Obama to end military gay policy

[Tanasinn]

I'll be surprised if anything is done before his (potential) second term, what with the tremendous political capital he'll have to spend to do anything decent for gay rights - Democrats aren't like Republicans, they don't mindlessly obey the man at top. In the meantime, I imagine Obama is a savvy enough politician to know that he'll have the (reluctant, bitter) support of gay voters because the only alternative in American politics are the Republican Christ-lunatics, and staying home is almost as good as voting Republican. I don't expect anything but the most token of gay rights moves, particularly not with the economy in the trash and the health care circle jerk still on-hand.

[The Defenestrator]

I'm a little bit optimistic that this is going to lead to something real, for two reasons. First, this is making the news and raising the expectation that he's going to do something soon. If the story doesn't pan out, I think people will notice that he brought up the subject of DADT and then dropped it. It's slightly different from a campaign promise in that the campaign is a time when he's talking about his plan for his whole term, while this is something he chose to bring up now, when he has the ability to start pushing it immediately.

Secondly, while DADT is a gay rights issue, it's also a military issue. If Dems are attacked for this, they can respond that since we're fighting two wars right now, and have to deal with the threat of terrorism on top of that, it makes no sense to remove people from the military for something that minor. Or, in other words, "Why do you hate our troops?"

Besides, as Duckie has already posted, there's overwhelming support for repealing DADT. If 80% of Americans think it should be repealed, then the only people who Obama would lose political capital with are those who already think he's a spy from the People's Republic of Kenya.

(Go ahead and tell me why I'm wrong)

[SirNitram]

My own thoughts, for what they're worth.

1) Benefits to same-sex couples in State Department.
2) Bill for DADT assembled in House, 170~cosponsors.
3) His nominees who are gay, and supporting them against right-wing smears(Also, named an openly gay man as an ambassador; expect that hold to never, ever be let down by the christotaliban Senators)
4) He told Reid to do. Reid, instead of starting work, whines like a little bitch he doesn't have enough support.

[SirNitram]

(Go ahead and tell me why I'm wrong)

Sums it up nicely.

Can't even get through a session of speeches, signifying little procedurally, without the psych-brigade coming out to rail against all sorts of crap.

[Broomstick]

I think a lot of this boils down to some homosexuals not realizing that the top most important issues right now are healthcare and the economy. Are gay rights important? Absolutely. But having the right to marry and/or serve openly in the military will give little benefit if those same people have no access to healthcare and no jobs.

Like it or not, homosexuals are a minority. Fixing healthcare and fixing the economy will help many more people, including many homosexuals who need jobs and healthcare, than universalizing gay marriage or repealing DADT or DoMA.

If Obama fixes healthcare and the economy (or they get better during his term, which amounts to the same thing politically) then he will gain political capital, which may well be spent on homosexual rights/issues. If however, he spends his capital on homosexual issues first he may not have enough leftover for the top two items.

Is that a cold-blooded, calculated move? You bet. It's also how politics work in the real world. Obama is a nice guy with enormous personal charisma. He's also a cut-throat politican.

Certainly, there is a trend independent of Obama towards legalizing homosexual marriage, it is slowly creeping along state by state. That started happening before he was elected President, and it will no doubt continue even if he does nothing about it. Healthcare reform, however, requires top-down as well a grass-roots efforts to get done. We have 50 million people without insurance. Probably another 50 million with inadequate insurance. That means 1 in 3 Americans might as well be living the third world in regards to healthcare, 100 million people folks. Thousands of Americans are denied access to healthcare, which leaves them maimed or even dead and it is perfectly legal. In fact, insurance companies employees may well be rewarded for denying people medical treatment. And it's perfectly legal. Whereas injuring or murdering a homosexual is, clearly, a crime in all 50 states and in some cases (where the homosexuality was factor in the victim being targeted) it even calls for additional penalities.

So... cry all you want about discrimination and oppression, but I think there's room for argument that denying people healthcare that is all too frequently a matter of life or death is a far more pernicious problem than denying homosexuals the right to marry. After all, said homosexuals can live together, they can enter into legal agreements together, and they may well be alive for a future where they can marry - as opposed to people who die today because they couldn't get the medical care they needed to stay alive.

That said, I absolutely support equal marriage rights and military service. Absolutely. But saving lives takes priority over getting married.

