Subscribe to Breaking NewsLowenstein: Seriously, President Obama? Seriously?
How many times does something need to be repeated before people start believing it’s true?
I’m not sure there’s a standard answer to that question, but President Obama seems to be giving it a good try.
During Wednesday’s NBC White House special, Brian Williams asked Obama, “do gay and lesbian couples who wish to marry in this country have a friend in the White House?”
President Obama, who has consistently called himself a “friend” and “fierce advocate” for the LGBT community, didn’t hesitate before saying yes.
Well, good try, President Obama, but Williams question was specific. Do gays and lesbians who “wish to marry in this country” have a friend in the White House?
Perhaps not, which is why, I presume, Obama went on to ennumerate the many ways in which he thinks he supports the LGBT community. He wants, after all, gays and lesbians to have “the ability to visit each other in hospitals, uh, that they are able to access beneftis, uh, that they are, uh, have a whole host of legal rights that they currently, uh, do not have.”
My colleague James argued this morning that President Obama should get credit for trying, because he has to worry about voters in Texas and Georgia. That’s true, he certainly does. But I guess I’m not sure why I should care about that.
James is arguing, in essence, that Obama’s answer was about political power. How he gained it, how much he still has, and how he doesn’t want to let go of it. And I think that James is probably right. Obama’s answer was an incredibly awkward attempt at political calculation.
But what if instead of worrying about politics and power, Obama worried about moral authority? How he gained moral authority, how he can hold on to it, and how he can refuse to cede it in the face of small-minded bigots. Twice in the last few weeks, Obama has given speeches on the importance of remaining steadfast in our American ideals. First, when he announced his nomination of Judge Sonia Sotomayor to the Supreme Court, Obama emphasized a message of equal rights and social justice. Then yesterday, he delivered a speech to the Muslim world, much of which emphasized the necessity of holding on to moral authority at all cost.
President Obama is a smart guy. He knows what he’s doing is based on political calculation and not idealogy, and he knows that’s not courageous. As Andrew Sullivan put it recently (and it drives me crazy to quote Mr. Sullivan), Obama seems to be acting on LGBT issues with “the fierce urgency of whenever.” And that’s just not good enough.
You know the slave masters that were nice to their slaves? That’s the kind of ‘friend’ Obama is, in principal.
When did we ever believe he was on our side. Anyone who watched the debate on Gay issues in which Obama participated knew right away, the best we would get was “do no harm”
As I have stated before, I’ll believe Obama is being sincere when I see his signature on legislation passed by Congress. The proof is in the pudding, so to speak. Besides, the legislation can always be amended at some future date. But let’s keep the pressure on Obama and Congress to do something. That is the only way to victory.
If that fails, then maybe it’s time to take to the streets to get our point across.
I was very disappointed with how he said it. Mentioning about he support Civil Union (so not marriage equality). Then he went on and said he doesn’t believe the federal government should define marriage and should be left to the state. Well, not so. We have a law (DOMA) that defines marriage. State won’t do anything since DOMA exist. Since Obama is now not going to repeal DOMA, we are stuck with this federal definition. So it is a double edged sword. We can’t win either way. Unless DOMA is out, then it will have a better leverage for LGBT for marriage equality.
Even with Civil Union, I haven’t seen anything being done by the new administrations. May be I am a bit more critical because my live is on the line here and nothing else is more important than my live. Not the economy, not the car industries, or anything else.
I think Obama is beating aroung the “bush” and dodge answering directly what was being asked.
President Johnson, pushed for, and signed, the 1964 Civil Rights Act for Blacks even though he knew the Democrats would suffer grievously at the polls and would lose the South as many would defect to the Republican Party because of it. Johnson would not have defended segregation like Obama.
In an interview with NBCs Brian Williams, Obama noted marriage was a state issue that was not the providence of the federal government, and talked a little bit on how he would fight discrimination.
Well. gosh, marriage was a state issue too when his own, interracial, parents’ marriage was outlawed in all of the Deep South and in many other states until 1967 when the US Supreme Court (Loving -v- Virginia) stated very clearly that marriage IS a constitutionally protected FEDERAL right.
Hmmmm… And you were a constitutional law professor, Mr. Obama? I would say that would be hard to believe if I didn‘t already realize how being a politician transforms so many people with weak moral fiber into seasoned liars.
I have no doubt that if Obama was Johnson, in the mid sixties, and if he was White, he probably would have come out in favor of allowing Blacks to sit at different tables just a little bit closer to the Whites in public restaurants — and then joyously proclaimed himself to be a great Civil Rights Champion of the era.
