While running for Illinois State Senate in 1996, Barack Obama told a newspaper he supported gay marriage. But as a U.S. Senate candidate in 2004, he insisted he was only for civil unions; he repeated this stance in 2008 as a presidential candidate. Why the switch? Maybe it has to do with his religious beliefs. Maybe it has to do with his campaign strategy. But is getting Obama to come out in favor of full marriage rights for gays and lesbians contingent on knowing why Obama is a flip-flopper? More importantly, is it even possible?
Obama didn’t leave the Chicago-area United Church of Christ until 2008, after the Rev. Jeremiah Wright’s rageaholic sermons made the video clip rounds. (As president, he’s been theoretically shopping for a new church, but hasn’t found one.) But it was the same United Church of Christ that in 2005 adopted a non-binding resolution recommending churches support “equal marriage rights for couples regardless of gender,” relays the San Francisco Chronicle‘s Bob Egelko. So if Obama is going to point to his religious teachings as the reason why he doesn’t back the M-word, doesn’t that contradict his own church’s message?
(This is not to be confused with Cardinal Carlo Caffarra of Bologna, of the Roman Catholic Church, decrying any politician who supports gay marriage as a non-Catholic. Obama was never Catholic, but you see how much influence a church can have on some officials.)
Enter the “pure politics” approach. That’s how Equality California’s Geoff Kors, and many other Obama apologists, describe the now-president’s about-face on gay marriage. He needed to court the electorate, and endorsing full gay marriage rights, this theory goes, would be seen as a vulnerability and a chance for conservative opponents to pounce. Particularly on the national stage. Instead, he voiced support for civil unions, the less-than-marriage institution that’s been proven to not, in fact, carry the same rights, privileges, and recognition that marriage does. Says Kors: “When he was running for office in Chicago and wanted strong support from the LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender) community, he made it clear he supported full equality. Since he has continued to seek higher office, he has changed his position for the worse. It’s especially appalling that he is citing his religious beliefs as grounds for his public government position on the civil marriage issue because he knows better.”
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Indeed it’s appalling, because conservative zealots fall back on those same “religious beliefs” to defend their no votes on marriage equality. See: New York, New Jersey, and even this week’s events in New Hampshire.
It’s impossible to tell whether Obama will ever flip-flop again and back full gay marriage rights. For now, the evidence points to absolutely not: He’s been silent on the federal Prop 8 Perry trial in California; he made no effort to mobilize Democrats to support gay marriage in Maine; his Justice Department continues to defend DOMA in court while trivializing gay Americans. Moreover, he doesn’t have to: With his mild push to repeal Don’t Ask Don’t Tell, he’s going to score LGBT points over the next year-plus as Congress moves to repeal the military law. Even if he does nothing truly remarkable and, like health care, hands off the project to Congress. And with a weak Gay Inc. that’s proving to be nothing more than a press release publisher, we have “activists” applauding Obama’s lip service instead of demanding action.
Meanwhile, as as Newsweek‘s Sarah Kliff notes, a DADT repeal is helluva lot more likely than federal marriage equality. With LGBT and military advocates reframing the debate over gay soldiers as one of national security, Obama gets to back a repeal with the message of making America safer. This makes the issue less about ending discrimination (although it is, very much) and more about Obama’s promise to fend off terrorists.
It brings us back to the usually stunted debates of The New Republic‘s Jamie Kirchick — who just got done assailing Andrew Sullivan — who questioned why liberals think the president, who is on the record saying he doesn’t support gay marriage, is just playing politics and is actually secretly in favor of it. Or at least more secretly in favor of it than conservatives.
Asking whether Obama will ever declare himself in favor of full marriage equality, let alone lobby voters and legislators about it, is really just a parlor game for political wonks. The man has declared his position, and if he’s like the senior politicians before him, will wait until he leaves office before admitting he made a giant, irrevocable mistake.
Devon
I would guess about six months after he loses in 2012.
Addyboo
He is just like every other politician. He couldn’t care less about our plight until he wants our vote. He is such a disappointment.
wmcarpenter
Zing!
Jillyouface
I think if he gets a second term, he may come out in favor of same sex marriage.
I mean, if he were to be open and favored same sex marriage during his campaign, HE WOULD NOT HAVE BEEN ELECTED PRESIDENT. The US is still backwards on their views and would not elect a president who were open to same sex marriage.
InExile
We will never be able to count on Barack Obama for anything, period.
It was obvious from the beginning with his slick, lack of substance and dishonest campaign selling himself with slogans like “hope and change” and using the racism card. He was not prepared to run this country then and still is not. There is a small thing called leadership that this man does not have in him which we all saw during the health care fiasco and have continued to see with the repeal of DADT, DOMA and the passing of ENDA.
