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President Barack Obama speaks before signing a Presidential Memorandum regarding federal benefits and non-discrimination during a ceremony in the Oval Office at the White House on Wednesday (AP Photo/Haraz N. Ghanbari)
As this week marked the bittersweet one-year anniversary of legal gay marriage in California, two political leaders made big moves in the advancement of gay rights.
In California, Governor Schwarzenegger on Tuesday decided not to defend the constitutionality of Proposition 8, which banned gay marriage, in a federal court case. Disappointing traditional marriage advocates, he said it will be up to the courts to decide because the case "presents important constitutional questions that require and warrant judicial determination."
The suit, which could possibly hit the U.S. Supreme Court, states that “this unequal treatment of gays and lesbians denies them the basic liberties and equal protection under the law that are guaranteed by the Fourteenth Amendment of the United States Constitution." Representing gay couples are former U.S. Solicitor General Theodore B. Olson and David Boies, former rivals in the Bush v. Gore Supreme Court case.
Yesterday, President Barack Obama officially announced his support for the Domestic Partners Benefits and Obligations Act of 2009, which would extend to the same-sex partners of Federal employees the same benefits already enjoyed by the opposite-sex spouses of Federal employees. This act would go against the infamous DOMA, a campaign promise he made. "I stand by my long-standing commitment to work with Congress to repeal the so-called Defense of Marriage Act," he said in a statement. "It's discriminatory, it interferes with States' rights, and it's time we overturned it."
While the act makes its way through congress, Obama signed a Presidential Memorandum directing the Secretary of State and the Director of the Office of Personnel Management to extend benefits to same-sex partners of Federal employees where it is legally possible, considering the constraints of DOMA and other Federal laws.
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At the risk of sounding like a pinky commie liberal fag, this is a start, but it's certainly not enough.
DoMA needs to go away, along with Prop 8 and Don't Ask Don't Tell.
It's time to start treating the LGBT community as first class citizens.
I didn't get to vote on anyone else's marriage - why did they get to vote to try and take mine away? (My husband and I are one of the 18,000 couples here in CA.)
I'm forced to agree with Robdaemon. This is just ass covering after the fact panicking on Obama's part. No one forced him to defend DOMA last week using shockingly vile bigoted language and arguments better suited for a klan rally, or a church, than in a legal document issued by the Department of Justice.
Furthermore, it saddens me to hear him claim this has anything to dow ith the bullshit States' Rights concept. This has nothing to do with State's Rights, and everything to do with the fact that DOMA is vile prejudice, enshrined by law, and unconstitutional to boot - it flagrantly violates the reciprocity clause in the US Constitution - but then, right wingers never honor the constitution.
No one forced Obama to insult the gay Democratic Constituency in such vile terms, and during pride month no less. But it's sour milk now to see people claiming that last night's statement is anything approaching a "big move". It's a desperate attempt to keep outraged gay democrats from bolting next week's GLBT DNC fundraiser and nothing more.
As a straight person, I just want to add that I think the way gay people are being treated is a national embarassment, bordering on blood libel. It sickens me to see my own party play these games with people's lives, even more so when being led by the candidate of "change". (Who I voted for.)
Adding - I'm not saying it's too late for Obama to make amends, but this definitely isn't far enough. And you know what's sad? it didn't even have to get this out of control - All Obama had to do is nothing. He could have ordered his DOJ to request a delay in reviewing the case. His DOJ could even have defended DOMA last week in the blandest possible terms with Obama insisting it was part of a legislative strategy or some such nonsense, and I'm certain that while it might have pissed people off, it wouldn't have actually caused a rupture this bad.
Instead, he allowed one of the creepy christian bigots burrowed into the Government by the Bush adminstration to stiumlate (said bigot's) fetishes by comparing gay marriage to incest and to pedophilia. Now he's forced himself to take bolder action that no one is going to take seriously and making himself look weak and ham handed in the process.
I don't know what happened to the well oiled Obama political machine from the campaign, but either Obama is a secret bigot, or he's getting tremendously bad advice and choosing to listen to it.
Ross we need more like you. You mentioned something that crossed my mind recently-- "secret bigots." I was thinking that there might be people, politicians even, who consider themselves liberals but have an underlying, irrational discomfort with gays. So we get hamfisted gestures from politicians who got our votes by promising equality to us, but when it comes time to act on the promises they made, they do anything but.
Thus we have Obama's DOJ filing a brief supporting DOMA and comparing same-sex marriage to incest and pedophilia; then we see him in full damage-control mode yesterday performing contrived, obvious political theater by giving same-sex partners of federal employees rights THEY ALREADY HAD. Could this be the manifestation of secret bigotry in our president? He still hasn't recanted saying he believes marriage should only be allowed between a man and a woman.
I'd like to add that Schwarzenegger vetoed same-sex marriage bills TWICE after they passed in the state legislature. He could have taken on the marriage issue sooner in a hands-on way and he didn't. To do it now just makes it look like he's climbing on the bandwagon. It serves him well politically as he tail-spins into history.
Still, it's kind of odd to have a Republican governor not defend a state law (Prop 8) he believes to be unjust while a Democratic president defends a federal law (DOMA) that he believes to be unjust.
Both laws deny gays equality. Both politicians say they support gay equality. But only one of them has a spine.
If Obama doesn't make good with the gays soon, it might be too late to have any of our support on his other issues, like health care reform. So he better work fast before we become a big "distraction"
it seems to me
that democrats version of "compromise"
is giving away *far* too much leeway,
even when *they* have the power.
can you imagine what would be going down
if the red states were currently in the majority?
all abortions banned.
even like, all gay bars would be shuttered and torched already.
the only thing the extremist right *understands*
is hubris, insolence, shouting down and swagger.
anything less reads as weakness.
how about a page from the HSA playbook?
we don't NEGOTIATE with bigots.