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HRC's Joe Solmonese has released a response to criticism of the e-missive sent out the other day to HRC membership that I published on the Blend.
As I said, the original message as delivered left it open to a whole lot of interpretation, particularly as an accommodationist position that we can afford to sit back and give the current President a free pass on progress through the end of an imaginary, assumed second term in office.
As I asked in my post, "Is HRC telling people to sit hands folded for Obama re: progress until 2017?," it was a "what does he really mean" moment; IMHO, he couldn't have possibly meant to telegraph that message in the context of what is going on this weekend. I asked you all what you thought the intent was in the e-blast as well. So this is his response. Again, I'll leave up to you whether it clarifies or "clarifies" matters. I am glad, however, that it was acknowledged the language used was, to be charitable, murky.
The following is from HRC President Joe Solmonese in response to reaction to his weekly message published yesterday: I’ve seen some reactions to my weekly message, that I gave the President a free pass not to fulfill his campaign promises until 2017.
Here’s something from what I wrote that the authors didn’t include in their pieces: “I predict great things coming out of our work with this President, but that does not mean that I am satisfied today. Our community cannot be satisfied so long as DOMA is on the books and an inclusive ENDA is not.“ I am not satisfied.
(NOTE FROM PAM: I published the text of the email as received; the text referenced above is not in that document. It may be elsewhere, but not that e-blast.)
HRC is not satisfied.
Our community is not satisfied and that’s why thousands of LGBT people and our allies are in Washington this weekend to demand more.
That’s our position. Stopping here would mean losing. But stopping here is not what we intend to do.
We are pushing for much more. It is our job to dog them, but it is also our job to make sure that success is possible. As I wrote, “To do the work, we have to work with our supporters in Congress and with the Administration.
Whatever you think of the Administration’s first nine months, you don’t pass laws by sitting out. You pass laws by sitting at the table.” Do I believe we’ll have a good track record by 2017? Yes. But the President can’t deliver on his promises alone. It will take all of us working together.
It's relevant to publish a reaction to the "patience" meme. Karen Ocamb features an interview with James Hormel, the first openly gay ambassador, where she asks him whether we should cut him a break or continue the pressure.
I was an ardent supporter. I am a fervent admirer. And although things haven’t moved as fast as one would like, I have no doubt that he is doing what he can in a very perverse atmosphere to accomplish goals which we all want.I am as eager as anyone else to have action on the various pieces of legislation – some of which are a generation old – like ENDA (the Employment Non-Discrimination Act). ENDA has been in the Senate for a literal generation.
…I am almost 77 years old. I don’t have time to wait. And I don’t see any reason why anyone in this room – whatever their age – should wait for things having to do with fairness and justice.
UPDATE: Just to show you what kind of schism there is from Gay Inc vs. the grassroots, take a look at this Hardball interview with Cleve Jones vs. Joe Solmonese.
What is the messaging you see?
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#NEM Twitter tagIf Twitter is any indication, a lot of LGBT are already in DC.
My response was writtenas HRC sent that out.
It still stands: http://www.dyssonance.com/?p=838
Dyssonance, you rock!
Make him prove it
Joe’s claim sounds like Bill O’Reilly’s standard ‘I was taken out of context’, which, of course, he never follows with the context because, when bloggers go back and provide more context, the original comments often are shown to be even worse than first thought.
If he didn’t actually include that in what he sent out but is accusing people of purposely omitting, then Joe is committing mass defamation.
If he did write that, I would have published itThere would be nothing in it (for me anyway) to be gained by selectively printing part of the email and not all of it, particularly information that portrays the rest of the email in a different context. The whole point of the original post was to ask and see if anyone else saw what I saw or interpreted the e-blast differently, because the premise I saw made no sense if it was intended to motivate anyone regarding forward momentum.
Just checked my copy of the email.That line is NOT in it.
Once again, Schmoe lies.
I presumed that he didn’t
Just to clarify: I wasn’t accusing you of anything. I just presumed that Pee Wee was either lying or being so out of it that he doesn’t know what he actually wrote – and I wanted to spell out the ramifications of what he was doing by engaging in revisionist history.