Johnson did everything to make sure that even that kind of intolerable bullsh*t segregation (Obama would call it an “acceptable” compromise) didn’t even see the light of day in the Congress. And let’s not forget that, before President Johnson, Harry Truman desegregated the military in 1949 when the vast, vast majority of people were against it in America — unlike today, sixty years later, how +70% of the public are FOR lifting that immoral and unconscionable ban which prevents Gays and Lesbians service personnel from serving openly, with dignity and honor, in the US Armed Forces of 2009.
So what do we get from Obama, even when all of the major public polls demand an end to discrimination — NOTHING! Such first-class leadership from our current “fearless” President — even when the polls are FOR ending discrimination. Obama is not a paragon of justice and virtue. It is all packaging. It is all hype. Even the Kool-Aid drinkers are beginning to see that he is no portrait in courage. He is no agent of “change you can believe in“. It is all an illusion created by a parasitic mass media dining on mass gullibility.
Obama is no man of vision and courage. He is nothing but a self-serving bigot and a moral coward of the vilest kind. He is NO different than the Dixie-crats in the Democratic party of the Deep South, in the 1960s, who made all kinds of promises to Black people about ending discrimination just to harvest their votes, and then did absolutely nothing after elected to office. Instead, they used the same familiar language, such as: It’s just not the right time for it…we have a war going on (WWII, Korea, Vietnam, etc.)….White people aren’t ready for it…there are other more important matters you know…don’t be selfish…don’t rock the boat…blah…blah…bs…bs…blah.
So, we’ll see if the tens of millions of voters in the GLBT community give this homophobic assh*le a pass again in 2012. And please don’t give us that hackneyed old crap about how Republicans would treat us sooooo much worst. Any comparison is like saying: Well, after all, the Republicans beat the Queers up and Democrats don’t — they just either turn their heads the other way or watch with indifference, unless, of course they are Southern Democrats (DINO — Democrats in Name Only) who join gleefully in on the bashing with the Republicans.
Also, don’t forget who gave us DADT and DOMA in the first place. If it was just the Republicans it would not have passed with a veto proof majority. Democrats were in control of the Congress in the first half of Clinton’s first term when DADT was passed, and significant numbers of Democrats were still in Congress, in the second half of Clinton’s first term, who gave their unqualified support to DOMA. And even if both bills passed without his signature and Congress overrode his veto, Clinton could have still vetoed those noxious discriminatory laws as a matter of principle. History would have honored him for it.
So, a plague on both their houses — both Republicans and Democrats. When you have to choose between the lesser of two evils, guess what, you still end up with EVIL. That is not acceptable to anyone with a modicum of human decency.
Likewise, if Obama thinks that we in the GLBT community should fight our battle for equality all on our own (unlike the support that Blacks got from President Johnson and the liberals in his party)…then fine, let him and the majority of Democrats get elected WITHOUT our help. F*ck them all!
But that doesn’t have to leave us without representation. If a liberal Third Party could capture at least ten percent of the seats in the House, and even a few seats in the Senate, they could be powerbrokers and control the agenda; keeping both major parties in check. It is far past time to start thinking about THAT option seriously. No more free rides from the GLBT community.
Earn our votes or do without them. It is a simple equation.
© Bud Evans, 2009
(If you’d like to check out my blog, click on the Blue Letters in my name at the top of this post to hyperlink to my website)
The argument that Obama is carefully weighing his political power does not have to be a negative. It is easy for you, Ms. Lowenstein, or me or any of the other commentators here, to posture about what we would do if we were in the president’s shoes simply because we are not. It is easy for us to criticize him because we don’t have to weigh the potential of our political losses on a national or global scale. It is easy for us to criticize him because we are not *personally* having to deal with fixing an economy in shambles, two plus wars in other nations, total financial meltdown, Supreme Court nominations, and myriad other subjects that actually do affect how many, many, many people (not JUST gays) are allowed to live their lives. It could be that Obama is weighing his political power in this case because he actually wants to see gay marriage become a reality. Can he say this without receiving gross backlash from his opponents? Hell, no! Obama is playing this situation cautiously and prudently. Additionally, politics actually DO have power in the government and the process of legislation. Lamenting that fact will never change it.
I’m really sorry that you people are so selfish and small-minded that you’d rather see the president commit political suicide over your pet issue than demonstrate the traditional virtues embodied and exhibited by people of all types who have ever had to fight for their rights. Gay people are not Obama’s only constituents, so stop acting like you are.
Pet Issue?
Equality a “Pet Issue?”
WOW, these Obama-kins are really brain washed. Scary!
