non violent protests and passive resistance efforts such as those previously mentioned.
What we need is a champion like Lt Choi to organize the events and then we all need to show up in force and start chaining ourselves to fences, taking over Congressional offices and being arrested for passive resistance efforts. Then the heterosexists will start paying attention and stop mollycoddling us.
Josh AZ
@sacgary: Oh, sure. If we all just run into the streets and get real angry, we’ll get our equality.
I think the time has long past for publicity stunts. People just laugh at us as we inconvenience them. We don’t need HRC and lobbying – we need people to join our team. Acting like spoiled brats won’t get anyone to join us – they’ll just avoid us more.
sacgary
@Josh AZ:
It is guys like you that give us the moniker “pussy boy”.
Activism of this type is not a publicity stunt, it is a way of letting people know how many of us there are and how we feel about our rights.
No segment of society that has won equality in this country has done so without this type of action. Think Suffragettes. Think Rosa Parks. Think Dr. Frank Bowe 1977. Think Harvey Milk.
Not since the days of Harvey Milk has there been a figurehead or spokesperson for the glbt community that is willing to stand up and be accountable to our cause.
I say stop being the pussies society takes us for and go out and act!
Travis
Mixner is complaining about we endorsed – Clinton and Obama.
alicia banks
amen!
so nice to see some real truth about hobama the hoax!!!
see much more at:
eloquent fury
alicia banks