Monday, March 09, 2009

More No on 8 Madness

This really is hard to fathom, though relative to the rest of the missed opportunities of the No on 8 Campaign it shouldn't come as a shock. Apparently Barack Obama did make a very emphatic statement against Prop 8 and, more powerfully, congratulated all of the gay and lesbian couples who got married in California -- except, the No on 8 Campaign decided not to let everyone know! The letter read as follows:

As the Democratic nominee for President, I am proud to join with and support the LGBT community in an effort to set our nation on a course that recognizes LGBT Americans with full equality under the law. That is why I support extending fully equal rights and benefits to same sex couples under both state and federal law. ...

And that is why I oppose the divisive and discriminatory efforts to amend the California Constitution, and similar efforts to amend the U.S. Constitution or those of other states. ...

Finally, I want to congratulate all of you who have shown your love for each other by getting married these last few weeks.


Activist Michael Petrelis dug up the letter and points us to a Bay Area Reporter article in which one of the outsourced heterosexual political strategists for the No on 8 Campaign explains that since the letter was sent to a Bay Area group most people across California wouldn't be familiar with the group, thus he decided not to use it. Jeez, it doesn't matter who the letter was sent to -- it was coming from Barack Obama! The impact would be enormous in many constituencies across the state if you put it in ads.

These people actually got paid our dollars, sent to the No on 8 Campaign, for this:
[L]ittle use was made of Obama's opposition in a letter last June to the Alice B. Toklas LGBT Democratic Club, and right before Election Day the Yes on 8 campaign sent out a mailer featuring Obama's image and quotes that he is opposed to same-sex marriage.

"That was a close call," Smith said. "Maybe we should have."

Smith said that people outside the Bay Area wouldn't know what the Alice Club was, but club Co-Chair Susan Christian spoke up and said that in fact, Obama's letter to the club been widely reported, including in the New York Times.


Insane.