Comments

You can follow this conversation by subscribing to the comment feed for this post.

1. Everybody, sing along!

   http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DAVI16FSjxU

   Posted by: Rad | Nov 7, 2006 12:10:59 PM

   
   

2. Way to go Bill. I still hope it's Hillary in 2008!

   Posted by: cool | Nov 7, 2006 12:21:28 PM

   
   

3. I must confess that I am confused. Clinton signed into law arguably the most prejudicial piece of legislation against gays and lesbians (DOMA), and yet he goes to these events. Is this some sort of penance? If he had acted to limit marriage for any other minority, I suspect he would know better than to show his face. Why do we embrace him? (And Hilary, for that matter.)

   Posted by: Dan | Nov 7, 2006 12:23:14 PM

   
   

4. Dan-agreed. Mr. Arndt's ex Reichen has written an entire book about his turmoil under 'don't ask, don't tell'. Yes, Mr. Clinton did a lot of good things for gays, that piece of legislation was junk.

   Posted by: Andrew | Nov 7, 2006 12:33:29 PM

   
   

5. Chip is the one who should have recieved an award from HRC...not reichen

   Hillary has compromised on our rights way too much.

   Retired 4 star General Wesley Clark on the other hand

   -supports gay couples having the same rights as straight couples (2003)
   - supports equal opurtunity in the millitary for gays unlike clinton's don't ask don't tell compromise (2003)

   Hillar is too polarizing...will drive out the repub base like no other candidate. Hillary will comrpomise on our rights to get power. Hillary has not yet repudated the Iraq war....will be like bush 1of 2 poeple who think iraq was a good thing.

   Support retired 4 star General Wesley Clark in the dem primaries. He supports the gay community
   

   Posted by: jimmyboyo | Nov 7, 2006 12:39:08 PM

   
   

6. Andrew, don't let Leland see that message. :0

   Posted by: Je | Nov 7, 2006 12:39:33 PM

   
   

7. Who cares about the Defense of Marriage Act? Clinton is a Democrat, so he deserves our undying love.

   Posted by: Wilma | Nov 7, 2006 12:55:26 PM

   
   

8. Hey Andy,

   I was one of the volunteers for this event and got to "meet and greet" the VIP's when they arrived for cocktails. Ten minutes before Clinton arrived, one of the organizers whispered to me, "You're about to get a surprise in a few minutes". I had no idea, but suspected Rosie O'Donnell. Imagine my surprise when Bill Clinton showed up. What an awesome experience!

   Posted by: Rick | Nov 7, 2006 12:57:06 PM

   
   

9. RE: Dan's comment. As I understand it, although prejudicial, "don't ask, don't tell" was a small step forward for gays in the military. Clinton should be commended for even addressing the elephant in the room- and he used his political capital to do so as the first issue of his first term.

   Posted by: DC8stretch | Nov 7, 2006 12:57:52 PM

   
   

10. Hoorah for Chip!

    Posted by: anon | Nov 7, 2006 1:01:47 PM

    
    

11. Looks like Chip is the real winner in the outcome of his relationship with Reichen. While one chases personal fame, the other chases the gay cause.

    Bravo, Chip!

    Posted by: Ryan | Nov 7, 2006 1:06:13 PM

    
    

12. Clinton thought that he'd push through the 'Don't ask' after misreading the hatred the GOP had for his win when he tried to open the ranks to gays. He cut and ran as soon as the heat was turned up on his miscalculation. He and Hillary are the perfect example of the career politicion. They will say or do what ever it takes to get and stay in office.

    That said I'm voting for them over anyone in the GOP. For the first time in years I'm happy to be voting for someone who I agree with on all levels for a major office, Elliot Spitzer, for the Governors office here in NY. Too often it is the lessor of two evils. I hope he proves to be the man I spoke to years ago at the Garden Party fundraiser for the Gay and Lesbian Center.

