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Loading ...Obama to sign hate crimes bill
10.26.2009 2:26pm EDT
The Advocate is reporting that Barack Obama will sign into law the Matthew Shepard & James Byrd Hate Crimes Prevention Act on Wednesday.
The new law will protect victims of crimes who are targeted because of sexual orientation or gender identity, which is an expansion of the federal hate crime law.Obama will sign the legislation – and make remarks – at 4:45 pm EST on Wednesday.
OMG. The Democrats finally passed something without gear of offending the Republicans?
The signing of this Hate Crimes Act by President Obama is going to bring a great sigh of relief from millions of Gay and Lesbian hearts throughout America. While it may not be the end all of the attacks toward our Community, the nation is moving in a positive direction. Unfortunately, you are always going to get those thick skulled bullhunks out there who will somehow elude justice for their crimes of hate and murder of Gay people. Even in Canada where we have had hate crime laws on the books for a number of years now, we still suffer from time to time at the hands of these homophobic bigots – if they have enough evil and hate in them, no law will ever stop them.
The Republicans were scared of it and I can’t believe the number of them who abandoned our troops over this! Imagine Republicans voting against defense spending!
@Ginelle – How do you figure this is going to put Gay & Lesbian hearts at ease? This is next to nothing. These same assholes who have been in the Senate for the last decade straight have knocked this shit down every year for the last 10 (TEN) years. Obama had nothing to do with this with the exception that he said he would sign it if it came to him, not that regardless of what happened in the Senate that he was going to force this down their throats if they liked it or not.
He isn’t our savior you know. I do not foresee him being the great leader of change he promised to be. He’s just as big a liar, crook, and flip-flopper as every last one of them politicos.
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On a lighter note, it is about goddamn time this law goes into effect. Judy Shepard has been trying, tirelessly mind you, for the last 11 years to get this passed…and not once did it make it until now. Fuck Politicos, Fuck D.C., and so far Fuck Obama. I hope Hills runs in 2012. She’s got my vote.
If you have any $$ to spare, you should donate to The Matthew Shepard Foundation in support of the Shepards tireless fight for LGBT rights and equality. THEY deserve your money far more then the big man does.
Now hopefully he will follow the governator’s example & start doing instead of talking bout acknoledging ALL of OUR RIGHTS!
Joey in CT: take a second to enjoy the victory. You started with “On a lighter note” only to verbally fuck a list of people in the same paragraph. I understand your frustrations but, that type of energy isn’t going to help anything.
I’m glad that not only did this bill pass the senate again but there is a president that is willing and happy to sign this bill into law. That shows some progression in my eyes and steps to get some things down without dragging your feet to do so.
Oh come on, I love to give Obama a hard but this is not the time. Even if this bill had magically passed under Bush, he promised to veto it. So atleast we had a congress and president to atleast pass one piece of legislation and it gives me hope we will finally see DADT repealed etc.
Joey in CT: Blame the Republican leadership in Congress from 1992 to 2007. They quite literally would not allow this bill to come to a vote.
The dems tried to pass it last session only to drop it when Bush said he would veto it.
@ Kari: Do a little more research on why the bill floundered for so long. First of all, how are you blaming the congress back to 1992? The bill was first introduced in 2001. 3 consecutive times it was introduced and failed to pass the committee. Then, the bill was introduced in 2007 for a 4th time, except that it was attached to the Defense Reauthorization Bill. Yes, Bush expressed that he would veto the bill if it came to his desk attached to some other piece of legislation, but what you fail to mention is that there was GREAT opposition to the Defense Reauthorization Bill from Anti-war Democrats.
This combination of factors led to the amendment eventually being dropped by the DEMOCRATIC LEADERSHIP.
No need to point fingers. Both parties have their problems, and for now, both parties are doing little in the way of guaranteeing ME, the rights I deserve.
There are some Log Cabin Republicans mourning right now.
No Log Cabin Republicans are “mourning” the passage of this bill. You assume that to be a Republican is to agree with everything that the Republicans do. This bill should have been passed loooooong ago, and Log Cabin Republicans have been outspoken proponents of this bill within the Republican party. I feel compelled to ask, as I am assuming you consider yourself a Democrat, do you agree with EVERYTHING, every platform of the Democratic party? If you do, then you probably don’t pay much attention to the world of politics. As the degree of in-fighting amongst Democrats is astounding.
In order to win over any sort of majority in this country regarding equal rights for gays, you are going to have to win over Republicans, and the Log Cabin Republicans understand this.