I say continue to hope for the future (maybe the courts) but expect NOTHING from Obama.
Robert, NYC
Of course he’s not going to back marriage equality, no candidate running for the highest office ever would because its political suicide in this society, all religion based prejudice and homophobia at the root of it all. Obama will probably do what Bill Clinton did, support it long after he’s left the White House, classic democratic cowardice. The only decent candidate who was running was Dennis Kucinich who would have made a far better president than the one we have right now and who publicly declared his support for full marriage equality, among other things. Obama has NO confrontational skills, is afraid to upset the GOP and afraid to do exactly what Bush 43 did, give the finger to the opposition and get things done. How can a party with a mandate allow a handful of conservadems and the entire GOP dictate policy? He’s a coward. He should go back to teaching college and get out of politics altogether. He’s lost my support in 2012.
jason
I think getting Obama to support gay marriage is less important than getting him to repeal DADT. He promised he’d repeal the latter.
W.
Uh. Hello. Obama “promised” to repeal DOMA as well as DADT and pass ENDA. NONE OF THAT HAS EVEN COME CLOSE TO GETTING DONE
rf
I’ll take a single payor/public option health care system over DADT repeal and I’ve got very good health care (for now). I hope everyone realizes that demmerkrats are no better than repuglicans–they’re just bad in different ways (ineffectual and weasily instead of mean and bullying). Both use people with ideals like pawns. The courts are going to give us our rights like they almost always do. might take a decade or more and we might have to actually do something to get them (like civil dis, and the like).
Ian
@InExile: Oh we’ll get some hardcore “ram it through” leadership from him around 2012 all right, but it will only be his being in campaign mode to crush any 2012 Primary challengers that he will see as potential threats to his re-election. Otherwise it will be the usual pull down the pants “Are you in yet GOP?” weak-knee’d type of leadership.
christopher di spirito
A couple of years after he leaves office, perhaps then Obama will say he supports gay marriage.
Just like uber-douchebag, Bill Clinton, who now says signing DADT and DOMA were two of his biggest regrets.
They’re all alike. Politicians have no balls when they’re in office but the moment they out of office they find their moral compass.
Acem
Obama is playing the card right IMO. As has been started already, him being a staunch ally of gay marriage is political suicide, and would almost ensure that his republican opponent would win. It’s the reason Bush was able to secure a second term in office. I know anti-gay marriage democrats who voted for Bush over Kerry for that reason alone. I say don’t press for now. There are other, less polarizing issues, that need more attention. Let him tread lightly on DADT/DOMA for the rest of this term, and then hit him hard with it after he wins the next.
Robert, NYC
I agree with some others here. The only way we’ll get marriage equality is through the courts and in some cases state legislatures and in the latter make sure that it can’t be overturned by referenda and other initiatives. I don’t see marriage equality at the federal level, not with the bench stacked with conservative, catholic republicans. Reverse that, and we might see some light. Now if by some miracel we had half of the states with marriage equality, that might alter the equation for federal recognition. Both parties are stacked with cowards who’d rather kow-tow to their religious constituents than do the right thing. Obama is a brilliant example of that. Religion is at the root of all the opposition on both sides of the aisle and I don’t see that changing any time soon. You can’t even get elected president in this country unless you declare a religious belief system, unlike most civilized western countries.
Brian En Guarde
The great side strategy for winning in November is to pass a simple repeal of DADT. It will whip up the base, and will be a huge embarrassment for the GOP if they try to block it with a filibuster of the legislation it should be attached to – the defense authorization act.
It will reassure the public that the Democrats are a party of principle, and it will show that Obama has a set of balls.
“I refuse to dump one more trained soldier on the street because he is gay at a time when we need every hand we can use in fighting these wars. If the republicans have a problem with that, then the times have passed them by, and their sense of fair play and patriotism has been lost.”
If the Democratic Party backs down, and do not give vets a simple repeal, the base will be angry, and the right will smell more blood, making them even more obnoxious.
The time is now, and it is a WIN.
Fitz
There is as much chance of him changing his position on gay marriage as there is of me changing my position on him.
greenluv1322
Do you morons not understand that being ANTI-gay is how Bush got re-elected? Do you dumb fucks not understand while you all sit here and type on your computers that you are probably not OUT in real life? Do you assholes understand that you gay white guys are probably the biggest problem in the gay community. You are racist and elitist and afraid to do anything other that blame everyone from Gay Inc., political parties, to Obama.
Barack Obama is hands down the best President that we have ever had in the history of the US. But because he’s black you just like so many of your racist/homophobic brethren you all hold him to the highest standard known to man. Get a fucking life people! Does it matter what his personal stance on gay marriage is when he promises to end the policies enacted by the 43 white presidents before him. He is actively moving towards doing what he can to change a whole bunch of shit. And all you little fags can do is shout about how you won’t vote for him again. Well then enjoy your closet because you will most certainly be there when Sarah Palin locks you in there when she becomes president.