I’m not inclined to give Obama a pass on gay issues because he’s taken action on so many different issues. This week’s speech in Cairo made it clear that this President is not inclined to indulge the whims of expansionists in Israel. He’s reached out to Muslims with a gesture of respect–not sucking up, but addressing equals. This is healthy stuff for our country. He’s taken action on the economy (which isn’t getting better yet, but isn’t racing downhill like it was). He’s worked to salvage the US auto industry. He’s done all these things and many more, all within six months.
But not a damn thing for us. No support for, say, a repeal of DADT to take effect in two years. No support to repeal DOMA and leave marriage to the states (which wouldn’t change anything anywhere in the South, thanks). Obama has shown respect and compassion for people across the country and across the planet. Except us. Now, if he were to do something as simple as make a speech at some gay dinner, and say that no, he wasn’t pushing on gay stuff yet, because the economy takes precendence, then that would be him acknowledging the absence of movement but not an absence of support (still fishy, but plausible). Nope, can’t do that. Of course, when it comes to cockblocking any political love for gays, Nancy Pelosi has been Obama’s wingman, and she needs to come under scrutiny too. But right now the issue is Obama, and for all the things he’s done, he refuses to resolve the primary civil rights issue of our time. Anyone who sees him as a master politician would do well to remember that Lyndon Johnson was a dirty S.O.B., and Johnson’s legacy was marred by Vietnam, but Johnson put his political soul into passage of the Civil Rights Act. He predicted the hit the Democrats would take for leading the charge on civil rights, and he was correct. (The GOP took advantage and picked up voters who wanted to keep segregation. This is something to brag about?) Johnson saw that history would excoriate him for not doing his all to see the Civil Rights Act passed. Obama acts as if honor and morality are simply yoked to politics in the here and now. He seems completely blind to time’s ability to reach a different and harsh judgement of those who refuse to do the right thing, and our rights are very much the right thing.
We do not need Obama to achieve our equality. DOMA and DADT will eventually be repealed, definitely in my lifetime (I’m 41). We have money and power to advocate for ourselves, and we are doing so. We’re bruised from fighting, and it would be nice if our “friend” could bestir himself to at least get us some Gatorade, but we’ll get through without him. I suspect that history will judge Obama more harshly on gay issues than it will Shrub, because Obama presents himself as so enlightened, where Shrub…hell, you know. It’s easier to forgive ignorance than it is to overlook a conscious gesture to deny equality to any Americans.
Mr Coffee. “Do no harm” was good enough to elect him over McCain and Palin. But Obama went and made these gay friendly promises and this time around the mainstream media is pressing him. If he doesn’t throw us some kind of bone, it is going to be a real issue come election time. His best course of action is to let GLBT lobbyists do their job, and get legislation written in Congress and then be the guy who signs it into law, after all, the average voter can’t be mad at Obama cause that’s what he promised. But for Obama to be hardcore gay friendly will alienate moderate right voters and would be more damaging to him come 2012. He’ll pass legislation that gets to his desk but that’s about it. I don’t see any initiative on his part coming.
I haven’t seen anything about this posted on the site:
http://www.towleroad.com/2009/06/signorile-palm-center-source-backs-bellini-claims-on-hrc-deal.html
Since Obama now is firm in his view that he believes in civil unions as a solution to our equality, and we all know it isn’t, what he’s doing is endorsing legal segregation, something that the Warren court disagreed with when it granted African-Americans their full civil rights during the 60s. Maybe he needs to re-read the decision. He of all people should know better than anyone when the court ruled that separate is not equal. I suspect he is of the view not unlike many African Americans and many whites, particularly right wingers and the majority in the republican party that marriage equality has nothing to do with civil rights. How convenient for him.
Two simple words to describe what i think about all this.
FUCK OBAMA.
He wont listen to us begging for our rights its time we show him that we can be a threat. It is time we start demanding our rights.
When will GLBT people learn that Obama has no time for them? We need to quit wasting time on Obama and ramp up our state by state effort for rights. That where progress will come not from the Obama administration and not from the federal government at this time,
The challenge to the antigay DADT ban was rejected by the US Supreme Court. That is breaking news at this moment, the headline from the online Washington Post newspaper at this moment. Just another message that the gay soldier in the trenches is still a second-class citizen who is not suppose to love, to date, to marry another adult of his or her own gender. Unlike in Canada where gay Canadian military personel can and do marry another office of their own gender.
I think it’s becoming more and more politically strained for Obama to maintain his pro-civil-unions (pro-apartheid, which is what civil unions really are) position given that he was publicly in favor of gay marriage in the 90’s, his Church and the Rev. Wright are in favor of gay marriage, and heck, even Dick Cheney is in favor of gay marriage.
With a “fierce advocate” like this, who needs enemies?