Obama's Gratuitous Insult To Gay Couples

Due to a social engagement down the street I did not post last night, but that's not to say that I - like many other LGBT Americans - wasn't seething at the nastiness of the Obama Justice Department's brief in support of DOMA. For a nation where allegedly there is a separation of church and state to see what in the final analysis is discrimination based solely on religious belief is disgusting and demonstrates that the USA's self-proclaimed religious freedoms are a false facade. Because LGBT Americans do not live in straight relationships dictated by the Christianist version of the Bible, we are condemned to less than equality. That a [half] black president who ought to understand bigotry and discrimination based on unchosen characteristics allows this to continue makes me sick. John Aravosis at America Blog was among the first to reveal just how badly the Obama Justice Department has betrayed LGBT Americans - we were not only thrown under the bus, but they backed up over us numerous times as well - and even equated gay marriage with incest. One would have thought Peter LaBarbera or Robert Knight had written the brief. Here's some of John's analysis:

*
It reads as if it were written by one of George Bush's top political appointees. I cannot state strongly enough how damaging this brief is to us. Obama didn't just argue a technicality about the case, he argued that DOMA is reasonable. That DOMA is constitutional. That DOMA wasn't motivated by any anti-gay animus. He argued why our Supreme Court victories in Roemer and Lawrence shouldn't be interpreted to give us rights in any other area (which hurts us in countless other cases and battles). He argued that DOMA doesn't discriminate against us because it also discriminates about straight unmarried couples (ignoring the fact that they can get married and we can't).

*
He actually argued that the courts shouldn't consider Loving v. Virginia, the miscegenation case in which the Supreme Court ruled that it is unconstitutional to ban interracial marriages, when looking at gay civil rights cases. He told the court, in essence, that blacks deserve more civil rights than gays, that our civil rights are not on the same level.

*
And before Obama claims he didn't have a choice, he had a choice. Bush, Reagan and Clinton all filed briefs in court opposing current federal law as being unconstitutional (we'll be posting more about that later). Obama could have done the same. But instead he chose to defend DOMA, denigrate our civil rights, go back on his promises, and contradict his own statements that DOMA was "abhorrent." Folks, Obama's lawyers are even trying to diminish the impact of Roemer and Lawrence, our only two big Supreme Court victories. Obama is quite literally destroying our civil rights gains with this brief. He's taking us down for his own benefit.

*

Here in Virginia we are looking a potentially close election in the contest between Bob McDonnell and Creigh Deeds where the LGBT vote literally could have the potential of deciding the election. And the Obama Justice Department just told us all to go f*ck ourselves. McDonnell as governor would not be a positive but now that Obama has taken a position akin to McDonnell's view of gays, maybe staying home on election day would make no difference.