DR
best president ever in the history of the US?
Call us back in about around a hundred years. Right now, I wouldn’t put Obama in the same class as FDR or Washington or Lincoln. You may want to refer to him as the best one in RECENT history, but saying “ever” when he’s been in office for a year is an overstatement.
rf
@greenluv1322: Um, a “Fierce Advocate” – his words not mine, would be tirelessly working to get ENDA passed (my vote for the most important one). not sitting quietly (except for a speech now and then) waiting for possibly DADT to go away (and just attaching himself to that because he sees the organic support for it), and ignoring the others. He had a chance to make inroads against the insurance monopolies and blew it. He had a chance to reinstate the financial regulations that went missing and destroyed our economy (especially during the height of the crisis)–yet, still played to the banks until Scott Brown came along. DADT repeal, new Glass Steagal and consumer finance reform, regulation of corporate finance in elections, and a decent health care law that removes the insurance monopolies (even if its not public option) in the next 12 months and he’s my guy.
Chitown Kev
@greenluv1322:
Oh, hun, put down the muthafuckin’ Kool-aid, please? The best in president in US history?
And not all those policies enacted by the previous 43 presidents were all bad, even you should be able to see that (uh, Lincoln, FDR, Truman, and LBJ alone, just for example)
Having said that, sure he might publically support gay marriage in 2014 (whether he’s president or not). Or add on full marriage equality say, on the West Coast, in New England, NY, NJ, and one additional Midwestern State (probably Illinois).
Bill Perdue
It took a swinish bigot like B. Clinton, whose homohating legacy includes, but isn’t limited to DOMA and DADT, 9 years – from 2000, when he left office much richer that when he entered it, until 2009 or so – to beg pardon and say he might have been wrong.
So lets see: 2012 plus 9 =, er, um, 2021 or therabouts.
Don’t hold your breath.
Mark Dallas
God decides Obama’s position on GLBT issues.
Brian En Guarde
Obama needs to get more in tune with black history, to give him guidance on how crucial it is to act boldly for gay civil rights. He should read Loving v. Virginia, which gave blacks equality in marriage. He should also listen to the words of the first black Supreme Court judge, Thurgood Marshall — “Separate in inherently unequal.” If he understood history, he would stop being such a weak little pussy and protect us already.
Chitown Kev
@Brian En Guarde:
Uh, the courts did all of that, hun.
And I think that Obama has more than an adequate understanding of history, including black history.
I’ve even argued that his approach is very similar to the “low-hanging” fruit approach that FDR took on black civil rights…
Don’t get ahead of yourself.
Chitown Kev
@Mark Dallas:
I don’t believe that Obama is all that religious. And if he were, as the article points out, then being from a denomination that was pastored by a TRUE fierce advocate on LGBT issues, he would support marriage equality.
Of course, his personal religious beliefs are of little consequences, it’s what he says publically that I have a problem with.
delurker
@InExile: Hillary will never, ever be president. Never. Got it?
Herbo
He will back it when it means profits for him or his cronies.
He will back it to earn money at Gay Inc speaking engagements after his shitty feeble one-term Presidency is over.
He will back it after he is safly off the hot seat when he is useless to the cause.
fuck him
delurker
@greenluv1322: I think we are at a situation in the gay blogging community where the president is loathe to get even the slightest credit for anything. If Mullen or Gates say something positive toward the repeal of DADT, it’s totally their credit, and none goes their boss.
If some conservative ghoul like Cheney expresses milquetoast support for the repeal, people cream themselves. “Even the arch-con Dick Cheney supports the repeal, but let’s see how Obama fucks it up.”
Just yesterday, the new Republican gov of VA rolled back employment protections for LGBT. Did queerty blog about? No. Will they? Who knows? If there is a criticism of the president to made, I’m sure that takes precedence. Or a Davy Wavey video.
Bob R
He’s been nothing but a major disappointment time after time, not just in regards to gay issues. I have come to depend on Obama and this administration for nothing, that way I will no longer be disappointed. Should he actually do something, not just for gays but for Main Street, then I’ll be pleasantly surprised. As it stands now, and the polls seem to agree, Obama is a one term, failed president. He has time to turn things around, but I think he is a better campaigner than he is a courageous leader.
rf
@delurker: queerty did blog about virginia, 2 days ago
http://www.queerty.com/virginias-gov-doesnt-want-gay-state-workers-protected-so-he-removed-their-protections-20100216/
and you can send them suggestions of stories if you think they don’t cover them.
delurker
Ok, I stand corrected on that. Good job, queerty.
dontblamemeivotedforhillary
@greenluv1322 is a reverse racist!