    Posted by: patrick nyc | Nov 7, 2006 1:11:54 PM

    
    

13. How do so many cocksuckingroach Repugs have time to rerun, yet again, their tired, half-truths about Clinton. Shouldn't you be out helping your Massas trick, block, intimidate, threaten potential voters not yet brainwashed to keep them in power?

    Whatever he failed to do, and I have never denied there was a lot, Clinton remains the most gay-affirmative, gay supportive President we've ever had, and he never, repeat NEVER proposed ripping us out of the US Constitution. He never, NEVER used antigay bigotry or homohysteria on the campaign trail, as Bush repeatedly has, including at EVERY campaign stop he's made in the past three weeks.

    By your standard of only judging people by cherry-picked parts of their past, all the voter obstruction and lies and legal chicanery and behind the scenes manipulation of the Supreme Court by the Repugs in 2000 would still not have put Bush in office because he wouldn't have even been on the ballot, having been rejected by the GOP as an AWOL alcoholic/cocaine addict married to a woman guilty of vehicular manslaughter.

    So, in the vernacular of the peasantry, shut the fuck up. No one's buying your propaganda anymore.

    Posted by: Leland | Nov 7, 2006 1:32:09 PM

    
    

14. Yes, nothing better demonstrates the hollow chocolate gym bunny that Reichen is than contrasting what he chose to do with his mini-fame from Amazing Race and what Arndt chose to do. Having read Reichen's book, it's obvious that it's just another vanity project. He cries a lot and uses every opportunity, real and imagined, to paint himself a martyr, including spending nearly two pages whining about having to work in a college dishwashing room while in high school and how unfair it was that he was fired after falsely being accused of kissing an "ugly" fellow female employee. He even admits that some things he describes as happening to him actually happened to others, and the only seriously traumatic incident--an attempted suicide by another Air Force Academy cadet--he never takes responsibility for having essentially caused by his own failure to warn him, as he had others, about an imminent mini gay witch hunt.

    And, oh yeah, he never even thanks Arndt without whom he would likely never have risen beyond a Bacardi Boy to get the chance to write the book, however bad or good, in the first place.

    Posted by: JP | Nov 7, 2006 1:49:43 PM

    
    

15. I don't totally agree with Patrick NYC, but he's the only one so far who knows his stuff. Clinton made gay rights (specifically in the military) one of his VERY first issues, and it was arguably the beginning of the rabid demonization by the Christian Right. The Repubs picked up on gays in the military and his 'woman' problems and raised the flag of morality. Clinton sacrificed more for gay rights than most of us would ever understand, and certainly more than any of us will ever do. For all the comments of 'slick Willy' it was an amazingly unslick move so early in his Presidency. He got ZERO support from the Dems and finally had to back away to salvage anything. We lost Health Care, the Congress, and potentially so much more because he did the unthinkable. He put his electoral capital on the line within weeks of his election for us. and he lost.
    Bill Clinton is many things less than perfect(MANY!!), but on this one issue he deserves our respect.

    Posted by: PSMike | Nov 7, 2006 1:51:49 PM

    
    

16. Leland posted as I was writing. Didn't mean to exclude his comments.

    Posted by: PSMike | Nov 7, 2006 1:53:25 PM

    
    

17. dc8stretch: I was in the Army when DADT was implemented and it most certainly was NOT a small step forward for gays in the military. It was a giant step back. The military leadership was royally pissed that Clinton was trying to force gays on them and we came under intense scrutiny, much greater than before. Suddenly, every commander wanted to start an investigation into anyone who wasn't overtly hetero. Gay soldiers had to either go deeper in the closet or get out. Unmarried female solders were branded as either sluts or dykes, with sluts preferable. Millions in tax dollars have been spent and countless military careers have been ruined by this bankrupt law.
    I believe that Clinton was trying to help us and screwed it up totally. I believe that, on balance, he did more for us than any other president, but that's not saying much. DADT was and is a disaster.