Would life be even better if Obama manages to take healthcare, the economy/jobs, AND gay rights all this year? Of course. But he's a man, not saint or messiah, and he has limitations.

[The Duchess of Zeon]

I think a lot of this boils down to some homosexuals not realizing that the top most important issues right now are healthcare and the economy. Are gay rights important? Absolutely. But having the right to marry and/or serve openly in the military will give little benefit if those same people have no access to healthcare and no jobs.

Like it or not, homosexuals are a minority. Fixing healthcare and fixing the economy will help many more people, including many homosexuals who need jobs and healthcare, than universalizing gay marriage or repealing DADT or DoMA.

If Obama fixes healthcare and the economy (or they get better during his term, which amounts to the same thing politically) then he will gain political capital, which may well be spent on homosexual rights/issues. If however, he spends his capital on homosexual issues first he may not have enough leftover for the top two items.

Is that a cold-blooded, calculated move? You bet. It's also how politics work in the real world. Obama is a nice guy with enormous personal charisma. He's also a cut-throat politican.

Certainly, there is a trend independent of Obama towards legalizing homosexual marriage, it is slowly creeping along state by state. That started happening before he was elected President, and it will no doubt continue even if he does nothing about it. Healthcare reform, however, requires top-down as well a grass-roots efforts to get done. We have 50 million people without insurance. Probably another 50 million with inadequate insurance. That means 1 in 3 Americans might as well be living the third world in regards to healthcare, 100 million people folks. Thousands of Americans are denied access to healthcare, which leaves them maimed or even dead and it is perfectly legal. In fact, insurance companies employees may well be rewarded for denying people medical treatment. And it's perfectly legal. Whereas injuring or murdering a homosexual is, clearly, a crime in all 50 states and in some cases (where the homosexuality was factor in the victim being targeted) it even calls for additional penalities.

So... cry all you want about discrimination and oppression, but I think there's room for argument that denying people healthcare that is all too frequently a matter of life or death is a far more pernicious problem than denying homosexuals the right to marry. After all, said homosexuals can live together, they can enter into legal agreements together, and they may well be alive for a future where they can marry - as opposed to people who die today because they couldn't get the medical care they needed to stay alive.

That said, I absolutely support equal marriage rights and military service. Absolutely. But saving lives takes priority over getting married.

Would life be even better if Obama manages to take healthcare, the economy/jobs, AND gay rights all this year? Of course. But he's a man, not saint or messiah, and he has limitations.

Why do you deserve to live when we don't deserve to marry?

No, gay rights does take precedence, because it's an openly discriminatory thing. It's targeted against a specific minority population, and hey, guess what? Universal healthcare isn't going to help me with any of my medical bills.

For many years part of the reason I opposed UHC was because I didn't think anyone else deserved healthcare when I wasn't going to get it within a hundred years of UHC being enacted. Now I've become less vindictive in general, but still, Broomstick, this is a fundamental ethical blight on our civilization, and removing it, just like the Civil Rights battles of the 1960s, takes precedence. Your argument makes me think a lot of the "Vietnam First" debate in the black civil rights movement in the 1960s, really, and it's no surprise that MLK's efforts began to crack the moment he ignored what the fundamental, core goal of his movement was to involve himself in other things.

Sorry, but the economic situation and healthcare simply aren't relevant to very real and legal discrimination against a minority. By all means, solve them, but it would take two fucking days for a single intern to copy and paste amended language onto the current law to create a bill, and it could be brought before the appropriate Senate committee and dealt with in a week, and then go back to work on your hot-button issues or whatever.

[Serafina]

I agree with Marina - it's not exactly a matter of limited resources where you have to choose between two things.

Sure, Obama (and the rest of the Democrats) can not do anything at once - but that IS saying "hey, you are just that important" to the gay community.
Overall, the worst that can happen if they do anything is that they catch even more flak from the rightwingers.
It's not like they have to barter about votes like "ok, we will postpone gay rights if you vote for our healthcare bill" - it's not like they can convince these nutjobs anyway.

This is especially true in the case of military policy - afaik, all Obama has to do is revoke it. Sure, that requires more than jut an hour - but's its not like it is an insurmountable barrier.