Barack Obama is remoulding himself as a “populist” Ronald Reagan right-of-centre President for 2012 and we know how well that worked out for Gays; especially with AIDS. The only way to get Gay Marriage is to think outside the box. We will not get Gay Marriage from the Barack Obama Administration unless it’s through Civil Rights panels and commissions and court litigation, pressing for the need to study how the law is unequal to lgbts and to enact an Executive Order (probably giving us a Civil Rights like legislation for Equality for All without the lightning rod of Gay Marriage as a recess action.) Dept. of Health and Human Services’ Kathleen Sebelius is already looking into the inequality of health-care for lgbts and this will be part of the findings of the overall case for Civil Rights. We know that we are second-class citizens where some of us are treated like less than animals…but does America? This is a Civil Rights issue and Civil Unions should carry the same Federal Legal Protections that Marriage does, which we can fight for from within a framework of Equal Protection under the Constitution (Oh, that Document that makes our case!)
As a Progressive, I will NOT be voting for Barack Obama based on the Environmental abandonment issue (Nuclear Power Plants), continuing 2 wars: in Afghanistan and Iraq – including a surge in the latter, the bailout of the Financial Institutions by the same people who oversaw the downfall (FCC, Geithner, Bernanke) which is the economic mess we are in right now and will continue to be in. Propping up Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae who have failed the American Dream as record mortgages defaulted with no bailout for average Americans, or too little, too late. They were set-up to provide low interest loans yet the sub-prime mortgage predators sent as pummeling off a cliff as they became reckless financiers in hedge funds and real estate speculation. It’s all nice on paper until the bubble bursts (I remember Will and Grace joking about Flipping) and we will find ourselves back there again, and you can’t blame Bush in 2012!
Continuing, the Stimulus Package (which created a minimal amount of jobs but was more of a raid on tax-payers who fund the Treasury as well as a very pissed off China) The Stimulus has proven to not only be slow, but the grants are put into the inexperienced and often unqualified hands of those who have no intention of creating jobs (look at the Illinois mess!) with no checks and balances – except from the media one year later. Obama has messed up from day one with Rick Warren, continuing Federal wiretaps and monitoring of U.S citizens, giving carte-blanche to the telecommunications companies, not creating Private sector jobs for small business, redirecting Educational funds to parochial schools who preach against gays and sex education, abandoning his Green promise to create jobs, not signing executive orders for repealing DADT, DOMA and killing ENDA. My anger at Obama is on the level of the Tea Party folk (and they are a misdirected bunch of fiscal hawks and plain nut-jobs!) though I rather like his speeches which ring hollow in practice.
If we do the math, Obama has lost a significant proportion of the Liberal base (remember, what his puppeteer, arch-conservative and right-wing power-monger Rahm Emmanuel calls “Retards”) which is 20%, the Moderate base of 40-50% known as Clinton Democrats (or Independents) as shown in Virginia, New Jersey and Massachusetts in recent voter backlashes. Anti-incumbency is at an all-time high (and you can say it’s because “they’re all racists” – so, how did he get elected in the first place??? – Oh, policy!) that even if he turns around the economy on paper (Census Workers who ask if you are a “Negro”) the economy will crash back down into a bigger hole while the infrastructure of this country is managed by an inexperienced team. There will be so many unskilled workers getting a temporary boost from the Census only to have sticker shock when they are taxed where previously it was supplemental income to Social Security and other social services as Obama is coming after every dime you earn on E-bay and Contractors, so Gird your Loins, girls – hustlers and website managers are going into tax fraud courts so you may want to cancel Paypal and barter in cash like drug-peddlers…if you are just trying to put food on the table or pay you home and health-care costs! We Gays pay $100,000 over our lifetimes for the lifestyles of the heterosexual, often on less income!
I know that a lot of people tie Health-care to the Economy as do I but Obamacare is written by the Health Insurance lobby!!! What do you think will happen? No public option or one that is so weakened that inflation will be the new barometer of medical bankruptcy, not just health-care fees. So, what do we do?
A friend of mine said that he survived Reagan and both Bushes and he’ll survive a President Palin! Sometimes, you have to lurch right, to realise what it is that we really need: a transformative society like that of the E.U (and not Hopey-Changey promises!)
In the U.S, we have a duopoly in politics (which amounts to the difference between stepping in shit and eating shit!) that a well-financed third party or multi-party system is necessary. Recruiting New York Mayor Mike Bloomberg to run in 2012, say with someone like Evan Bayh is not good for Gay Rights but it is good for Democracy. Even if a three-way race gives us President Palin or an Independent, it will force the Democrats to return to their base because you can’t win without New York and California (who are the litmus test of gay progression despite current Gay Marriage quagmires.)