    Posted by: sam | Nov 7, 2006 1:56:22 PM

    
    

18. Here's a good timeline of the antigay industry put together by the Southern Poverty Law Center as a part of their study of hate groups. http://www.splcenter.org/intel/intelreport/article.jsp?aid=522

    They don't include the ripple effect firing of thousands of gays across the country generated by the anti "sexual perversions" Executive Order of, no, not Bill Clinton, but REPUBLICAN President Eisenhower in the 50s, and it only goes through 2004, and we know how much worse it's gotten since driven by, no, not Bill Clinton or even Hillary but REPUBLICANS like Tina-addict, male prostitute regular, and college gay orgy fantasizer the very Reverend Ted Haggart. Dan, JE, Wilma. Feel free to submit your counter history showing how many times Republicans have come to our aid and defense.

    "The Thirty Years War"
    A timeline of the anti-gay movement

    1977
    Born-again singer Anita Bryant campaigns to overturn an anti-discrimination law protecting gay men and lesbians in Dade County, Fla. Inspired by her victory, Bryant founds the first national anti-gay group, Save Our Children, drawing unprecedented attention to gay issues and motivating gay groups to organize in response.
    James Dobson, author of 1969 pro-spanking book Dare To Discipline, founds Focus on the Family in Arcadia, Calif. Focus will move to Colorado Springs, Colo., in 1991, become America's wealthiest fundamentalist ministry, and spearhead the campaign against gay marriage.

    1978
    Gay activist Harvey Milk, elected to the San Francisco Board of Supervisors in 1977, is assassinated on Nov. 27 (along with Mayor George Moscone) by right-wing religious zealot Dan White, a former city supervisor who had resigned in protest after the board passed a gay-rights ordinance.
    John Birch Society trainer and "family activist" Tim LaHaye publishes The Unhappy Gays (later retitled What Everyone Should Know About Homosexuality). Calling gay people "militant, organized" and "vile," LaHaye anticipates anti-gay arguments to come.
    California State Sen. John Briggs floats a ballot initiative allowing local school boards to ban gay teachers. "One third of San Francisco teachers are homosexual," Briggs says. "I assume most of them are seducing young boys in toilets." The initiative is defeated, but the campaign inspires anti-gay crusaders like the Rev. Lou Sheldon, who will found the Traditional Values Coalition in 1981.

    1979
    The Rev. Jerry Falwell founds the Moral Majority, a national effort to stimulate the fundamentalist vote and elect Christian Right candidates. Early fundraising appeals include a "Declaration of War" on homosexuality.

    1980
    Paul Cameron, former psychology instructor at University of Nebraska, begins publishing pseudo-scientific pamphlets "proving" that gay people commit more serial murders, molest more children, and intentionally spread diseases. Expelled from the American Psychological Association in 1983 for ethics violations, Cameron will continue to produce bogus "studies" widely cited by anti-gay groups.

    1981
    Moral Majority allies in Congress propose the Family Protection Act, which would bar giving federal funds to "any organization that suggests that homosexuality can be an acceptable alternative lifestyle." Despite President Reagan's endorsement, the bill is defeated.
    The Council for National Policy, a highly secretive club of America's most powerful far-right religious activists, begins meeting quarterly at undisclosed locations. Among the members will be R.J. Rushdoony, who calls for death penalty for homosexuals, and anti-gay crusaders James Dobson, Beverly and Tim LaHaye, Jerry Falwell, Tony Perkins and Phyllis Schlafly. George W. Bush will meet with the Council during his first campaign for president.

    1982
    The U.S. Department of Defense issues a policy stating that homosexuality is "incompatible" with military service. Almost 17,000 gay soldiers will be discharged during the 1980s, though a 1989 Defense Department study will find gay recruits "just as good or better" than heterosexuals.

    1983
    Pat Buchanan, communications director for President Ronald Reagan, calls AIDS, first identified in 1981, "nature's revenge on gay men."

    1984
    The Coalition on Revival is founded to promote "Christian government" in the U.S. and to agree on theological tenets — including anti-gay principles — that fundamentalists can rally around. Board members include Tim LaHaye, D. James Kennedy of Coral Ridge Ministries and Donald Wildmon of the American Family Association. Founder Jay Grimstead later tells The Advocate, "Homosexuality makes God vomit."