[Lonestar]

Why do you deserve to live when we don't deserve to marry?

Sorry, but UHC is something that is targeted for EVERYONE, as opposed to Gay Rights which is targeted for a minority(yes, I know that it doesn't do anything other than elevate that minority to equal status, but one is easier to sell with better societal gain than the other)

[Broomstick]

Why do you deserve to live when we don't deserve to marry?

Because healthcare and jobs affect homosexuals and heterosexuals, and if you're dead from lack of healthcare then you can't marry anyway.

And please don't twist my words - absolutely you deserve to marry. Unquestionably equal marriage rights is the moral good here. But I feel being alive is more important than being married. I believe that people getting a divorce - which does happen - so illness or injury to a spouse doesn't cause destitution to an entire family is as much an outrageous situation as two same-sex people either not being permitted to marry, or not having their marriage recognized is all states in accordance with the full faith and credit clause of the constitution.

Universal healthcare isn't going to help me with any of my medical bills.

Legalizing gay marriage throughout the US won't help with your medical bills, either.

Would it help if I stated that treatment for transsexuality - including surgery and required supplements, all follow up treatment, etc. - should ALSO be included in universal health care? Because it certainly SHOULD BE as your condition is most certainly defined as a condition calling for medical treatment.

Broomstick, this is a fundamental ethical blight on our civilization, and removing it, just like the Civil Rights battles of the 1960s, takes precedence. Your argument makes me think a lot of the "Vietnam First" debate in the black civil rights movement in the 1960s, really

Oddly enough, though, we wound up with major civil rights legislation years before the Vietnam war ended.

We really don't know what's around the corner. Obama might pull off all of the above in the next six months. If he does, great.

Sorry, but the economic situation and healthcare simply aren't relevant to very real and legal discrimination against a minority.

Yes, it is relevant. If we had UHC then it wouldn't matter whether a same sex spouse could or couldn't get coverage on his/her spouse's health plan from work, would it? Lack of jobs affects everyone regardless of sexual orientation. Or are you defining homosexuals solely in terms of their sex lives? Having a place to live, food to eat, equal access to medical care when you need it... these are all important, too, and affect not only those homosexuals desiring marriage but ALL homosexuals, bisexuals, and any other variant.

By all means, solve them, but it would take two fucking days for a single intern to copy and paste amended language onto the current law to create a bill, and it could be brought before the appropriate Senate committee and dealt with in a week, and then go back to work on your hot-button issues or whatever.

Except there's no way in hell that it would happen that way. The Conservatards would leap onto it and do their level fucking best to use it to tear down the current administration.

We've got several moral issues here at once. One of them is the morality of discriminating against people due to their sexuality. That is repugnant and disgusting. The other moral issue is people dying because they don't have access to health care. That is also repugnant and disgusting. As I said, if I must choose between the two (and I'd prefer not to have to make such a choice, but the world sucks sometimes) I'll take the choice that leaves you alive next week to bitch about marriage rights rather than the choice that might leave you married but dead. Or maimed in a way that could have been prevented.

[Duckie]

Broomstick, you seem to be horrifically and terribly misinformed that gays have all rights straights have save the right to be married and that all the current battles are about Same Sex Marriage. 90% of the work being done is laying things down like it being illegal to fire gays from their job save for soldiers and churches- that is winding its way through Congress, which incidentally is why LGBT persons have the worst rate of health care coverage of any minority one can name due to the majority of US health care being employer based. Healthcare reform without a public option won't matter one whit to many people if they can still be fired on a whim, especially since both persons have to work because they can't share eachother's health care- an economic problem not inflicted on most straight families.

This really is a problem with the gay rights movement. While Same Sex Marriage is exciting and fun, and winning SSM really helps other battles simply because people will easily okay things like housing non-discrimination once marriage equality is passed, often observers seem to forget there are actual and significant things denied to the gay community. No one has died of lack of marriage. Well, except maybe if they can't use their partner's health insurance or similar scenarios. But nobody has directly died. But Gay Marriage isn't all that is being done.

While health care would still save more people and in the long run is- from a utilitarian perspective, and not an explicitly moral one- the superior thing to focus on, gay rights can't be cast as a completely frivolous marriage-only matter.

