Obama's Lies to LGBT Americans

Dan Savage has a column at The Advocate that looks at Barack Obama's calculated courting of LGBT Americans during his presidential campaign and then the slow betrayal of that same group of citizens once he achieved his goal and won the election. Like Savage, I was swept up by Obama's in retrospect false campaign promises and for that I kick myself daily. True, Obama in the White House is better than the alternative of McCain and Bible Spice, but nonetheless, I cannot help but feel betrayed and cynically used. More evidence of Obama's double speak is highlighted in a new piece from the Palm Center that looks at Obama's use of signing statement - except for when it comes to protecting LGBT equality. First some highlights from Dan Savage's column:

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We could start with the betrayals and the slights -- the Reverend Rick Warren, 265 (and counting) gay men and lesbians kicked out of the military since Barack Obama was sworn in, the now-infamous DOMA brief that compared gay marriage to incest and pedophilia -- but maybe we should start by remembering the good times.

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Remember when he positioned himself to the left of Hillary Clinton on the Defense of Marriage Act? While Clinton came out in favor of a partial repeal, Obama said he favored -- and would fight for -- a complete repeal, and described DOMA as “abhorrent.” That was pretty sweet.

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But then Obama was sworn in under Rick Warren’s porcine gaze and the “fierce urgency of now” quickly morphed, in Andrew Sullivan’s damning turn of phrase, into the “fierce urgency of whenever.” Never mind that gay people are being turned away from their partners’ bedsides during medical emergencies now. Never mind that people are being kicked out of the military now. Never mind that Arkansas banned adoptions by same-sex couples on the very same day that Obama was elected. (Gosh, where’s that bully pulpit when you need it?) The man who wasn’t afraid to appeal directly to us for our votes as a candidate -- and certainly wasn’t shy about asking us for our dollars -- couldn’t be bothered to acknowledge the promises he had made to us and seemed to greatly resent being asked to actually honor them.

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Have you ever been introduced to someone with whom you’d had a torrid one-night stand and he acted like he didn’t know you? “Don’t know me?” you’re tempted to say in a loud voice. “Honey, you ate my ass.” Could Barack Obama be that one-night stand?

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[G]ay rights don’t seem so trivial if you’re the person being kicked out of the military -- like Dan Choi, Arabic linguist, West Point grad, Iraq vet -- or if you’re the person being turned away from your partner’s bedside during a medical emergency. But the supposed triviality of “our” issues is just as good an argument for moving on them as it is for shelving them. Demand a repeal of “don’t ask, don’t tell” -- a move supported by 75% of the American people (including wide majorities of conservatives) -- and if members of Congress balk, call them out for bogging down on such a trivial issue, one that most Americans would like to see resolved in our favor.

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Now’s the time -- people are being kicked out of the military now, turned away from their partners’ bedsides now. And yes, President Obama has a lot on his plate now. But delay now could very well result in no action on gay issues until the next Democrat is president. And since the White House tends to flip back and forth between parties, that could be 16 years from now.

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Speaking of Don't Ask, Don't Tell, the Palm Center is continuing to reveal why and how Obama could stop discharges of LGBT service members - if he wanted to do so. The sad reality is that he doesn't seem to care. Nor, apparently do many Congressional Democrats who happily accept LGBT dollars and then sit on their hands when it comes to taking real action. Here's the Palm Center's analysis:

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President Barack Obama’s use of signing statements—a presidential authorization to ignore portions of Congressional law—is being criticized by scholars who study gay rights for directly contradicting his defense of ongoing gay troop discharges. The President has refused to intervene to stop the firing of gay troops, citing the rationale that the White House should not be “simply ignoring a Congressional law.” Last month the President told Anderson Cooper of CNN that “it’s not appropriate for the executive branch simply to say, ‘we will not enforce a law.’”

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But yesterday’s New York Times reports that the President has used signing statements five times to challenge nineteen provisions of federal statute, including a law restricting the use of U.S. troops in United Nations commands. According to Dr. Aaron Belkin, Director of the Palm Center at the University of California, Santa Barbara, the President’s use of signing statements to ignore provisions of standing law is a far more flagrant assertion of executive authority than would be an executive order halting gay discharges. “Contrary to what some have stated,” said Belkin, “using executive power to suspend the gay ban is not questionable or even controversial among major legal scholars. It is a power explicitly granted to the President by Congress under the ‘stop-loss’ statute.”

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In light of all of this, I cannot help but believe that Obama was lying to LGBT Americans during the campaign for the presidency and many of us foolishly believed him. Speaking only for myself, that WILL NOT happen again.