I, for one have the right to Vote with my conscience and not Fear (even coming from within the gay blogosphere that always uses the ‘Nazi Germany’ card like with Bush – who was just really, really inept!)
Obama does equal Bush which is why I am voting Green Party, the only gay supportive party with a Gay Civil Rights platform! The Democrats had their chance and threw us under the bus after wrenching bundles of dollars from our fists, and the Stonewall Generation will pass from this world with No Equality under the current regime! Harvey Milk would be marching in the streets TODAY at this Absolute Outrage!
InExile
@delurker: Even Bush was a better president than Obama! LOL
How’s that hopey changey stuff working out for ya?
delurker
@InExile: It’s working fine. Our standing in the world has improved. The whole world doesn’t hate us any more as recent surveys show. We are pulling out or Iraq by the summer. We are capturing Taliban commanders. We are getting a DOL that is on the side of Labor actually. We replaced a liberal justice with another one, with two more vacancies possibly coming up. The stimulus, which President H.R. Clinton would have pushed through as well, saved us from the Great Depression II.
There is bad stuff and disappointments of course, but your irrational PUMA hatred is really funny and sad. So Hillary turned a coronation into an incompetent bumbling campaign and her stubborn failure to renounce her Iraq vote cost her the presidency. Don’t blame the guy who beat her. Blame her.
delurker
Oh, and we don’t have 100K troops in Tehran and have not 3rd war front opened up, which President McCain would have done by now (and perhaps Hillz, too, to prove she’s one of the big boyz with ballz). So, yeah, it’s working pretty well actually.
David Ehrenstein
No he will never be a gay marriage ally.
He’s for “separate but equal.”
Robert, NYC
#31, DontblameIvotedforHillary….you hit the nail right on the head!
Greenluv1322….you think Obama is the best president ever? In office for only a year and already he’s caved in to the GOP and the conservadems who are dictating health care policy. How on earth can a party with the majority of power in both houses allow that to happen? During his campaign he said he wanted single payer, but no….the conservadems and rethuglicans forced his hand so he took it off the table. Then came the public option, the second best option to single payer, and again, he allowed the right wingers in the GOP and in the Democratic party force his hand yet again. What kind of leadership is that? He has zero confrontational skills and is afraid to take any of them on. At least Bush 43 had balls and did just that with the dems, not caring about bipartisanship as this one does. Everything he campaigned on is not happening, not for us. You watch, DADT will be years before its repealed. He could have done a bit more on that one and look at ENDA…..still nowhere. This is NOT what progressives voted for. Obama is NO progressive by any stretch of the imagination but a conservadem who kowtows to the religious bigot constituents and shafst us in the process. He doesn’t give a damn about full equality for LGBT people, he’s already made that quite clear opposing marriage equality. Of all people, given his background, he should know better that separate is never equal. How much more proof does he need? He disgusts me and so does the democratic party, almost as bad as the GOP.
rf
31 – Don’t blame me – great post!
“he’ll survive a President Palin!” – perhaps, but what about 1 or 2 Palin Supreme Court nominees?
voting independent for local/congressional races may be fine–although basically useless because of gerrymandering–but it makes a big difference when the president controls that pesky third branch of government.
truth is both repugs and demmerkrats have been marching us towards fascism (not socialism like the teabaggers want you to believe) since the Reagan years. Corporate personhood, too big to fail, bank bailouts, insurance monopolies intact, wealth redistribution, fossil fuel reliance, 20% credit card rates vs. 1% savings rates, etc. are prime examples of how major corporations own every facet of American life. Obama had a golden opportunity to reign in the financial institions in his first 6 months while the crisis wast still hot–99% of the country would have supported him. But who were some of his biggest supporters? Wall Street. We got nothing but banks with more money.
Our next president will be sponsored by Exxon, Wellpoint, and Goldman. then, believe me, there ain’t gonna be any rights for anyone.
InExile
@delurker: No one here has mentioned Hillary! Last I checked she was Secretary of State with an approval rating of 75%.
Oh, that’s right BO’s approval is in the 40’s now. Did you know no President has ever been re-elected with an approval of 47% or less?
delurker
@InExile: “Did you know no President has ever been re-elected with an approval of 47% or less?”
Wtf? Link? And stop comparing apples to oranges. Compare presidents to other presidents.
Reagan had a 34% rating in January 1983 and won re-election by a landslide year later. At this point in his presidency, Clinton was in the 30s, and won re-election. You can look at ebbs and flows of approval all you want, but they are meaningless almost 3 years before an election.
Stop being a damn fool and seek meds for your Obama derangement.
InExile
@delurker: I have no problem with Obama other than ALL OF THE PROMISES he has forgotten. Treating gays like dirt is no way to win re-election.