[The Duchess of Zeon]

As a question, do you categorically reject any kind of violent resistance to oppression? Because your argument only makes sense in that context. If no form of oppression is ever worth killing people over, then it's certainly true that UHC takes precedence over gay rights, but if there are cases where oppression demands action, even violent action, then telling dying people that they're dying because their government oppressed a minority, is perfectly viable. If 625,000 people were killed to free the slaves in America, why are a few already gravely ill people slipping away in the meantime suddenly an issue for which we should wait?

And make no mistake, Broomstick, it's just a FEW. Six percent of American citizens will still not have health insurance under the bill Baucus cooked up for the insurance companies whose cocks he sucks. That's 18 - 20 million people that will still be uninsured unless the House manages to pull over a miracle with a public option. So why does the bill even matter? Without a public option, we would be better off if the bill fails. I would consider the passage of any kind of health care reform without a public option to be the biggest travesty on the planet and I'd encourage every legislator I could to vote against it. The current system is better than literally turning the entire population of America into debt-slaves for insurance companies, and that's what you want to hold gay rights up for? Your own slavery to some corporate fat-cats?

[Shroom Man 777]

But it's not like you're being actively oppressed. Unless if you also think that you're being neglected and denied whenever you're just second or third in a waiting line, while someone with a more serious problem is ahead of you, and you'll be tended to shortly afterwards.

But eh, if you think you're being oppressed, then go ahead - resist violently.

[Thanas]

As a question, do you categorically reject any kind of violent resistance to oppression? Because your argument only makes sense in that context. If no form of oppression is ever worth killing people over, then it's certainly true that UHC takes precedence over gay rights, but if there are cases where oppression demands action, even violent action, then telling dying people that they're dying because their government oppressed a minority, is perfectly viable. If 625,000 people were killed to free the slaves in America, why are a few already gravely ill people slipping away in the meantime suddenly an issue for which we should wait?

Marina, this argument makes no sense. For once, There are not just 625.000 people who will have their lives ended, but far more due to lack of healthcare. And oppressing gay rights has nothing to do with Universal Health Care because lack of universal health care is not what is oppressing gays. Unless you want to go flat out and say right here that Obama should focus on getting a bill passed that will face far more opposition than any UHC bill ever did. What is your evidence that a gay marriage bill has any hope of passing? The republicans will still fight it tooth and nail, maybe even moreso than they currently do UHC.

Comparing it to the civil war is also not a very good argument, because at that time slavery was the greatest injury to society. Gay oppression is not, as unless I am mistaken, more people are killed and will be killed this year due to lack of healthcare than through any gay oppression in the United States. Dead people are not going to be able to profit society any more. And it is not just the old people who are already dying. The USA has the highest infant mortality rate of any country in the western world. Bluntly put - lack of healthcare kills more prospective productive members of society than gay oppression ever will. Not saying it should be upheld, but from a purely logical perspective, then yes, UHC should be and currently is a bigger and more important thing to get.

[The Duchess of Zeon]

Marina, this argument makes no sense. For once, There are not just 625.000 people who will have their lives ended, but far more due to lack of healthcare. And oppressing gay rights has nothing to do with Universal Health Care because lack of universal health care is not what is oppressing gays. Unless you want to go flat out and say right here that Obama should focus on getting a bill passed that will face far more opposition than any UHC bill ever did. What is your evidence that a gay marriage bill has any hope of passing? The republicans will still fight it tooth and nail, maybe even moreso than they currently do UHC.

Comparing it to the civil war is also not a very good argument, because at that time slavery was the greatest injury to society. Gay oppression is not, as unless I am mistaken, more people are killed and will be killed this year due to lack of healthcare than through any gay oppression in the United States. Dead people are not going to be able to profit society any more. And it is not just the old people who are already dying. The USA has the highest infant mortality rate of any country in the western world. Bluntly put - lack of healthcare kills more prospective productive members of society than gay oppression ever will. Not saying it should be upheld, but from a purely logical perspective, then yes, UHC should be and currently is a bigger and more important thing to get.

Well--my argument is that if equality is worth killing people over, then it's ethical for oppressed and unequal peoples to let people die of untreated health issues because they're forcing their own equality through the government first. Does that mean other people should support it, or that this is the tactically correct course of action? I don't know and I'm not even trying to answer that. It's just that Broomstick by telling us to shut up and wait in line is positioning herself with the same people who told blacks that they should shut up and wait as there were more pressing issues than their equality.

