I guess some people think it matters and reflects a lot on the president’s character whether or not he endorsed gay marriage of his own free will or was forced into it prematurely by his vice president. For me, it was something that was going to happen, one way or the other, and it was merely a matter of timing. When the history books are written, people aren’t going to pay attention to who was invited to give a prayer at the 2009 inauguration or how long it took to repeal Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell or how many years it took to endorse gay marriage. The history books will simply say that gay rights advanced in leaps and bounds during the presidency of Barack Obama, and he didn’t stand in the way.
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BooMan
Martin Longman a contributing editor at the Washington Monthly. He is also the founder of Booman Tribune and Progress Pond. He has a degree in philosophy from Western Michigan University.
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DITTO, BooMan!
And, I LOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOVES me Joe Biden!
It is very interesting that public polling on gay marriage moved substantially on the issue in the months after the President made this move. It moved particularly strongly among African-Americans, as I recall.
And, of course, the courts started finding more frequently for gay marriage as a constitutional right after Obama moved. The California initiative actively took away a right that people had for a while; that seemed to be an important judicial precedent that is still causing the homophobic edifices to come down, State by State. Still, I wonder if Barack’s move helped the cultural climate around the issue so that judges could see it with fresh eyes.
I don’t think it matters at all.
Big shock: politics plays a part in the timing of announcements by the president. The only people who think it matters are the people who want to think it matters – because it benefits their agenda.
Gosh, how did I innately know before I even hovered my mouse over the link that it be something from Politico.
It’s sort of hard to determine the rightwing story on Obama and gay rights. He is tarred as being the Satan that enthusiastically spreads the evil and pursues the “agenda” at every turn (backing gays in the military, not defending DOMA, endorsing marriage rights etc), while simultaneously being the weak disingenuous political hypocrite who didn’t “really” support it/them.
As you say, history in the main will look to dates and events as the crucial “history” of an issue. Motivations and urgency of leaders are second tier topics and are often difficult to pin down, albeit quite interesting. Lincoln and slavery is an analogous issue.
here’s the thing.,….
even when Barack Obama was ‘ against’ gay marriage
PRESIDENT Barack Obama ordered through Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell, and instructed the Department of Justice NOT to defend DOMA. and instructed the DOJ to accept the marriages of gays in states like Utah. (you really think Holder did all this on his own without talking to the President?)
I think it hurts some people’s fee fees in the LGT community that this President is the one who ushered in this era of broader acceptance,
while the mofo they gave the award to- Bill Clinton – was the one who brought in Don’t Ask Don’t Tell and DOMA.
I never ever will understand that.
For me, the only thing comparable is when,
After the passage of the Voting Rights Act and Civil Rights Act..
the NAACP turned around and didn’t give the Springarn Medal to Lyndon Baines Johnson…
But, gave it to Strom Thurmond..
it made that kind of sense to me.
Don’t we think Joe was the trial balloon? Let Biden – who has a history of speaking…extemporaneously… make a statement about marriage equality. See if shit hits the fan. When it doesn’t, let POTUS “evolve”.
What I wanted to think too. Brilliant strategy and all. But there’s a lot of detail in the Times story that would have to be pointless falsehoods in that case.
I know Joe Biden shoots his mouth off a lot (one of the reasons I like him), but it’s always been difficult for me to believe his gay marriage remarks weren’t coordinated by the White House.
Biden’s comments about gay marriage allowed Obama immediately to follow up with his “changed mind.” It happened so fast that I just can’t believe it wasn’t planned.
It matters for his legacy. If he was pushed, doesn’t look so good and he looks week.
Because he is the first black president it’s important that we seal his history as not being pushed and as the one who pushed Biden to do it. Even if that’s a lie or incorrect. Had it been a bland white president I don’t think it would be worth the lie, but that’s not the situation we are in.
OT: Does anyone think Obama was pushed in Ukraine?
Has anyone noticed the lack of news coverage in MSM about Ukraine this a.m.?
Has anyone seen the claim that the photos of Russia’s maneuvers are pictures of maneuvers from 2013 in which Ukraine participated?