    1985
    Addressing the annual Conservative Political Action Conference, Paul Cameron uses the AIDS crisis to suggest that "the extermination of homosexuals" might become necessary. The following year, Colorado's Summit Ministries will publish Special Report: AIDS. Co-authored by Cameron, the popular pamphlet blames gay men for the epidemic and calls for a national crackdown on homosexuals.

    1986
    At the first Congressional hearings on anti-gay violence, Kathleen Sarris of Indianapolis tells of being stalked and assaulted by a "Christian soldier" who held her at gunpoint, beat and raped her for three hours, explaining that "he was acting for God; that what he was doing to me was God's revenge on me because I was a 'queer' and getting rid of me would save children."
    Anti-gay groups cheer the U.S. Supreme Court's 5-4 decision in Bowers v. Hardwick holding that state anti-sodomy statutes are constitutional. Four years later, Justice Lewis Powell, the swing vote, will tell New York University law students, "I probably made a mistake in that one."

    1987
    Boston's Gay Community News publishes a satire of anti-gay propaganda, beginning: "Tremble, Hetero Swine! We shall sodomize your sons, emblems of your feeble masculinity, of your shallow dreams and vulgar lives. We will raise vast private armies ... to defeat ... the family unit." Anti-gay groups seize on the article as proof of a "secret homosexual agenda."
    ]
    1988
    After a ferocious campaign by the fundamentalist Oregon Citizens Alliance (OCA), Oregon voters overturn their governor's executive order banning anti-gay discrimination in state hiring. Led by anti-gay crusader Lon Mabon, OCA claims "promiscuous sodomite activists" have called for "the closing of all churches that oppose them and the total destruction of the family."

    1989
    U.S. Rep. William Dannemeyer (R-Calif.) publishes a landmark anti-gay tome, Shadow in the Land: Homosexuality in America. Calling lesbians and gay men "the ultimate enemy," Dannemeyer accuses straight people of "surrendering to this growing army without a shot," and predicts gay rights will "plunge our people, and indeed the entire West, into a dark night of the soul that could last hundreds of years."

    1990
    University of Colorado football coach Bill McCartney founds Promise Keepers, which holds all-male stadium revivals promoting "traditional masculinity" throughout the 1990s. McCartney calls homosexuals "a group of people who don't reproduce, yet want to be compared with people who do reproduce," and says, "Homosexuality is an abomination of Almighty God."

    1991
    Pat Robertson founds the American Center for Law and Justice (ACLJ), run by Christian Right attorney Jay Sekulow. ACLJ will be instrumental in fighting gay marriage, calling it a cancerous "perversion" that "directly attacks the family, which is the most vital cell in society."

    
    1992
    Colorado voters approve Amendment 2, overturning municipal laws protecting lesbians and gay men from discrimination. One of the organizers, Tony Marco, hones a "special rights" argument, claiming that gay people are inordinately wealthy and politically powerful, and neither need nor deserve the rights they "demand."
    "The Gay Agenda," 20-minute video featuring racy scenes filmed at gay-pride marches, is released by Ty and Jeannette Beeson of the Antelope Valley Springs of Life church in Lancaster, Calif. Aired by Pat Robertson's "The 700 Club," it will become one of the most widely viewed pieces of anti-gay propaganda.
    At the Republican National Convention in Houston, Pat Buchanan famously declares in a prime time speech, "There is a culture war going on in our country for the soul of America." Cheering audience members wave signs reading "Family Rights Forever, 'Gay' Rights Never."