[Thanas]

Well--my argument is that if equality is worth killing people over, then it's ethical for oppressed and unequal peoples to let people die of untreated health issues because they're forcing their own equality through the government first.

That does of course assume that the two problems are equally grievous, which they are not, and that these are two seperate groups here, which is also not the case because there is a serious overlap.

Does that mean other people should support it, or that this is the tactically correct course of action? I don't know and I'm not even trying to answer that. It's just that Broomstick by telling us to shut up and wait in line is positioning herself with the same people who told blacks that they should shut up and wait as there were more pressing issues than their equality.

I find that hard to believe as the vietnam war has not killed millions of americans. The two things are not up to scale. Lack of UHC is the number one killer in the USA (discounting diseases). Meanwhile, the lack of black civil rights are opppressing a large part of america. As does the lack of gay equality. But the people who said Vietnam should come first had no argument in the first place, as the two things did not require political capital - and Johnson had way more control over the congress than Obama will ever have.

I do not think one can really compare the two, unless you like me saying "this is just like the Bar Kochba insurrection" everytime an insurrection is brought up.

[Broomstick]

Broomstick, you seem to be horrifically and terribly misinformed that gays have all rights straights have save the right to be married and that all the current battles are about Same Sex Marriage.

Quite the contrary. I am well aware that same sex marriage is a small part of what needs to be corrected, and it's a pity that's the part that gets paid all the attention in the media.

90% of the work being done is laying things down like it being illegal to fire gays from their job save for soldiers and churches- that is winding its way through Congress, which incidentally is why LGBT persons have the worst rate of health care coverage of any minority one can name due to the majority of US health care being employer based. Healthcare reform without a public option won't matter one whit to many people if they can still be fired on a whim, especially since both persons have to work because they can't share eachother's health care- an economic problem not inflicted on most straight families.

This may come as a shock to you, but straight people can be fired on a whim, too. Anyone who isn't a white, male, Christian under the age of 35 is more likely to be let go than the white, male, Christian under the age of 25. It is entirely legal for an employer to refuse to provide insurance for any but the employee, leaving heterosexual spouses and dependent children entirely without coverage and it's becoming more and more common. If you blithely assumed that straight people are not subject arbitrary termination based on prejudice, if you assumed that health coverage of spouses was automatic in all circumstances, it is YOU who is uninformed.

With UHC your employment status doesn't matter - whether you're straight, gay, employed, unemployed, 6, 16, 46, or 86 you will have coverage. In other words, UHC would solve that item on the "gay agenda" just as it will for everyone else. In other words, this is not a "straight" or a "gay" issue it is a universal issue and, since you have common cause with everyone else, you should work for it for everyone else.

This really is a problem with the gay rights movement. While Same Sex Marriage is exciting and fun, and winning SSM really helps other battles simply because people will easily okay things like housing non-discrimination once marriage equality is passed

No, it won't. Legalized SSM will not end housing discrimination any more than legal marriage between black people ended housing discrimination for black people. The people who don't like/fear/hate gays will not be any more willing to live next to a married gay couple than an unmarried gay couple.

No one has died of lack of marriage. Well, except maybe if they can't use their partner's health insurance or similar scenarios.

Which problem would be solved by UHC.

While health care would still save more people and in the long run is- from a utilitarian perspective, and not an explicitly moral one- the superior thing to focus on, gay rights can't be cast as a completely frivolous marriage-only matter.

Nor are many gay issues in reality strictly gay. UHC being an excellent example.

[Alyrium Denryle]

Mike et al.

While I agree that if a choice is forced healthcare reform in what I will also agree is our shitty little excuse for a country is more important, I will contest that in the case of DADT the choice is not forced. Killing that abomination will take little political capital as it already had broad support with both parties. Moreover it will shore up his approval among his progressive base which is becoming increasingly bitter. It could be done in a week.