Did anyone see the NY Times article about how the Russians are lying to us saying things like Brennan was in Kiev over the weekend?
Just wondering. I’m trying to figure how many people are still feeling patriotic with all the saber-rattling going on. I hear that news in the German press reflects that the public there are not particularly happy with the US’s over-the-top war push in Ukraine.
Like I’ve asked before, who put this flaming bag of shit on the White House front porch?
over the top war push? as far as I can tell we’re doing everything possible to avoid war
Five billion dollars to overthrow a democratically elected government? Sending in John Brennan to Kiev to give tips on peacemaking?
The $5 billion story is a well-established canard. Brennan’s visit to Ukraine was apparently about intelligence sharing (which is a big problem because of Russian penetration of Ukraine intelligence). It indicates only that the US wants a secure way of finding out what is going on. The administration definitely will not encourage Ukraine aggression if only because they know Ukraine isn’t ready for it (their military depends on Russia for spare parts, and conversely, in a production system unchanged from the Soviet era), unlike the way Bush handled the Georgia crisis in 2008.
You may be reading too much Russia Today.
Since the US, through the army and then the CIA, have been working to destabilize Ukraine through the fascist Banderistas since 1945, the five billion number is probably well below overall expenditures. That is allegedly State Department money. And since the CIA budget is classified, we don’t know what they’ve spent there. Then there’s NED and USAID and who knows how many other government agencies that routinely work to undermine governments around the world.
As far as Brennan’s appearance in Kiev, it really wouldn’t matter either way what Brennan was doing there if the mainstream media hadn’t denied it for 24 hours. But if you think that the CIA is a force for positive change in the world, “sharing intelligence” is probably a harmless activity to you. I’ll let you stand shoulder to shoulder with Brennan and the CIA.
I have never thought of the CIA as a positive force for anything (though I do believe, call me an idiot, that the current administration is sincere in claiming it wants to change it and that Brennan works for the administration as opposed to the secret government). Happily, it is now such a worn-out force that even Senator Feinstein doesn’t mind jumping on it. Russian Eurasianism, on the other hand, is alive, and just as fascist (authoritarian, violent, irrational, and anti-Semitic) as its Ukrainian opponents (see this piece by Timothy Snyder from before Yanukovych fled the country). <blockquoteNaturally, it is important to be attentive to the far right in Ukrainian politics and history. It is still a serious presence today, although less important than the far right in France, Austria, or the Netherlands. Yet it is [Yanukovych’s] regime rather than its opponents that resorts to anti-Semitism, instructing its riot police that the opposition is led by Jews. In other words, the Ukrainian government is telling itself that its opponents are Jews and us that its opponents are Nazis.
Oops,ake that:
I have never thought of the CIA as a positive force for anything (though I do believe, call me an idiot, that the current administration is sincere in claiming it wants to change it and that Brennan works for the administration as opposed to the secret government). Happily, it is now such a worn-out force that even Senator Feinstein doesn’t mind jumping on it. Russian Eurasianism, on the other hand, is alive, and just as fascist (authoritarian, violent, irrational, and anti-Semitic) as its Ukrainian opponents; see this piece by Timothy Snyder from before Yanukovych fled the country:
Hasn’t “this flaming bag of shit” been on the “White House front porch” since 1991? Four administrations spending a total of $5 billion to bring coups, regime change, and disaster capitalism to Ukraine.
Who hired Nuland and the US ambassador in Kiev?
I’ve been around a long time, but I’m pretty sure flaming bags have been placed on the White House front porch since FDR died and we stopped fighting Nazis and started recruiting them.
As far as who hired Nuland, a good question, but I suspect that no President has much say in who gets to be in the permanent government. Not an apology for Obama, but more an appreciation of how large swaths of our government are immune to the people’s will.
Nuland worked for Cheney and then was hired by Clinton at State.
Who promoted Peress?
That’s an obscure reference. And doubt that I get your point.
Initially thought you might have meant Geoffrey Pyatt who was nominated as Ambassador to Ukraine by President Obama.
