OVERKILL

Will & Grace Creator Max Mutchnick Finds Obama’s Marriage Position “Wholly Offensive”

Joe Biden gave a rousing shout-out to Will & Grace when coming out on TV in support of marriage equality this Sunday morning.

The big announcement has set the tone for political commentary this week, with some commentators cynically saying it was a “calculated” political move to buy Obama some more time to evolve while throwing LGBT advocates a bone.

But while one of the creators of Will & Grace, Max Mutchnick (right), is happy with Biden’s endorsement, he has strong words for the President.

Mutchnick told Variety:

“[President Obama] needs to catch up with his vice president in terms of his views… I have always thought that his language, where he has stated that his views are ‘evolving,’ I personally find that wholly offensive. I can’t imagine what it would be like to say that about other minorities in the United States. I couldn’t speak that way about other people.”

Mutchnick is going a little hard on Obama here—he has said his views on same-sex marriage are evolving, not that his views on homosexual people as a group are evolving. What with the DADT repeal and his consistent personal support and hiring of gay people, Obama has always esteemed LGBTs with the same amount of respect he’s given to black people, Latino people, and, yes, good ol’ white people. Let’s not pretend the good sir has maligned our people. Far from it.

But, yes, we get Mutchnick’s point, and his impatience is mirrored in many prominent gay figures, including gay journalist Joe Sudbay, who got Obama on record as saying he was “evolving” on the marriage issue some 500 days ago, and radio host Michelangelo Signorile.

Mutchnick continued with a bit more nuance: “The reason I feel most offended by this is because I don’t believe the President believes this,” meaning that Obama actually does believe in gay marriage and actually doesn’t have to hesitate to reconcile it with his faith. “I don’t believe he is evolving. I believe he is a man seeking reelection, and he all but breaks it down into Morse code. The President should take a page from his friend Oprah Winfrey who takes a page from her friend Maya Angelou. ‘We do better when we know better.’ I believe the President knows better.”

The President may know better, but can we just let him know better in the first few days after his re-inauguration? Why make more of a wedge issue out of this in the lead-up to an election where the choice between a pro-gay president, one who should and almost unfailingly will push for federally recognized gay marriage within the next four years, and an anti-gay president couldn’t be more clear?

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