    1993
    The battle over gay marriage is ignited when the Hawaii Supreme Court rules that denying same-sex couples marriage licenses violates "basic human rights" guaranteed in the state constitution — unless the state legislature can show a "compelling reason" to prevent gay marriage. Anti-gay groups begin a campaign to "defend marriage," with legal challenges led by ACLJ's Jay Sekulow.
    President Clinton's proposal to lift the ban on openly gay military personnel sends anti-gay activists into action, shutting down phone lines to Congress with hundreds of thousands of calls in protest. "Honestly," asks D. James Kennedy in a fundraising letter for Coral Ridge Ministries, "would you want your son, daughter, or grandchild sharing a shower, foxhole, or blood with a homosexual?"
    The Cobb County (Ga.) Commission passes a resolution calling homosexuality "incompatible with the standards to which this community subscribes." Organizer Gordon Wysong declares, "We should blame them for every social problem in America." Cobb County will be dropped as a host for 1996 Atlanta Olympic events because of its anti-gay stance.

    1994
    More than 40 fundamentalist groups, led by Focus on the Family, hold a summit in Colorado to coordinate a "special rights" argument to oppose gay rights. This strategy is also promoted by the Traditional Values Coalition's "Gay Rights, Special Rights," a 40-minute video claiming gay rights will erode the civil rights of African Americans.

    1995
    The Pink Swastika: Homosexuality in the Nazi Party, by fundamentalist activists Scott Lively and Kevin Abrams, claims gays weren't victimized in the Holocaust, but instead helped mastermind the extermination of Jews (see story, p. 18). Repudiated by credible historians, the book is nevertheless praised by the Family Research Council and sold by several anti-gay organizations.

    1996
    The National Pro-Family Forum, dedicated to "one man-one woman" marriage, holds its first secret meeting in a Memphis church cellar with representatives from more than 20 major anti-gay groups. Before the end of the year, forum members successfully push the Defense of Marriage Act, a symbolic measure defining marriage as between a man and a woman, through Congress.
    The Southern Baptist Convention announces a boycott of Disney parks and products because the company gives insurance benefits to partners of gay workers and allows "Gay Days" at its theme parks. "Beware of the Magic Kingdom," Focus on the Family advises parents. Gay Day protests become a staple of the anti-gay movement.
    In Romer v. Evans, the U.S. Supreme Court rules Colorado's Amendment 2 (see 1992) unconstitutional by a 6-3 vote. The ruling puts an end to 20 years of state and local ballot initiatives aimed at stripping gays of anti-discrimination protections, leaving same-sex marriage as the main issue for anti-gay organizers.
    
    1997
    Ellen DeGeneres' character on the TV sitcom "Ellen" comes out as a lesbian, initiating protests and boycotts of sponsors led by Donald Wildmon and Jerry Falwell, who calls the actor "Ellen Degenerate."

    1998
    A coalition of fundamentalist groups led by Coral Ridge Ministries sponsors "Truth in Love," a million-dollar advertising campaign promoting "ex-gay ministries," which use discredited psychological methods to "cure" gay people. One day before a second round of "Truth in Love" ads is released, gay college student Matthew Shepard dies after being savagely beaten and left tied to a fence in Wyoming. The murder spurs a national debate about the connection between anti-gay rhetoric and hate crimes.
    In a TV interview, Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott (R-Miss.) compares gay people to alcoholics and "kleptomaniacs," earning praise from anti-gay activists. "Leaders willing to be set apart and stand solidly in the truth are rare in today's permissive culture," says James Dobson.

    1999
    Vermont Democratic Gov. Howard Dean signs a law sanctioning same-sex civil unions, entitling gay couples to marital rights and benefits. Anti-gay leader Gary Bauer calls it "an unmitigated disaster" that is "worse than terrorism."

    2000
    "Teletubbies" cartoon character Tinky Winky is "outed" as gay in a "Parents' Alert" in Jerry Falwell's Liberty Journal, which asserts, "He is purple — the gay-pride color; and his antenna is shaped like a triangle — the gay-pride symbol."
    The U.S. Supreme Court rules 5-4 that the Boy Scouts of America can continue to ban gay scoutmasters. Anti-gay activists like Robert Knight of the Family Research Council use the scouting controversy to revive anti-gay "child molester" propaganda. After CBS morning-show host Bryant Gumbel interviews Knight, he is heard on air commenting, "What a fucking idiot." Anti-gay groups label CBS the "Christian Bashing System" and lobby unsuccessfully for Gumbel's firing.