Hate LCR’s because they differ on their approach to achieving equal rights, but then you are no different than people who hate us for for who we love. Both is a hatred based on principal.
@MavFan
I hate no one, their actions I do. What’s disgusting is that the Republican party is obviously no longer the party of Lincoln. Your beloved party has been hijacked by the most vile people of our society. Yet you religiously go and support this party and it’s platform.
Is it for fiscal conservatism… please the last 8 years is a poor example. Individual freedom… please they want to ban same-sex marriage, get into our bedrooms and infringe on women and minority rights. When you have people like Sarah Palin, Santorum, Huckbee and Pawlenty as possible candidates for 2012, your party is in trouble.
Log Cabin Republicans have been relegated to the outside looking in, your leaders don’t even recognize you. Not one favorable policy was placed by Republicans for gays the last 8 years. It’s only now that DADT and DOMA is being discussed. Had it been McCain/Palin it would have been constitutional amendments.
No I do not agree with everything the Dem party does but at least they recognize the LGBT community and are not plotting to write discriminatory legislation like your beloved GOP.
Politics is all about the lesser of the evils. So when you Log Cabiners come on here bashing Obama, just remember that at least in our minds he is not Republican!
Your assumptions about me are numerous, unfotunately many are wrong. To start with, I am inherently non-religious. I am a hardcore atheist. I am all for womens’ rights to have an abortion, and I would never consider voting for Huckabee, or Palin in 2012.
When you consider “the lesser of two evils” you are placing higher priorities on certain agendas. In my mind, socialized healthcare and out-of-control spending is NOT the lesser of two evils. And if my memory serves me right, it was Clinton who, under some pretense of making a concession, instituted DODT.
When Bush signed DOMA, it made me sick. It made me angry. I probably felt many of the same emotions that you did. The difference is, I choose to fight this type of bigotry from within the “belly of the beast” so to speak. On the other hand, I am not willing to concede other issues that I hold dear, including strong national defense and small government. By the way, if government truely were “small” in a conservative sense, they would have little to no interest in what two consenting adults do in their own bedroom. This I believe is where you are refering to the hijacking of the GOP by the religious right. And to that assessment, I couldn’t agree with you more. Still, I cling to Lincoln’s Log Cabin, and will fight to bring the Republican Party more in tune with their true principals, one free of religious-based bigotry. (believe me, I get enough of that from my parents..)
I am thoroughly enjoying these discussions, as I am always interested in different opinions. And I would love to hear your perspectives.
As of Wednesday, it’s the first step. It’s real action. It’s not solely due to Obama, and it’s not like the Democratic caucus has asserted its power. But it’s a step. It’s a right step.
And yes, I will also take the opportunity to remind MavsFan of this simple truth. A significant percentage of the GOP caucus is so insistent on holding onto its homophobia that it chose to vote against military spending rather than do anything that would recognize gays.
One of those voting against was Senator Lamar Alexander of Tennessee. In 1979, Alexander was sworn in as Governor, three days early, in an attempt to close out the amazingly corrupt (Democratic) Blanton administration as quickly as possible. (Among other things, the outgoing governor had been selling pardons and parole to prisoners. His brother was in Federal prison for bid-rigging on highway contracts.) Alexander was elected because Tennesseans were tired of Democratic corruption. Thirty years later, as US Senator, Alexander voted against a defense spending bill because it included an expansion of civil rights for gays. “It’s a shame that this piece of legislation was added to a bill that’s supposed to be about supporting our troops” was his observation (McClatchy-Tribune News Service). I guess it was too distasteful for him.
So, MavsFan, I don’t claim this is conclusively damning of Alexander or any other no-voting Republican, but for me it shows just how much Lamar Alexander does not need to represent the state where I grew up. He is one of many who will even turn on a core constituency if it means thwarting gays. This is a politician who cleaned up after a corrupt predecessor, yet he clings to the notion that it’s perfectly fine to exclude some Americans from their Constitutionally-guaranteed equality. Why? Again, the only why is that the existence of bigotry is used as justification for its continuation. This is the face of today’s Republican Party, MavsFan. Bigotry. Homophobia. My America doesn’t need a party that believes in nihilism instead of equality under the law. Your GOP can rant all it wants about “traditional values,” but somehow Republicans (like Sen. Alexander) just can’t bring themselves to defend the traditional value of the Constitution. That’s why I have disdain for the GOP, and for politicians like Sen. Alexander whose bigotry has been put on such clear display.