Moreover, god damn it I am sick and fucking tired of being taken for granted by politicians. This very thread reveals it. "What are you going to do? Vote republican?" That is the exact attitude that democrats have toward us and I am sick of it. Being used and abused because we dont have any other viable choice. What I want is a token effort, Something to indicate to us that our interests matter. That it is indeed their intention to make good on their otherwise empty promises at some point and not just keep paying us lip service. Repealing DADT would be a step in the right direction. Otherwise there is no reason for me to not vote third party. If they cannot even get THAT done what chance is there for healthcare reform? By voting for them I might as well be voting republican, the results are the same. I might as well vote Green or Socialist.

With UHC your employment status doesn't matter - whether you're straight, gay, employed, unemployed, 6, 16, 46, or 86 you will have coverage.

Even with a public option, we are not getting UHC. We are getting the Quasimodo (half formed... appropriate) between it, and Ayn Rand. Better than what we have now, but that is not saying much.

[Broomstick]

As a question, do you categorically reject any kind of violent resistance to oppression?

No. But the bar for finding violent resistance acceptable is something I would set quite high.

Because your argument only makes sense in that context. If no form of oppression is ever worth killing people over, then it's certainly true that UHC takes precedence over gay rights, but if there are cases where oppression demands action, even violent action, then telling dying people that they're dying because their government oppressed a minority, is perfectly viable. If 625,000 people were killed to free the slaves in America, why are a few already gravely ill people slipping away in the meantime suddenly an issue for which we should wait?

Because people don't die for being unable to marry, they die for lack of health care access, and that applies to EVERYONE, not just gays!

And I'm surprised you are taking the tired old meme of "the Civil War was about slavery" because it wasn't - it was about State vs. Federal rights. Slavery was part of that dispute but not the whole of it.

And make no mistake, Broomstick, it's just a FEW. Six percent of American citizens will still not have health insurance under the bill Baucus cooked up
for the insurance companies whose cocks he sucks. That's 18 - 20 million people that will still be uninsured unless the House manages to pull over a miracle with a public option. So why does the bill even matter?

Because reducing the non-covered from 50 million to 20 million represents progress, just as legalized SSM marriage in some states rather than no states represents progress.

You speak as if the Baucus bill is a done deal. It is not.

And, to top it off – I understand that LGBT rights are high on your list of personal wants and needs as it is a personal issue with you. Likewise, healthcare is important to me as I have a spouse with multiple chronic medical conditions that we can not pay for out of our own income. If we did not have health insurance he would die – slowly, painfully, going blind and having his kidneys fail and his feet literally rotting off. This is not hypothetical, it is reality. That is how you die from untreated diabetes that is not quite severe enough to drop you into a coma. He would, perhaps, have two years to live without his medication. Maybe. And slow, painful, helpless, undignified years they would be.

Without a public option, we would be better off if the bill fails. I would consider the passage of any kind of health care reform without a public option to be the biggest travesty on the planet and I'd encourage every legislator I could to vote against it.

Incorrect - a requirement for mandatory coverage without a public option would be the travesty, not a bill that lacks both.

The current system is better than literally turning the entire population of America into debt-slaves for insurance companies, and that's what you want to hold gay rights up for? Your own slavery to some corporate fat-cats?

Again, you are assuming the worst outcome, as is typical of you. I admit the situation does look grim at present, but the outcome is not yet final. Please save the hysterics for when they are actually called for.

And what Thanas said. (Damn, how did you get so eloquent in a second language? Makes we wish I could read German so I can see how you do in your native tongue)

Well--my argument is that if equality is worth killing people over, then it's ethical for oppressed and unequal peoples to let people die of untreated health issues because they're forcing their own equality through the government first.

Marriage equality is not worth killing people. Lack of marriage is not as deadly as lack of health care.

Now, if beating homosexuals to death was legal THEN you would have a leg to stand on in that argument, but it’s not.

Personally, I’d rather see a LOT of other legal and rights protections for LGBT people before SSM. As noted, in some places it is entirely legal to fire people for no other reason than they are homosexual or transsexual. I would rather see THAT changed before SSM. I’d rather see protections for LGBT people seeking housing before SSM. Why? Because having a place to live and means to support yourself is more important than being married. Being able to get healthcare when you need it is more important than being married.

It's just that Broomstick by telling us to shut up and wait in line is positioning herself with the same people who told blacks that they should shut up and wait as there were more pressing issues than their equality.