I even went and checked my old e-mail account to see if I received a copy. That e-mail address usually gets the Scampaign’s scamgrams, but I didn’t see that one.
First time ever I was disappointed not to see something from hrc.org in that mailbox.
no I wasn’t receiving that as any accusationBut Joe S.’s response is in essence calling me a liar. I don’t appreciate that, and I wouldn’t make an omission like that. I printed what I received.
If he’s angry, fine, if he wants to put out a statement recalibrating that email message, fine, but don’t call me a liar because the messaging blew up in HRC’s face.
Defend or reshape your message and let the people decide whether it’s backtracking or a clarification.
HRC: DON’T CALL ME A LIAR.
Pee Wee SpeakethFrom the video clip – Solmonese on the hate crimes bill taking 10 months into the Obama Administration to get done as opposed to six months:
I didn’t think that my opinion of him could go any lower than it already was.
Now, waiting a bit is fine. The hate crimes strategy of 2009 seems to have worked – and I would have been fine with nothing over a diseased monstrosity of a non-inclusive ENDA in 2007.
But in 2007, when there was no chance whatsoever of any ENDA actually passing, waiting was unacceptable – soooooooooooooooo unacceptable that screwing over trans people one more time, thereby giving further license to any state/locality that might do so thereafter (I won’t mention Delaware by name), was so necessary that anyone who questioned the strategy would be branded activist non grata.
Is it possible to be less than worthless?
Pee Wee Solmonese – and, by extension, his chorus of robots, unwilling to challenge their dear leader (assuming anyone there actually does disagree with him) masquerading as an ‘organization’ – has just proven the answer to be ‘Yes!’
What a load…Solomonese’s second statement is laughable. It’s like you’re selling your car for thirty grand and the first thing out of your mouth to the prospective buyer is that you’ll settle for twenty, but then your partner kicks you under the table and you say “No, I didn’t mean twenty, I meant… umm…not a penny less than thirty!”
You can’t take it back. Any negotiator worth his salt knows that.
This man must NOT be allowed to speak for the gay community ever again.
Little JoeAs if he wrote this stuff himself. Interesting how he so easily lies and his staff lies for him. That’s a boatload of integrity there.
“It’s not January 19, 2017″What bugs me about that comment is that
1. It is assumed that Obama will have a second term as President. (Hell, January 19, 2017 could potentially be Palin’s last day of her first term. (Not likely, but possible!)
The way things are going, I wouldn’t be too sure of Obama having a second term! Too much Bush shit to clean up, yet it will be blamed on him.)
2. It’s saying that if he IS elected for a second term, there’s no reason to be too upset until January 18, 2017, when it’d be clear that he did not and would not live up to his promises to the GLBT community
3. It ignores the fate of thousands of GLBT community members whose lives will be devastatingly impacted by this non-action
Let’s face it. To cease implementation of the DADT would take about 5 seconds: Obama’s signature on an Executive Order. He could do that before his first sip of coffee in the morning.
Napolitano did it with the ‘married to a US citizen but the US citizen died’ immigration thing. No biggie. Really.
HRC and the Inside the Beltway PoliticsYes, we have Obama’s back…but how long do we have to wait…we have had 6 studies done since 1959…how much more do we need to study to allow openly gay people to serve without fear and trepidation….I am so tired of waiting. Waiting, while there is two wars going on? This does not make sense…but the irrationality of homophobic old men is why we have been forced to wait and wait. As long as HRC is involved and without good advice from lawyers who are conversant with military administrative law etc., we will continue to wait. I have never trusted HRC, even when I worked for NGLTF….and that was 16 years ago.
ALREADY radicalWhat always gets me even more are the squandered opportunities for progress-that-could-have-been. What could have been accomplished by now if a REAL “Human Rights Campaign” had been active over even the last few years, instead of what seemed to become the Joe Organization. Unfortunately, human rights, when they have to be demanded, ARE ALREADY radical, and can’t be successfully pursued by means that aren’t, such as waiting politely.