It’s approximately as relevant, and as paranoiac, as asking who hired Nuland.
Nothing “paranoiac” about pointing out that a Cheney appointee aide was hired by Clinton at State and she has with colleagues proceeded to continue fomenting a coup in Ukraine. (We could also mention that Nuland is married to one of the PNAC architects.)
It is true that our society has been moving in the direction of accepting gays. But it wasn’t so long ago – 2004 – that an incumbent President used anti-gay feelings to fuel his campaign. I don’t think President McCain or Romney would have repealed DADT or said that marriage equality is a right. Obama’s remarks about that captured a wave and gave it support. Approval of marriage equality has increased since then. That’s what matters and history will record.
2003 Howard Dean was declared “unelectable” by a high percentage of blogging Democrats because as Governor of VT in 2000, he’d signed the first in the nation Civil Union law.
What is it about “equal protection under the law” that Americans don’t get, resist, and fight against long after it has been made clear and obvious that some class of citizens have been denied equality? Getting quickly and easily on the right side of history is a no-brainer for anyone with a functioning cortex.
That’s why we need to keep in mind polyamorous people and do our best to tackle their fight for equality as soon as the ink is dry on gay marriage. And yes I am being serious, they do exist and they are discriminated against.
They have equal protection under the law to be legally married to one person. If the polygamous and polyamorous (a subset of polygamists) don’t like our limitation on marriage, they are free to emigrate to a country more welcoming to their persuasion.
We’ve got a friend who has two husbands. They’ve gone through as much as possible with getting legal status as far as the kids are concerned, but there are limitations and I’m not sure how to get around the problems with guys in Utah collecting wives and putting them on welfare, but I bet our friend does. She’s been giving talks about the subject.
That be definition confers specific rights onto the two people who enter into that contract. Also by definition there are some of those rights that cannot be outside of two people.
For example lets saying one woman is married to two men and she is in an automobile accident that leaves her in a vegetative state. She hasn’t left a living will so it comes down to someone has to make a choice to “pull the plug.” That isn’t a decision that can be made by committee. ONE PERSON has to have the final say and the marriage contract gives that final say to the two parties who entered into it.
Another example: social security benefits. When a spouse dies if they had more in social security benefits than the remaining spouse that remain spouse gets the amount the deceased spouse was receiving. How would that work with three people involved?
What is it about “equal protection under the law” that Americans don’t get, resist, and fight against long after it has been made clear and obvious that some class of citizens have been denied equality?
Most Americans have no clue about equal protection or due process, and when they hear the words, assume it should only apply to them and members of their tribe.
Write a lot of history books, do you?
“Viewed from the genuine abolition ground, Mr. Lincoln seemed tardy, cold, dull, and indifferent; but measuring him by the sentiment of his country, a sentiment he was bound as a statesman to consult, he was swift, zealous, radical, and determined.”
Frederick Douglass.
That’s a great quote by Douglass- thanks for sharing that, Davis X.
The Green Lantern is at least a century-and-a-half old.
When one speaks of FDR no one jumps to say “he’s the president that passed a racist watered down social security, refused to do health reform, put Japanese Americans in internment camps, embraced austerity and through the country into a recession, firebombed Tokyo, and passed the “Economy Act” as his second act in office which was a conservative piece of legislation that cut salaries of all government employees.
No, what people say is, “he’s the giant that passed Social Security, ended a depression, and beat the Nazis.
Same with Obama. Decades from now no one will be defining Obama by “the stimulus being too small, not having a public option, taking took long to repeal don’t ask don’t tell”.
No, what history will say is that Obama is the President that “stopped a depression, rescued an entire auto industry, created a consumer financial protection agency, passed health care reform, student loan reform, credit card reform, repealed don’t ask don’t tell, came out if favor of marriage equality, too out Bin Laden, took out Gadaffi, ended the Iraq war, ended the Afghanistan war, banned torture, decimated Al Qaeda, and disarmed Syria and maybe Iran of their WMD without a shot being fired.
You make Obama a white Republican with this record, statues of the man be under construction as we speak.