    2001
    On "The 700 Club" two days after the 9/11 terrorist attacks, Jerry Falwell blames the tragedy on "the Pagans, and the abortionists, and the feminists and the gays and lesbians who are actively trying to make that an alternative lifestyle." Host Pat Robertson responds: "Well, I totally concur."

    2002
    The Rev. Michael Bray, a convicted abortion clinic bomber and leading advocate of murdering abortion doctors, praises Saudi Arabia for beheading three gay men on New Year's Day. "Let us give thanks," Bray proclaims. "Let us welcome these tools of purification. Open the borders! Bring in some agents of cleansing."

    2003
    Alan Sears, head of the Alliance Defense Fund, co-authors The Homosexual Agenda, a book that asserts gay activists' ultimate goal is "silencing" conservative Christians. Sears also accuses cartoon character SpongeBob SquarePants of being gay.
    The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court rules 4-3 that gay and lesbian couples have a right to marry. In the Washington Dispatch, legendary fundamentalist organizer Paul Weyrich declares marriage "The Final Frontier for Civilization as We Know It."
    The U.S. Supreme Court overturns state anti-sodomy statutes in Lawrence v. Texas, ruling that gay people are entitled to "an autonomy of self that includes freedom of thought, belief, expression, and certain intimate conduct." Dissenting Justice Antonin Scalia complains that "the court has largely signed onto the so-called homosexual agenda."

    2004
    Constitutional amendments prohibiting same-sex marriage pass by wide margins in all 11 states, including Ohio and Oregon. Anti-gay groups meet in Washington, D.C., to plan for 10 more state initiatives in 2005.
    James Dobson's Focus on the Family Action organizes "Mayday for Marriage" rallies in six major cities to promote anti-gay marriage ballot initiatives in 11 states. An estimated 150,000 turn out for Oct. 15 protest in Washington, D.C., where Dobson declares, "[E]verything we care about is on the line. It's now or never."
    San Francisco officials begin issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples in February, with a handful of other U.S. municipalities following suit. Later that month, President George W. Bush announces his support for a Federal Marriage Amendment to the Constitution.

    Intelligence Report
    Spring 2005

    Posted by: Leland | Nov 7, 2006 2:09:59 PM

    
    

19. PSMike is correct that Clinton stuck his neck out for our community in a BIG way by attempting to force the military to accept gays and lesbians. And I truly believe he thought 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell' would improve the lives of queers in the service. And don't forget that Clinton was the first sitting President of the United States of America to ever meet in the Oval Office with a GLBT group. That act was a gigantic symbol that the GLBT community deserves respect from the leadership of this country. As for Defense of Marriage Act, I have *no idea* what he was thinking when he signed that...it went counter to every single thing he'd done up until that time.

    Posted by: peterparker | Nov 7, 2006 2:11:40 PM

    
    

20. Well said SAM. I have many friends in the military and I hear the horror stories they go through. I would have loved to serve my country in the military or the police or fire department, but that was not an option for a gay man in the late 70's. Clinton did not mean to open a hornets nest and the GOP is far more to blame, but open the nest he did.

    Thanks PSMIKE, once again, for the complement on my thoughts, and that is all they are, thoughts. Not right or wrong, and I too do not always totally agree with them, but feel the need to voice them. I hope all are voting, for the love of our country and this world. ;)

    Posted by: patrick nyc | Nov 7, 2006 2:21:25 PM

    
    

21. 
    Help celebrate the Democratic national victory :: This weekend make a point of attending a fundamentalist church service and spread the joy and truth of a inclusive-tolerant-democracy.

    Help the fundamentalists rejoin an America society being rebuilt without hate.

    rob@egoz.org
    

    Posted by: rob adams | Nov 7, 2006 3:00:22 PM

    
    

22. Clinton may have felt forced to compromise his principles when he authorized the "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy, but nobody was holding a gun to his head in 1996 when he signed the Defense of Marriage Act into law. Of course, it was an election year so Clinton did what he did out of political expediency. Then he had the chutzpah to go begging for money hat in hand at HRC fundraisers later that year and during his second term in office.