Maybe check into AA for help getting off the Kool Aide.
I voted for him which will not happen again.
Bill Perdue
@InExile: InExile, stop making things up. According to most tracking polls Obama is 51 to 53.
http://www.gallup.com/poll/113980/gallup-daily-obama-job-approval.aspx
If the economy continues to tank he probably won’t be reelected. That seems likely but we’ll have to wait and see. All we know for sure is that Obama’s claims that he produced a recovery are spun from purest bullshit.
Obama’s economic gurus, the same people who created mass unemployment and homelessness by helping B. Clinton ram through a Republican sponsored deregulation bill, now claim that the fourth quarter of 2009 improvement in GDP – coming in at an impressive 5.7% – heralds the end of the Recession.
Obama told us that he’d avoided a depression when he stabilized the markets, by which he meant that he covered the losses of the looter class and insured that AIG will have the wherewithal to pay out about $250 million in promised bonuses. Obama pretended to be shocked but now he says the looters at AIG and the banks ‘earned’ their money’. That abrupt about face is explained by the fact that when was just a Senator on the make he got his own ‘bonus’ of $101,332 bonus in political ‘contributions/ Now he’s a President on the make. Opensecrets.org.
What shoots down Obama’s latest ‘recovery’ is the fact that for 2009 as a whole GDP shrank 2.4%. That was the biggest annual contraction since 1946. The sharp but temporary upsurge was based on the need to increase inventories which have been dwindling for the last three years. Unemployment, based only on numbers of people with active claims, was 10% by December, 2009. However the real rate estimated by the Bureau of Labor Statistics for all of 2009 was 16.2% per annum and 17.5% in December. http://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.t12.htm
In human terms that’s 15 million people thrown into desperation and poverty. Several million people have lost their home as foreclosures increased 63% in 2008 and continued to climb steeply in 2009. One in every 7 homeowners is facing foreclosure nationally and one in four in California, Nevada and Michigan.
A recession corrects itself but this one is a non-correcting economic event, that is a depression fueled by massive a 17.5% unemployment and mass homelessness. Those are characteristics of a depression.
Another characteristic of a depression is the inability of employed and underemployed workers to generate a recovery because of widespread poverty. 2009 labor costs increased only 1.5%. Even those with jobs can’t afford to spend enough and since consumer purchases are about 70% of the US GDP the pauperization or workers, the underemployed and the unemployed will push the recession into a depression.
Obama says his priority is no longer job creation but reducing the madly escalating federal deficit. He wants a three year freeze on government stimulus spending. In the 1980’s we used to call that Reaganomics when we were being polite and voodoo economics the rest of the time.
No one should be surprised that Obama is imitating Nixon’s war goals or Reagan’s economic plundering or if he’s not relected.
yeah
He’ll come out in favor of gay marriage once his term as president is over. Which I hope is 2016. I still think he’s a fantastic president even though he’s not exactly the gay rights champion we hoped he’d be. Do you think Bush would have put pressure on Uganda to do away with their barbaric anti-gay law? Or signed hate crime legislation? Do you think McCain would have done any of those things? In 2021, do you think Pawlenty (or whoever the GOP nominee is) will do those things? Who would McCain or Pawlenty appoint to the Supreme Court? What would their views on gay rights be? Obama’s not perfect but you have to be practical and consider the alternatives.
bluprntguy
I think Obama’s decision to defend DOMA served a political purpose. It’s also in our best interest as we can now say this law was defended and lost on it’s merits when the courts overturn DOMA as unconstitutional.
Additionally, Obama’s ‘defense’ of DOMA probably helped the case against it more than hurt it. The first brief submitted to the court defended the law on offensive and discriminatory grounds. The Second brief was more neutral, and the third stated that the law was discriminatory, but came up with bizarre new reasons for upholding it that likely won’t pass any rational logic test any court could throw at it.
Now the court must review this bizarre course of defense against a law that everyone agrees is discriminatory.
InExile
@Bill Perdue: Excellent points Bill, except for the Clinton Bashing! LOL
I don’t get how they talk of recovery without jobs??? The jobs are not coming back. The administration seems to still not be focusing on jobs. In the end, it’s all about jobs.
It blows me away how little BO has done for the common man. Gays are not the only people upset with him, he has pissed off everyone except the deluded Obots.
Chitown Kev
@delurker:
Well, IMHO, Obama is nowhere near as bad as Bush 43. But the greatest president of all time? Sorry.
@InExile:
Yep. It’s all about jobs.
I really don’t think that Obama’s re-election chances have that much to do with the gays at all.
delurker
@Chitown Kev: I never made that claim nor agreed with it.
