Forty Years After Stonewall, That Lavender Hour Uncertain

Monday night in the East Room of the White House, President Obama meets with gay and lesbian leaders to commemorate the 40th anniversary of the Stonewall riots. It represents the first time Stonewall has ever been officially recognized in the White House. Press secretary Robert Gibbs has said that no substantive announcements are expected at the reception. (The president will not, in other words, officially legalize same-sex marriage in all 50 states; being a president and not, alas, a Supreme Leader, he has no authority to do so. Nor is he likely to apologize for his supposed foot-dragging on gay civil rights issues. But isn't the reception itself to be seen as a watershed event? Wouldn't any right-thinking observer consider it a step forward (to continue the well-worn foot metaphor) on the road to equal rights for gays and lesbians?
Apparently not. Blogs are already rife with calls for boycotting the reception, and even more moderate voices --those, for example, who seem to believe that an invitation to the executive mansion from the leader of the free world should be accepted, perhaps even gratefully -- seem intent on reminding us that the president early on invited Republicans from Congress to the White House, as if to suggest that (a) breaking bread and hoisting glasses with one's opponents is the sleaziest, most cynically Machiavellian political maneuver imaginable, and (b) it takes some kinda nerve for him to treat us the way he treats duly elected representatives of the people who happen to dwell on the other side of the aisle.

Yes, the president gets it from the Left and the Right. Did you know that there's a gay Right? Well, there is, and they're unhappy with this administration on any number of fronts. Go to www.gaypatriot.net, and you'll see tonight's reception excoriated as "window dressing ... more political theater." One commentator terms the event as "just another cheap, opportunistic and now-desperate attempt to make nice to the Gay ATM-machine before it's [sic] self-deletes the DNC's pin-number and eats their card," while another doubts that "those useful idiots on the GayLeftLib borg [!] will man up enough to even bring up ... failed campaign promises ... they'll just bare their backsides and scream 'thank you sir, may I have another?'"

Let it never be said that the GLBT community speaks with one voice. Nor that all gay commentators follow a left-leaning party line.

I'm heartened, however, by more moderate -- and more literate -- voices, such as that of Joe Solmonese, president of the Human Rights Campaign, quoted by David Brody as saying that he's attending the event because the circumstances "require us to be present and to use every opportunity for dialogue and discussion even when we strongly disagree on the level of progress that's been made." In the same column, Brody quotes Robert Raben, gay former U.S. assistant attorney general: "Going [to the reception] will help me get over lingering anger I harbor toward the last president ... President Obama promises to be a real leader on LGBT equality and I am eager to do whatever I can to do the work to fulfill that promise."

Forgive my accommodationism, but this does not to me sound like "baring one's backside" and asking for more. It sounds like a solemn promise to push this president to fulfill his campaign promises, and an ominous warning not to take the gay vote for granted. It is forward-looking, and it is optimistic, and it is respectful.

In today's New York Times, Frank Rich quotes Jennifer Chrisler of the Family Equality Council: "People are waiting for that passionate speech from him [Obama] on equal rights [for the LGBT community], and the time is now." I agree with her. Despite the White House's protestations that nothing extraordinary is going to happen tonight -- wouldn't it be glorious if tonight were the night?