Wednesday, May 9, 2012

Why I'm Not So Excited About Obama's Personal Position

First there was the suspense and then the breaking news on the Interwebs today. In an interview President Obama said, "...I've just concluded that for me personally it is important for me to go ahead and affirm that I think same sex couples should be able to get married."

So why is this not so exciting for me? He also stressed that this is his personal position and that he still supports the concept of the states deciding the issue on their own.

Is this a stand for marriage equality and for equal rights? Substitute "interracial" for "same sex" and decide for yourself how different it looks when applying the concept of states deciding the issue.

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

Obama always personally supported gay rights. I'll bet he never had any personal objections to gay marriage, given the cultural milieu of his college/Harvard pre-Chicago days.

So, you can either praise him for open-mindedness, or ding him for political cowardice. I'd lean toward praise on this issue--not defending DOMA was a biggie--except for the timing of his "evolution" announcement.

Many gay advocates are saying that Obama had nothing to gain by making this announcement. I sharply disagree. Yes, the announcement carries a political cost. But what it really signifies is that Obama realizes he's lost his core humanitarian constuency (what the Fascist media calls "far left") by his refusal to punish torture, his decision to murder Muslim children for political gain, his surveillance state, his lies about the public option and private deals with Pharma, his decision not to prosecute his big money donors on Wall Street, etc etc.

So, it's a gambit, but a studied gambit. Not a few of the most vocal civil libertarians are gays who want to marry (eg Greenwald), as are many voices in the ever-so-slightly left "alternative" media (Maddow, Savage, Cooper).

The 1% have also converted to the gay marriage cause, seeing it as a way to split yet another constituency away from working class issues.

Obama used this announcement as a way to garner money and power, while promising nothing more on the federal level than he has already done.

Anonymous said...

Perfectly timed for the Romney bullying story, which WaPo helpfully "delayed."

Next up: George Clooney's 1% Hollywood fundraiser.

Fabulous.

Anonymous said...

$40k for a plate of Peking Duck, but King George (the Ascendent) staged The Lottery so a lucky muggles couple could attend.

Unforunately, Barbara Streisand mistook the couple for appetizers and ate them.

Obama assured the Hollywood crowd that he understood their oppression and would spend his second term ending it. "Look what I did for Goldman Sachs, and they only gave me a million!"

Salma Hayek complained if things got any worse, she might have to marry a second senile billionaire.

Kat Nips said...

Out of appreciation of the Hollywood elites' millions in contributions, Obama's campaign will borrow a new slogan:

"May the odds be ever in your favor, working class Americans!"

Anonymous said...

I can't afford a ticket to this election. I can't even afford the DVD!

I'm just going to download it from a Chinese website.

Thomas PITA said...

I just wish I could afford to buy back the voting and free speech rights I lost under Citizen's United.

Thanks a lot, Glenn Greenwald and ACLU LGBT Project for supporting that decision.

You got your rights, and I say great! I've marched for your rights, and voted for them.

But why are you so profoundly bigoted against the rights of nonelites and the nonwealthy?