More trouble in Paradise for the president, and not just from the storm brewing off Martha’s Vineyard that threatens to interfere with his vacation. At a fundraiser for the Lambda Legal Defense Fund held last month by a wealthy gay couple at their ocean-front Fire Island home, Obama’s name invoked something less than the adulation he has come to expect from his well-heeled lib fan base. Time‘s John Cloud reports:
Turns out the president’s record on gay issues, like his record on so many matters of import to the various “communities” that lavished their money and their votes upon him, is mixed. On the one hand, he’s against gay marriage, and, as Cloud puts it, “pandered to African-American audiences — a group that was already for him” by inviting a black singer who “believes one’s sexuality can be changed by praying to Jesus Christ” to perform at campaign events. On the other hand, he claims to oppose the Defense of Marriage Act. On the third hand, his administration defended DOMA in a lawsuit, employing “a legal argument so reactionary that it would embarrass Dick Cheney (who, incidentally, is to the left of Obama on marriage).” On the fourth hand, “Now the Administration says it opposes DOMA and wants it overturned — but that tradition dictates that it defend the law.” On the fifth hand . . . well, you get the picture.
At best, you could say this is the portrait of every liberal politician struggling to find the balance between “values” that are very much at war with one another. At worst, this is the story of a particular man, Barack Obama, who combines the mastery of a pol willing to use any means, including not a little prevarication, to get himself elected with the ineptitude of a person so accustomed to the free ride that he is actually shocked when someone hands him a bill and expects him to pay it.
Looking forward to reading about that booing next year, Mr. Cloud.
