As for the Dems and Pelosi, it was a miracle they managed to pass the Hate Crimes Act. But soon after, they failed us by giving us constant excuses and lip service as to why our ENDA legislation could not be voted upon. Pelosi squandered all last year on Healthcare and refused to allow ENDA a vote and the gay leadership just sat their like idiots and accepted this! It was clear by the start of this year that the Dems would lose their majority in Congress, yet no action was taken on ENDA. to try and pass it while it was still possible…excuses included that the votes weren’t there or ENDA could get hostile amendments attached. Like we won’t face that all the time. Pelosi held ENDA hostage not allowing a vote on it….NO DIFFERENT THAN A GOP MAJORITY THAT WON’T ALLOW IT OUT OF COMMITTEE FOR A FAIR UP AND DONE VOTE!

But it just wasn’t the Dems alone that failed us. The gay leadership also screwed things up big time! Instead of focusing on one major piece of legislation at a time like ENDA as they did in the case of Hate Crimes, they introduced too much pro gay legislation at once which ended up competing with each other resulting in Pelosi saying that both ENDA and Ending DADT could not be voted upon at the same time….one bill at a time. As a result, we ended up with the misguided priority being ending DADT when the obvious priority had to be ENDA! Only a fraction of us work for the US military stupid! Most of our community would have benefited from ENDA as it would have protected us in ALL 50 states! The gay leaderships botched it…AGAIN!

I’m beginning to think that gay organizations like HRC have no vested interest in passing all our legislation…..why would they? If they did, they would be obsolete and lose funding from people supporting them. As such, the longer they can drag things out, the better to keep working until retirement. Face it the only major legislation we have managed to pass on the federal level since Stone Wall has been Hate Crimes.

Look what the are doing now with the lame duck session, squandering it again by focusing on yet another vote on Ending DADT! What happened to giving ENDA a chance for a vote at all? That was the plan, get a vote on DADT then ENDA gets a chance. But somehow you think the result is going to be different a month later by voting on it again. The same GOP members that voted against the bill before will do it again STUPID. Nothing will change. Waiting on this Pentagon Report ending the policy is a smoke-screen allowing the GOP cover and excuses when they know that in the end they will ignore the report when it concludes the policy can be ended and do nothing.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m all for gay marriage, etc., but they are far from priorities. Ever hear of Abraham Maslow and the Hierarchy of Needs? It’s pretty ironic that trans people tend to reach the top of the hierarchy (self-actualization), only to have society fling us right back to the bottom in search of basic survival.

Comprehensive European-style civil-unions legislation, that would include anti-employment discrimination, anti-housing discrimination planks, the right to bequeath and ingerit to and from same-sex partners, the federal right to put one’s same sex partner under one’s health insurance plan, and more, would have passed the Senate. Now, as I said when this disastrous DADT-of any of the players in this depressing tableau.Repeal defeat occurred, and Barney Frank has just confirmed, nothing at all will pass. He must at least say the lame-duck Senate will repeal DADT, but he says it with little sound of enthusiasm.

And if gays get completely in a mood to cut their …. off to spite their face and vote for a Republican against Obama in 2012, then there will be no GLBT-friendly legislation for the rest of the decade.

I hold the Log Cabin Republicans most repsonsible for the results of this distressing tableau. They were the ones who brought those 6 Republican servicepeople with good service records up to the White House in that demonstration, which induced the Democratic leadership, lacking such a high-profile demo by people who just wanted to live together with the social benefits of straight people, to allow this DADT Repeal to come to the floor. Republicans, as I said, knew that LGBT people would get one bite at the legislative pie during the first two years of the Obama Administration, and that this was the easiest one for them to lose. Brilliant, I say, and utterly free of legal risk, unlike most Republican dirty tricks we have watched in my 40 years back from Vietnam. Mr. Rove could not possibly have done better.

The LCRs are REPUBLICANS FIRST, and then– maybe– gay somewhere down the line. On their website there is a link supposedly to a list of candidates they were going to endorse on September 15. Guess what? No list. And one can see why, if the list was anything like Congressman-elect Murray, a retired colonel and anti-gay rights all the way. Former Capt. Clark Cooper may have gotten out without a blemish on his service record, but he and his friends have forever vacated any claim they have to being GAY. Now all they can say– if they even are– is that they are homosexuals.

I am mildly surprised that more prominent LGBTs have not called the LCRs on their treason. But on the other hand, perhaps gays just are unable to believe that any members of their community would act so directly in their own self-interest. They traded civil-unions legislation which would have ensured civil rights for 15 million people, assuming a GLBT population of 5% in America, for legislation which MIGHT have assured ONE RIGHT for less than 100,000 (assuming 5 times as many GLBTs have served or are serving in the military in the 17 years since DADT was enacted, and adding the 13,000 gay discharges . then, plus maybe that many naive twinks who might have enlisted but for the deterrent effect of an anti-gay military as have been discharged. Let’s say another 13,000). 91,000 goes into 15 million 165 times. This DADT-Repeal defeat hurt everybody– it was a terminal blow for gay rights at least during this administration, But it wasn’t even DESIGNED to help everybody. It was, in fact, a masterful, cynical piece of political machination that was sinceCALCULATED TO FAIL.

And one other thing, you just watch: my political discussion forum’s resident Log Cabin Republican (I blush to admit that http://www.hypercrites.com has one as a regular liar, er, poster) is going to show up here and attempt to debunk me with emotion and right-wing talking points. A hateful little man from Washington. A little not-far-past-twink-age Republican agent provocateur. Like all the LCRs, conflicted to the nitty max!

I call on gays to police their own civil rights movement, and remove– forcibly, if necessary– the hands of the Log Cabin Republicans from the levers of power in our nation’s capital! I regret al the kids getting bullied these days, but it is grown people– the LCRs and their Republican handlers– who are busy trying to recreate a homophobic environment in which more kids will take their lives because bullies will be empowered. If anyone needs to get bullied, it is the Log Cabin Republicans, and by gays and lesbians themselves.