    I don't know which is worse, a Republican President who openly advocates for anti-gay Constitutional amendments, or a Democratic President who takes our money with one hand while signing our rights away with the other.

    That said, I voted for Clinton in 1996 despite the fact that I disagreed with him about DOMA because I agreed with him about many more non-gay issues that I thought were important.

    And if you voted for Clinton in '96 for the same reason despite your misgivings about his signing DOMA and "Don't Ask, Don't Tell," just remember that the next time you choose to criticize a gay person for voting Republican because maybe they disagree with a Republican candidate's position on gay issues but agree with them on other issues they consider more important.

    Some people aren't single issue voters.

    Posted by: LightningLad | Nov 7, 2006 3:22:22 PM

    
    

23. Respect your not being "a single issue voter," Lightninglad, for, believe it or not, neither am I.

    However, there is absolutely NO equivalency between what Clinton did and what Bush is advocating. DOMA, while preventing the Federal government from recognizing same gender unions, left that right open to individual states. It only said that one state did not have to recognize within their own borders unions legally permitted in any other state.

    Bush is advocating an amendment to the US Constitution which, if passed and ratified, would override ANY law in ANY state that recognized same sex unions of ANY kind. In other words, it would outlaw gay marriages currently legal in Massachusetts. It would outlaw domestic partner/civil union recognition in California, Hawaii, Maine, the District of Columbia, Vermont, Connecticut, and New Jersey.

    AND prevent any future legislation recognizing gay unions in ANY way in ANY state.

    Think of it this way: Clinton wrongly amputated and arm and a leg. Bush would kill the patient entirely.
    

    Posted by: Leland | Nov 7, 2006 3:45:34 PM

    
    

24. It was Sam Nunn, a Georgia Democrat, that spearheaded the DADT legislation thru Congress as a compromise against a more severe restriction that he and many others, both D and R wanted at the time at the behest of military brass and former brass. Support for banning gays was bipartisan and DADT was a halfway measure by Clinton to save himself politically after vainly and half-heartedly trying to end the ban entirely. Clinton was forced by his gay staffers and the press into taking a position on gays in the military only days into his first term who thought mistakenly he could end the ban by presidential fiat. He didn't even have a cabinet in place and it was the politics of cabinet member selection that sank the whole thing in the end. Having been burnt once, he never took up the subject again.

    The Christian Right has not made much progress over the years, despite their efforts. Bans on gay marriage are a pain in the ass, but we couldn't get married in most states anyway, so this is just like banning trips to Mars or something. The progress made over the last 30 years has been enormous and by far the biggest setback was AIDS, something that conservatives love but for which there is scant evidence they can take credit for. Progress seems to be accelerating, as seen in mainstream movies and TV shows, company benefit plans and the like. The right wing wanted to use gays to create a wedge issue for coalition building, but they've been losing ground for years really. If you want lists of fortune 500 companies that give partner benefits to gay employees, etc. and cities with anti-discrimination and hate laws protecting gays it would be much longer than the list of accomplishments of the religious right.

    Posted by: Anon | Nov 7, 2006 3:50:36 PM

    
    

25. Sorry, Anon, I'm sure you mean well but your analysis and comparisons are full of holes. To say that the religious right has been losing ground is, with all due respect, simply nonsense. Gay advances in an area such as corporate job protection is to be celebrated, but they do not outweigh the deep and broad advances of the American Taliban in other areas. There's a huge difference between no law being on the books in, e.g., Tennessee permitting gay marriage and one being enacted specifically forbidding gay marriage. State after state, those are HUGE losses. In fact, the opposite has been used against us repeatedly, hence the need in place after place to add gays as a protected class to laws. All of that is directly attributable to the "religious right," as well as the explicit ban on gays adopting in some states. See the timeline above.

    Posted by: Leland | Nov 7, 2006 4:06:50 PM

    
    
Next (more comments...) »

Post a comment

Name:

Email Address:

URL:

Remember personal info?

Comments: