According to Mark Joseph Stein and J. Bryan Lowder, writing at Slate (LGBT Comes to the SOTU), Obama’s 2015 State of the Union address was historic in that it contained three references to gay rights and “marks the first time a president has used the words transgender and bisexual in a State of the Union address (in addition to the explicit use of the term lesbian rather than the generic gay).”
For many on the left, it seems, keeping count of nomenclature is exceedingly important. But I’ll grant you that inclusive rhetoric can matter. More importantly, however, let’s weigh the administration’s record.
The Employee Nondiscrimination Act (ENDA), then backed by many LGBT Democrats, never made it out of committee during the first two years of the Obama presidency when his party enjoyed large majorities in both houses of Congress—a sign of lack of administration interest in pushing it. But last year, the president belatedly fulfilled his 2008 campaign promise to issue an executive order barring government contractors from discriminating on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity.
His administration sat back and would have allowed Harry Reid to scuttle a Senate vote to end “don’t ask, don’t tell” at the end of 2010, as I’ve written about before (Susan Collins and Joe Lieberman saved the day). Subsequently, however, the Defense Department moved to successfully implement the new policy of letting gays and lesbians serve openly in the military.
Obama initially ran for president opposing gay marriage, alluding to marriage’s “religious connotation” and holding that “marriage is something sanctified between a man and a woman.” But in office his position evolved to support for marriage equality. And while the truly historic advances for the freedom to marry were driven by lawsuits and the courts, the administration did weigh in against the Clinton-era Defense of Marriage Act. After the majority ruling penned by Justice Kennedy (a Reagan appointee) finding DOMA unconstitutional, federal agencies have moved to ensure equal treatment of same-sex spouses in the areas that they regulate.
As David Boaz sums up on The National Interest website about the speech and, more broadly, Obama’s legacy:
[W]e got a sweeping vision of a federal government that takes care of us from childhood to retirement, a verbal counterpart to the Obama campaign’s internet ad about “Julia,” the cartoon character who has no family, friends, church or community and depends on government help throughout her life. … The spirit of American independence, of free people pursuing their dreams in a free economy, was entirely absent. … The president wants more and better jobs. And yet he wants to raise taxes on the savings and investment that produce economic growth and better jobs. … President Obama’s tax-spend-and-regulate policies have given us the slowest recovery since World War II. You want to help the middle class? Lift those burdens.
But also:
I appreciate the president’s inclusiveness in his rhetoric and his policies. In 2013, he paid tribute to “Seneca Falls, and Selma, and Stonewall.” This year he cited gay marriage as “a story of freedom”—indeed, his only mention of freedom—and he touched on the deepest roots of our liberty and our civilization in this passage: “we are a people who value the dignity and worth of every citizen: man and woman, young and old, black and white, Latino and Asian, immigrant and Native American, gay and straight, Americans with mental illness or physical disability.”
All in all, the Obama administration’s record on gay rights may be its only lasting positive legacy.
25 Comments for “Obama: Good for Gays, Not So Good for America”
posted by Tom Scharbach on
Let me put this very simply: If President Obama had not been elected in 2008, Justices Kagen and Sotomayer would not be on the court. We would not have had a Windsor decision for the lower courts to build on, we would be about 20 states short of a sandwich right now, and we would not be looking forward to a 5-4 majority in June.
posted by Houndentenor on
Before the ACA every trip to the doctor came with a couple dozen pages of paperwork to fill out so that my insurance company could attempt to weasel out of paying for anything based on some pre-existing condition or other. Don’t tell me he hasn’t accomplished anything good for America. A great many of us benefit in ways both large and small from what little he was able to get through a hostile Congress. I am better off than I would have been under Presidents McCain or Romney and so are most Americans whether they realize that or not.
posted by Doug on
If Obama was ‘not so good for America’, Bush was the ‘ultimate disaster’. Not only was he anti-gay and pandered to those voters he also ran up the national debt by a trillion dollars, lied us into a war, created no jobs and left the country in a major recession we are just coming out of.
posted by Jorge on
I actually listened to the speech and didn’t notice it. So much of his speech was typical “wah-wah-wah” Obama rhetoric. Oh, yay, we have a president who can make a speech! The only interesting part was the dueling applause moment. Oh, yay, Washington still has a sense of humor. That makes me feel so much better about the fact that we are slowly backsliding into a petty demogoguracy that cares more about making black and brown people feel people are talking nice about them than about protecting America.
At least he didn’t say LGBT. Saying “gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender” is tongue-tying, but it comes across as talking about four very important people rather than four slices of meat stuffed in a sandwich.
Now, did anyone else besides the gay media and the left notice it?
posted by James in Chicago on
Not entirely on topic, but I fail to see why any gay people should be gratified that Obama made mention of bisexuals, just as we shouldn’t be happy, in my opinion, that they were ever included in our movement. As an identity, rather than simply a sexuality, their political objective is not ours. Our goal is equality with heterosexuals. Their political goal is necessarily some kind of legal recognition of non-monogamous relationships, the very thing our foes in this society have been warning that our movement leads to. Why else would anyone identify as bisexual in a political context? It’s not as if it were a distinct sexual/romantic orientation against which there is prejudice. It’s merely a combination of heterosexuality and homosexuality and the prejudice they experience is merely a consequence of the prejudice aimed primarily at us.
posted by Houndentenor on
People have been having non-monogamous relationships as long as we have written records of human doings. You seem to be implying that bisexuals cannot be monogamous or that they are less likely to be monogamous than heterosexuals or homosexuals. And moreover you seem to imply that there needs to be some “legal recognition” of nonmonogamous relationships. Perhaps you have some evidence to back any of that up?
posted by James in Chicago on
I tried to state as clearly as I could that it’s a matter of the identity in terms of politics, not the sexuality in itself. I have no reason to believe that merely being bisexual causes a person to be more sexually promiscuous than anyone else, but it only makes sense that someone who identifies as bisexual politically seeks some kind of legal recognition as a bisexual. Let’s hope that the B in LGBT, already enjoying the privileges of heterosexuality, will be satisfied with marriage equality. Let’s hope that they, along with more libertine heterosexual liberals cheering them on, don’t soon give our country’s anti-gay bigots an opportunity to say “I told you so”.
Maybe I’m overly concerned, but as someone who grew up and spent too many years in the rural Midwest, I’m always anticipating the bigots’ next move.
posted by JohnInCA on
I like how your whole post makes it obvious your last line is simply wrong.
posted by James in Chicago on
So bisexuals experience a unique prejudice in your opinion. Now what could that possibly be, other than a “prejudice” against sexual and romantic fidelity? If there actually were such a prejudice I don’t think there’d be nearly as many homosexual men claiming to be bisexual. But it’s better than homosexual men resorting to the vacuous, evasive, and fundamentally homophobic, concept of “queerness”, I guess.
posted by Mike in Houston on
I think you need to spend some time educating yourself on bisexuality — If you are gay or lesbian, this means that you have innate strong physical, emotional and romantic feelings for people of the same gender. Being bisexual means you are attracted to both men and women. Being heterosexual means you are attracted to the opposite gender.
Bisexuals are not confused about their or looking for “legal recognition of non-monogamous relationships”. What they are looking for is the ability to pursue their relationships the same as anyone else — without being looked down on by straights for having same-sex attractions or gays for “not making up their minds”.
posted by JohnInCA on
“So bisexuals experience a unique prejudice in your opinion”
Based on *your* opinion.
Seriously dude, you’re obviously prejudiced against ’em. And it’s not because a “a ‘prejudice’ against sexual and romantic [in]fidelity”, as they’re no more prone to infidelity then anyone else. That’s just your prejudice showing.
posted by James in Chicago on
Not entirely on topic, but I fail to see why any gay people should be gratified that Obama made mention of bisexuals, just as we shouldn’t be happy, in my opinion, that they were ever included in our movement. As an identity, rather than simply a sexuality, their political objective is not ours. Our goal is equality with heterosexuals. Their political goal is necessarily some kind of legal recognition of non-monogamous relationships, the very thing our foes in this society have been warning that our movement leads to. Why else would anyone identify as bisexual in a political context? It’s not as if it were a distinct sexual/romantic orientation against which there is prejudice. It’s merely a combination of heterosexuality and homosexuality and the prejudice they experience is merely a consequence of the prejudice aimed primarily at us.
posted by James in Chicago on
Sorry that comment got posted twice.
posted by Mike in Houston on
Not to point out the obvious, but…
The DOW is in record territory.
Unemployment has reached nearly pre-2008 levels.
The U.S. economy is growing.
My 401K is whole again.
The deficit is down.
Medical cost inflation is down or flat.
15 million people who didn’t have health insurance now have it because of the ACA.
And has been pointed out, two Justices on the Supreme Court are not in the mold of Scalia or Thomas.
Not to mention, no Sara Palin as a VP.
All and all, I’d say that President Obama has been largely good for the country… beyond the LGBT community.
posted by Tom Scharbach on
Stephen conveniently forgets, I think, that elections are binary, and that the 2008 choice was between Senator Obama and Senator McCain.
We know what happened with respect to gay/lesbian issues under the Obama administration, and we can surmise with some accuracy what would have happened under a McCain administration:
(1) DADT – DADT was repealed, and despite much carping from Stephen about how it was done both before and after the vote, the repeal was implemented in a year-long, orderly manner that allowed the military to absorb open service without any serious problems. Senator McCain fought repeal to the last ditch, almost hysterically at various points, and there is no doubt in my mind that had Senator McCain become President McCain, DADT would sill be with us, absent a Supreme Court decision mandating DADT repeal, which would not have happened (see below).
(2) Supreme Court – President Obama filled two vacancies on the Court. Justice Kagan replaced Justice Souter in 2009, and Justice Sotomayer replaced Justice John Paul Stevens in 2010. Senator McCain pledged to “nominate judges like Justices Roberts and Alito”. I have no doubt that had Senator McCain become President McCain, he would have kept his word, and the vacancies that opened in 2009 and 2010 would have been filled with justices in the mold of Chief Justice Roberts and Justice Alito. Had that happened, (a) the Log Cabin Republican’s DADT lawsuit would have been unsuccessful if and when it got to the Supreme Court, by a vote of 6-3, (b) the Windsor decision would have been unsuccessful by a vote of 6-3, with Justice Kennedy writing an elegant dissent, just as Justice Blackmun did in Hardwick, later overturned by Lawrence, (c) the 9th Circuit’s favorable opinion in the Prop 8 case would have been overturned rather than dismissed on standing, (d) we would now have 16 marriage equality states instead of 36, with no prospects of increasing that number through judicial action any time soon.
(3) Federal Regulations – The Obama administration has consistently expanded the boundaries of equality within federal regulations to the extent that the law allows. I doubt that would have happened under a McCain administration, if for no other reason than he would have faced incredible pressure from his party. Instead of pushing federal regulations toward the legal boundaries of equality, a McCain administration would have pushed to do as little toward equality as possible under the law.
I don’t know if Stephen is a serious student of law and politics, but he misses the mark in this post, misses it by a mile.
Whether or not President Obama had feet of clay (and he did for a long time) on gay/lesbian issues, had he not been elected, we would be far worse off than we are now. And because Supreme Court justices tend to serve a long time, we would be far worse off for a long time to come.
posted by Tom Jefferson III on
I do not pretend that President Obama is a saint (MSNBC) or the anti-Christ (Fox News) but I really didn’t see the other main candidates in coming up with any better ideas.
In 2008; McCain shot himself in the foot when he put Sarah Palin on the ticket, and pretty much abandoned in effort to be an Independent “straight talk” candidate.
In 2012 Romney made so many classic campaign mistakes, that professors will probably be teaching him alongside the classic mistakes of the 1988 Dukakis campaign. He needlessly insulted a significant number of voters, didn’t want to give full disclosure and the like.
posted by Tom Jefferson III on
The Clinton administration — in terms of gay rights issues — was better then any President before, (not quite sure when gay rights starting to become an issue that Presidents had to take a position on — maybe Carter).
Had Clinton not won in 1992 or been defeated in 1996, the situation for gay rights at the Federal level would have only gotten worse. As it happens they got better, but very, very slowly and with lots of clear limitations.
posted by Tom Scharbach on
A brief legal note: The 8th Circuit refused to stay the federal proceedings until after the Missouri Supreme Court decided the state case, and granted an expedited briefing schedule. The 8th Circuit also has an appeal from Arkansas in the process.
posted by Tom Scharbach on
A quick legal note: The Arkansas state proceedings are getting interesting, now that the administration has changed hands. AG Leslie Rutledge, elected in November, filed a Motion for Oral Argument with the Arkansas Supreme Court today, requesting that the court, which heard oral arguments in November, schedule a new round of oral arguments before deciding the state case. The reason for the motion is that two (I think) new Supreme Court Justices were elected in November. I have no idea what the court will do with the motion.
Arkansas has a state-level cases pending before the Arkansas Supreme Court, and a federal case is on appeal to the 8th Circuit, although no oral arguments have been scheduled in the federal appeal.
posted by Tom Scharbach on
A legal update on Alabama (11th Circuit): Federal District Judge Callie Granade just issued a decision in Searcy v. Strange invalidating Alabama’s ban on marriage equality.