Oh, please – you forget, I’m on your side here. You don’t need Obama’s approval to keep working towards equal rights for LGBT people. It would be sad if you did. The fact is that even if Obama obliterated DoMA and DADT tomorrow morning at 8 am Eastern Time you STILL wouldn’t have equal rights. Why? Because marriage law resides with the states, not the Feds, and most states still do not recognize, or even explicitly ban, SSM, in defiance of the full faith and credit clause. The ONLY way to resolve that is the Supreme Court, not the Executive or Legislative branches of US government. Either that, or a constitutional amendment. Good luck with that!

MOST of the civil rights gains for ethnic minorities were, in fact, done through the courts, not Congress and not the Executive. Hanging all hopes on Obama is both foolish and wrong.

Enormous progress has been made on LGBT rights within my lifetime without active support from the PotUS (indeed, there has often been active opposition). Absolutely it would be better if you had the support of the PotUS, but lack of it shouldn't stop you, it certainly hasn't so far.

The only thing that Obama can really change at the stroke of a pen is DADT. And he SHOULD. Absolutely he should do that.

[SirNitram]

It's nice to know, down underneath the niceities to their allies, it comes down to a straight life being worth less than a gay marriage. Because that's exactly what it said on the tin.

I know it's a hugely important issue. It's why, despite having a failing fucking liver and having to move at a moment's notice for any time from the next second, and many years from now, I have done what I can for gay rights. Not just marriage. I push lawmakers for everything from the latest Matthew Shepard bill(And by the way, I made sure to show my support for the guy introducing it as including 'Gender Identity' got it in the meaningful way, a donation), I do what I can in states(I related most of it the last time this firefight sparked up, but yes, I've been doing what I can in Maine, same as always), and I do the donation and supporting letter to the co-sponsors of the DOMA repeal lately, and once a goddamn congresscritter puts it on the agenda, I was planning on keeping at it.

Now I'm having doubts. Because apparently all this isn't enough; my life should last in limbo or even end, because marriage isn't here yet. Frankly, I can't do more.

ANd if this still gets me lumped in with the 'My marriage comes before your life' crap, fuck you all. I'm going to focus on my minority. Because I learn a valuable lesson with this repetitive crap: Look out for your own. No one will give those who help others a second of respect.

[Pick]

It seems to me that once we accept things as being low-priority, they have a tendency to stay there indefinitely. Essentially, being second in line forever. Unless you think the "big" issues are going to step aside any time soon.

[Broomstick]

UHC has been waiting since the Nixon administration (he first proposed it). Is it news that things take time? Healthcare has been pushed to the back burner plenty of times, too.

There is a LOT of shit that needs fixing, a lot of it serious. But putting marriage before human lives is a bizarre sort of priority.

[Darth Raptor]

Now I'm having doubts. Because apparently all this isn't enough; my life should last in limbo or even end, because marriage isn't here yet. Frankly, I can't do more.

The Duchess is speaking for crazy people, not gay people. Please, just, try to remember that. I can't afford any health insurance either, and while I'd love to marry my boyfriend (entirely for the MONETARY BENEFITS), I have no fevered delusions about which one takes priority.

[SirNitram]

UHC has been waiting since the Nixon administration (he first proposed it). Is it news that things take time? Healthcare has been pushed to the back burner plenty of times, too.

FDR, actually. Look for his 'Second BIll Of Rights' speech.

[montypython]

UHC has been waiting since the Nixon administration (he first proposed it). Is it news that things take time? Healthcare has been pushed to the back burner plenty of times, too.

There is a LOT of shit that needs fixing, a lot of it serious. But putting marriage before human lives is a bizarre sort of priority.

G.B. Shaw's point of 'deprivation of the body degrades the spirit' is something that ideologues of different stripes prefer to disregard for their own pet POVs, but placing POV above improving material conditions just ends up getting neither at all.

[Invictus ChiKen]

Now I'm having doubts. Because apparently all this isn't enough; my life should last in limbo or even end, because marriage isn't here yet. Frankly, I can't do more.

ANd if this still gets me lumped in with the 'My marriage comes before your life' crap, fuck you all. I'm going to focus on my minority. Because I learn a valuable lesson with this repetitive crap: Look out for your own. No one will give those who help others a second of respect.

Agreed at this rate the crazies in the gay community are going to set there own cause back to pre-stonewall days and will have no one but themselves to blame.