Daily Kos: Gay America, just wait another seven years

Daily Kos: Gay America, just wait another seven years

Tue Jun 16, 2009 at 02:16:04 PM PDT

John Berry, director of Office of Personnel Management, and highest ranking openly gay administration official:

On Sunday, John Berry, who is director of Office of Personnel Management and the highest-ranking gay official under Mr. Obama, told The Advocate that the administration plans to take action on both DOMA and "don’t ask," as well as an employment nondiscrimination bill, "before the sun sets on this administration."

So apparently the plan is:

1. Ignore promises to repeal "don't ask, don't tell".

2. Write unnecessary and bigoted legal briefs comparing gays to pedophiles and incest.

3. Wait seven years.

4. Hope Obama does the right thing "before the sun sets on his administration".

Meanwhile, things look pretty bad for that Democratic National Committee gay fundraiser planned for next week.

A lot of us have been saying that if the Human Rights Campaign, the largest gay civil rights group in Washington, were to pull its attendance from next week's DNC $1,000 a person gay fundraiser, then the fundraiser would effectively be dead. Well, HRC just pulled out.

A reliable source just sent me the text of a Facebook conversation he had with HRC National Field Director Marty Rouse. Rouse reported that he notified the DNC today that he would not be attending the fundraiser. Rouse was among a list of already-confirmed guests that the DNC was using to pump up interest in the fundraiser.

Rouse's departure ups to four the number of high profile gay politicos who have now dropped out of the event following the Justice Department's filing of a homophobic brief defending the Defense of Marriage Act last week. The other three people to pull out of the fundraiser are famous "friend of Bill Clinton" David Mixner, Alan Van Capelle (Executive Director of New York's largest gay group, the Empire State Pride Agenda), and top gay blogger Andy Towle.

Maybe they can reschedule this fundraiser for 2015, before the sun sets on the Obama Administration and he's maybe started delivering on what he promised on gay rights.