And yes, in 2012 it’s all jobs, jobs, jobs. If the unemployment rate is 8%, he’ll be re-elected by a large margin. Gay rights issues will figure nowhere in that equation.
Sure, the gay blogs will claim influence, as if the gay community can turn a national election (give me a break!), but we will have nothing to with whether he’s re-elected or not.
delurker
Ugh. My comment did not come out as I wrote it. I meant to say:
If the unemployment rate is greater than 10%, he’s toast. If it’s between 8 and 9.9%, it’s a 50-50 shot. If it’s less than 8%, he’s golden.
terrwill
Anyone who utters the phrase “President Pallin”: Go wash your mouths out with soap right now!!!! : p
Chitown Kev
@delurker:
Well.
I do believe that the gay community COULD turn a national election. Well, a few of the battleground states, anyway.
It’s simply that the gay community is way too fractured at the present time to do so.
And I am convinced that until the gay community can actually flip a few states that gay rights will move in slow motion, even with Democrats in office.
By the way, I agree with your assessment on the job situation vis-a-vis Obama’s re-election chances.
Bill Perdue
@InExile: It’s no more possible to bash B. Clinton than it is to bash Nixon, Reagan or BushTwo.
It’s no more possible to bash H. Clinton that it is to bash Margaret Thatcher or Emelda Marcos.
Being an apologist for them must be very lonely.
Dirty Ole Man
@greenluv1322: #16
I agree with your #16 post wholeheartedly!
The vitriol being thrown towards this President by
WHITE Gays is appalling! Obama attended their shitty
little Gay Summit and swore to give us equality and equal protection under the law, yet all I see when I visit this site is HATE disguise by virtue. In fact, every story on this Blog
that features a Person of Color will almost certainly have a
sarcastic negative connotation to it!!
You Racist Fags make me Sick!
Josh AZ
Obama will not back Gay Marriage until the POLLS make it safe to do so. He’s very much like Bill Clinton.
Dirty Ole Man
@ CHiTown Kev
Why don’t you sit your Uncle Tom Ass down somewhere!
Everytime you show up, it’s to defend the indefensible!
For a Black Man, you are a fucking disgrace! You apologize for
these Racist assholes by trying to use “peace keeper” logic.
You do the same shit on Rod’s boring ass blog!
You have ZERO credibility with me and your mama.
tjr101
I just vomited in my throat on reading someone saying they would survive a President Palin… Are you guys NUTS?
Your anger towards Obama is completely irrational to suggest this. How about surviving President Palin’s supreme court appointments. We will see laws similar to that being proposed in Uganda, SURVIVE THAT!
Robert, NYC
#41 Bill….excellent points and right on! Another thing,Obama has surrounded himself with the wrong people. Rahm Emmanuel is definitely the wrong guy to have around him, a right wing zionist conservadem who is anti-equality and then there are the other two, Geithner and Bernanke both of whom were part of the problem that brought about the disaster on Wall Street. He needs to reshuffle his cabinet and get rid of these clowns.
Chtiown Kev
@Dirty Ole Man:
Uh, I don’t think with the color of my skin, I think with my brain.
And anyone who knows me on these boards knows that I don’t think that Obama is any worse than Clinton (in fact, I think he’s a little better than Bill Clinton).
Defintely not an FDR or a LBJ (and no president will ever be another FDR simply because no President will ever win 4 terms again).
So you can quit your vitriol. I could care less whether the president is black, I care about what the man does.
So you can take your coon ass on somewhere else (you had no right to bring my mother into this, by the way. My mother loves Obama but she’s doesn’t love the president so much that she’s not critical of him. But of course, to negroes of your ILK, all you need to see is a black man in office and you think he’s doing just fine.)
My mama taught me waaaay better than that!
Chitown Kev
@Dirty Ole Man:
And let me ask you this.
What has Obama done that would benefit the black community thus far other than speeches (and he’s always good for a damn speech)? Oh, and saying that the Cambridge police acted stupidly to Henry Louis Gates (Obama was right about that, by the way, but he should have stayed on topic, which was health care).
Health care reform and JOBS, JOBS, JOBS are need in the black community and he hasn’t delivered.
All he’s done thus far (more or less) is presidented while black. And I guess that’s good enough for some black folks.
Bill Perdue
One – Unemployment and Poverty
As expected poverty and unemployment for working people who are Black, Latino, imported workers, native American, Asian Pacific becomes worse when a lapdog for Wall street like Clinton, Bush or Obama gets elected.
Anyone who denies that is dangerously out of touch or a paid agent of the Democratic National Committee or some other apologist group. In any case it’s safe to dismiss anything they have to say as gibberish or a lie.
(I have to break up the data and sources because Queerty only allows me two links per submission.)
