A few minutes ago, President Obama signed a memorandum instructing the Executive Branch of the government extend certain benefits to LGBT members of the government and their families. Here's the video:
[Hat tip: Towleroad]
In addition to this memorandum, Obama acknowledged that this, indeed, is only a small step. He also mentioned that the federal government cannot extend full insurance rights to its same-sex employees due to the odorous Defense of Marriage Act, and he reiterated his campaign pledge to repeal DOMA. He also mentioned about the Lieberman-Collins Benefits and Obligations Act, which would explicitly give LBGT goverment employees parity to their hetero counterparts (And yes, the one of the big co-sponsors of the bill is Sen. Joseph Lieberman).
Now, a lot of hay has been made as to why Obama is doing something about this today. The Department of Justice last week defended DOMA in a legal brief, even citing cases of incest to defend the exisiting legislation. Because of this, lots of bigwigs in the LGBT community are now backing out of a huge upcoming DNC fundraiser, featuring Vice-President Biden. Many feel that this memoranda today is throwing the gay community a bone to help quelch any potential PR problems the DNC and the administration might have with a very vocal portion of its base.
This is, indeed, a very small step, and I'm glad that the President did acknowledge that. This is also the first time the President has spoken about LGBT rights extensively since he took office (and I use the term "extensively" rather loosely). I voted for Obama over Hillary in the primary because of LGBT issues, so like a lot of people, I've been rather impatient with his lack of movement on the core political issue in my life. But also, I do think we need to cut the President a wee bit of slack.
Obama is the first President in office who at least has even courted the LGBT community since Clinton. And in the 6 years that the Republicans controlled all three branches of government (from Jan. 20, 2001 to Jan. 20, 2007), not one piece of legislation has ever been passed helping the gay community. Obama's been in office for roughly 5 months, and let's face it, he has a lot on his plate right now. While doing this memo is throwing us gays a bone (and it is), he is at least responding to the pressure we were giving, unlike our last President. So, let's keep up the pressure and make sure Obama delivers on his campaign promises, while at the same take realizing that all this is going to take a while.
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