Judge Granade did not issue a stay order, and there is no suggestion that the judge plans to do so in the future. Alabama is in the 11th Circuit, which denied a stay in the Florida federal case, as did the Supreme Court.
The state has announced that it will seek a stay, so we will have to see how this develops, but as of right now, Alabama marriages could commence as early as Monday.
posted by Tom Scharbach on
Although all eyes are (properly) focused on the Supreme Court at this point, legal developments in other cases/courts continue (as evidenced by the Alabama decision yesterday). Accordingly, I thought that it might be useful to focus on the states where marriage equality is not yet a fact on the ground, looking at the legal situation in each state.
At this point, all but 12 states are marriage equality states, assuming that you count Kansas and Missouri (which enjoy partial marriage equality) and assuming that yesterday’s Alabama decision is not stayed.
In Alabama, the state has appealed for an emergency stay from the District Court, and the stay could be granted/denied at any time. If the District Court does not issue a stay, then the state will seek a stay from the 11th Circuit as quickly as possible, and if a stay is not granted by the 11th Circuit, then to the Supreme Court. If could take 7-10 days before we know for certain whether a stay will be issued or not.
As far as I know, here is the situation with respect to federal litigation in each of the remaining 12 states:
5th CIRCUIT
6th CIRCUIT
8th CIRCUIT
11th CIRCUIT
Outlook: I think that there is a fair chance that the 5th Circuit will issue a decision prior to the April 28-29 Supreme Court arguments in the 6th Circuit cases. Oral arguments have been concluded, and the three-judge panel has time to prepare and issue a decision before Supreme Court oral arguments if the panel wants to weigh in before the Supreme Court hears the 6th Circuit cases. It is possible that the 11th Circuit could hear oral arguments and issue a decision prior to the Supreme Court arguments, but (as far as I know) the 11th Circuit has not scheduled oral arguments and the certain Alabama appeal complicates a hearing schedule. It is very unlikely that the 8th Circuit will act prior to a Supreme Court decision in the 6th Circuit cases.
posted by Tom Jefferson III on
I think that their are two marriage equality lawsuits in North Dakota, although it was pretty much a foregone conclusion that the court was wait until a higher court — the U.S. Supreme Court — said something on the matter.
posted by Tom Scharbach on
After the majority ruling penned by Justice Kennedy (a Reagan appointee) finding DOMA unconstitutional …
I crack up every time you do this, Stephen. President Reagan appointed two of the sitting justices — Justice Kennedy and Justice Scalia. How’s that other one working out for you?
posted by Tom Jefferson III on
Sometimes in our nation’s history a presidential pick for the U.S. Supreme Court does not go as planned.
Reagan wanted to put Bork and Scalia on the bench, but he only got Scalia. Kennedy was not his second choice — his second choice was an economic libertarian who was disqualified for his past use of pot.
Kennedy was the sort of Republican Justice who (a) didn’t have any “embarrassing” issues in his past (that were known about) and (b) could win the approval of the many Democrats in the Senate.
Justice Kennedy has turned to side with liberals justices on certain issues, although he does tend to side with the conservative wing on the court on many other (important, but less reported on) issues and he does make some of the same mistaken assumptions as much of the rest of the court on some issues.
On the flip side, President Kennedy appointed Justice White to the bench and he often voted with the more conservative wing on the court (much to the shock and surprise of many Democrats). White wrote the majority opinion in Bowers, rejected the idea of sex discrimination being a 14th Amendment issue and so on and so forth.
It has become LESS AND LESS likely that this sort of thing happens since the Reagan administration. Administrations are much much better are screening justices, the media has become 24/7 (everyone’s get a cell phone camera/video recorder) and judicial candidates tend to have a body of work on hot button issues before they become serious supreme court candidates.
posted by Tom Scharbach on
Robert Bork, had he survived the nomination process, would have made Justice Scalia look like a liberal. He was a terrible choice, in my opinion.
Judge Ginsburg, on the other hand, would have been an excellent Justice, I think. He was in my law school class, is brilliant, and has written consistently good opinions over the years. Had Doug made it through the nomination process, quite a number of questionable decisions that have come down in recent years would not be the law of the land.
Justice Kennedy would not survive the nomination vetting process today, which is much more ideological than it was when President Reagan was in office, and would not be nominated by a Republican President. If anyone doubts that, just look back to 2008 and 2012 and look at the Justices mentioned by the Republican presidential candidates as models — Justices Scalia and Alito, and Chief Justice Roberts got lots of mentions, but Justice Kennedy got nary a one that I know about.