[img]http://www.bls.gov/opub/ted/images/2009/feb/wk2/art02.gif[/img]
[img]http://www.nclr.org/section/marchemployment[/img]
Bill Perdue
Two
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2009/11/06/business/economy/unemployment-lines.html – This impressive interactive graphic was presented las November when the Ronald Reagan defined version of the unemployment rate was 10.2% but the real rate, as defined by the BLS was over 15%. It still is.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kQkGGwyTV0Q Obama, the wars and the murder of civilians and GIs. From Black Agenda Report.
http://angryarab.blogspot.com/2010/02/apology-accepted-keep-on-bombing-o.html From the http://angryarab.blogspot.com
Bill Perdue
Three
http://www.blackagendareport.com/?q=content/black-america-loses-gamble-electing-first-black-president
“On the Blackfoot Reservation in Montana, for example, the annual unemployment rate is 69 percent. The national unemployment rate at the very peak of the Great Depression was around 25 percent. That means that each year the Blackfeet people, whose aboriginal lands once comprised Glacier National Park, suffers an employment crisis nearly three times as severe as the Great Depression.” http://www.spotlightonpoverty.org/ExclusiveCommentary.aspx?id=0fe5c04e-fdbf-4718-980c-0373ba823da7
Bill Perdue
Four
http://www.nclr.org/, the website of the National Council of La Raza has frequent updates on the double exploitation of immigrant and imported workers.
From the US BLS :
http://www.bls.gov/cps/race_ethnicity_2008_unemployment.htm
Bill Perdue
@Robert, NYC:
Hi, Robert.
I don’t think he wants any changes or would accept our advice. What he wants is to make a bundle in office like his predecessors. It never ceases to amaze me that people can’t accept the fact that only venal, pathological liars have a chance to get elected.
The key characteristic of the late-stage American Republic is that shit rises. The last few decades of the dezinens of Congress and the White House are proof positive.
They’re not quite as crude and Roman Counuls (except for LBJ, Nixon and Clinton, who were as crude as you can get and still walk upright) but the similarities are there.
So now we can either wait for Caesar or take things into our own hands.
Gay and Proud
Hoonah Alaska police chief John Millan posted these comments about President Obama in the policelink website.
This is the kind of “community activist” Presidency we can expect for the next 3+ years. High taxes, gun control, gay agenda, retreat and defeat abroad and cop-bashing. Well news flash sports fans, this is the same ACLU lefty who refused to apologize for porta-potties on the police memorial, so what do we expect? Any sworn LEO who voted for this man, all I can say is SHAME.
http://policelink.monster.com/topics/63414-should-obama-have-criticized-the-cambridge-police-department-without-knowing-all-of-the-facts/posts?page=7
PopSnap
Im not defending him but its obvious WHY he did it. He would’ve lost more votes than gained if he said he support gay marriage; so he went for the “I support gays in everything but marriage” route and snagged the LGBT vote as well as some of the religious vote who were pissed off at Bush.
I’m sure he hasn’t changed his mind; he pretended to in order to make himself seem less “liberal” and more of a “compromising moderate”. Which is what he is and thats why he isn’t that good of a president
Colin
Why do we care if Obama backs us or not? clearly, you still can’t be elected president of the United States and support gay marriage. youd be viewed as too ‘left’ or ‘liberal.’ personally, obama probably has no problem with gay marriage, but doesnt really care either way. He never promised while running for president that he would support gay marriage, and thats fine.
stop bitching about Obama’s support and do something YOURSELF to support gay marriage. Tell your family, friends, and co-workers why it’s important in the scope of equality that it be legal. This isn’t Obama’s fight. This is OUR fight. This is OUR movement, the GLBT movement, that needs to lead the charge when it comes to OUR rights. JFK and Lyndon Johnson weren’t the leaders of the African American civil rights movement, and we can’t expect Obama to lead our movement.
Stan
From a progressive perspective, Obama has been lax on just about EVERYTHING.
if you’re looking for Martin Luther King or Harvey Milk…uh….Obama isn’t that. He’s a politician, just like any other President.
we’d have gotten no different if horse-faced Kerry was elected (he also refused to support gay marriage). The Democrats only want to seem left at times, but in reality, a lot of what they do is right-wing.
Wen
You American gay people have to vote for Obama in his next term, unless a republican stands up in favor of gay marriage (and DOMA, ENDA etc). And that will not happen.
It must be terribly frustrating to be faced with the reality Obama doesnt do (yet?) what he promised. But to vote-understandably, out of anger and disappointment-on republican candidate will guarantee you have to wait 10 more years.
Chitown Kev
@Stan:
Dr. Jeremiah Wright tried to tell folks that Obama was nothing more and nothing less than a politician.
Folks were too busy beating down on him as the messenger and did not focus on the message.