As you know, Servicemembers United released a statement asking HRC National Dinner keynoter White House senior adviser Valerie Jarrett to meet with DADT repeal proponents.
HRC has already issued its air kiss to the Obama administration as the nation’s largest LGBT advocacy organization’s National Dinner is tonight. The Obama administration, which to date has done everything to retard DADT repeal, and has accomplished zero of the promised equality gains to the LGBT community, clearly has the organization in its pocket. (The Advocate):
HRC president Joe Solmonese in a Friday release called Jarrett’s attendance “a tremendous addition to the event. … She and President Obama both care deeply about equality and are strong supporters of those of us fighting for LGBT rights.”I’d love to see what efforts would come out of this WH if it didn’t “care deeply.”
In response, Alex Nicholson of Servicemembers United said:
“We certainly do not feel like the White House is a ‘strong supporter’ of gay and lesbian troops and veterans right now. To ignore the reality of the administration’s choices, a reality manifested in our daily lives, while appearing at a party hosted by an organization that has given cover to this administration would be incredibly insulting.”
And in what can only be described as a statement of an organization in internal political freefall,
HRC’s vice president of communications Fred Sainz said this today, as the organization’s national “No Excuses” dinner is about to get under way:
“These latest hijinks by Nicholson are part of a troubling pattern of irrational, unprofessional, and unproductive behavior,” Sainz said. “[Nicholson's] rant is also without substance. The Administration helped to craft the legislation that was successfully voted on by the House and the Senate Armed Services Committee. Never before has a Defense Secretary or a Joint Chiefs chairman publicly supported repeal. This president got them there, and for that, he deserves our gratitude.”
Who’s classy now? I thought it was the blogging set that had no couth, devolved discourse into personal attacks and was politically unsophisticated. What makes this doubly disgusting is that HRC has been on the inside of the DADT policy “planning” (for what that’s worth), and knows full well that this adminstration played the community.
It’s clear HRC doesn’t want to take responsibility for what has gone wrong under its watch, that it has no juice with an administration that took the money and ran (but threw a few cocktail parties for the insiders), and tossed the community Cinderella Crumbs to tout at the dinner (crumbs can be rolled back by a future anti-gay president).
I contacted Alex Nicholson for a response to Sainz’s outlandish attack. He said:
“When the spokesperson for the largest gay organization stoops to vicious personal attacks against committed, unpaid staff of the smallest gay organization, you know there’s a problem with the former. While I have more professionalism, rationality, and class than to return the favor and attack Sainz personally, I think this official ‘response’ from the Human Rights Campaign speaks volumes as to who is truly holding the administration’s feet to the fire on ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.’”
What else will it take for the HRC apologists to see that under its current leadership, has failed miserably, and has developed a circle-the-wagons attitude rather than admit fault. It would rather publicly try to shame SU or anyone not willing to shut up and fall in line behind HRC as the voice of the community. When you brand yourself as “the community”, you can’t pretend you’re the outsider and had no role in letting this administration and Congress crap on “the community.”
We need better leadership if HRC is supposed to be working on our behalf. Someone please stop this embarrassing madness.




41 Comments


Yeah
You know, people’s lives are still being destroyed, and you could stop it with the stroke of a pen, but hey, props for sitting on your ass and doing nothing while Congress voted on it.
Is that enough gratitude?
Fuck HRC..I’m very glad I no longer give money to them. VERY.
“Vichy personal attacks”Par for HRC. Say, if you want troubling reading about DADT, there’s this in the Advocate. It seems that Obama kowtows on a number of fronts. He asks for three plans on Afghanistan and they only give him one? And he doesn’t sack the lot of them?
http://www.advocate.com/printA…
Maybe it’s just as well the OWH is not on our side. They’ve been a tower of Jell-O to us.
I’m now going from not supporting the HRC……to insisting nobody I know support the HRC, either. For that matter, the next time I see another one of their bumper stickers on a stranger’s car, I’ll have a word with the driver, if at all possible.
The HRC has to be destroyed. That’s what it’s come to. They are the enemy.
Yes, Fuck HRC.I don’t contribute anymore either.
The DNCis probably now paying their expenses.
So HRC issues a vitriolic statement against someon actually working for human rightsSorry, Pam, but this isn’t exactly a “clutch the pearls” piece of news. Now, if HRC got off its ass and did something other than lick Democratic boots, well, that would merit a fainting couch.
Yes And NoYes, HRC is totally stabbing us all in the back with its “all talk, no action” strategy.
No, the President cannot stop DADT with the stroke of a pen. Not unless you want to give the President the authority to override Federal law on his own intitative. That’s why DADT itself was such a huge betrayal of the LGBT cause — it turned the military’s anti-LGBT policy from an administrative policy which could be revised by ANY future President into an actual law which could only be repealed by Congress.
All for the sake of a “compromise” which barely helped gay/lesbian service members and didn’t help trans service members at all.
But he can suspend the policy.He needs to explain why he hasn’t.
HRC has really crossed a line, this timePam and friends–
Thank you for calling HRC out for its despicable conduct–lashing out at Alex Nicholson and veterans who have been working to repeal DADT is a pretty sad state of affairs. Only the elite and privileged could possibly call an absolute failure of leadership something to be grateful for–HRC does not speak for veterans and all those silently serving gay active duty service members. This time HRC has gone too far. I do think that this is the first time in recent history (the last 20 years) that people are speaking out against HRC–rejecting their convoluted spin and complicit alliance with a do-nothing White House. Embracing Valerie Jarrett and Barack Obama as true advocates for the LGBT is not only a farce, it’s a lie. It’s time HRC be called out on its abysmal record of failure. Giving money to HRC is throwing good money after bad.
I have also stoppedany donations to the HRC.
While I have donated to HRC before, pro-Equality candidates and effective organizations are where my $ goes now.
Instead I’m focusing on the few nearby pro-equality candidates, and Equality NC which is actually there at the protests, at the rallies, at the parades, and lobbying our state legislature (successfully passing a gender identity inclusive bullying bill, helping advocate for the law that moved us closer to comprehensive sex ed, they helped keep us as the only state in the south east with no marriage discrimination amendment, and now they are working on a gender identity inclusive statewide ENDA push). And they don’t just host dinners like HRC, they host a lobby your representative day, they organized post-card, petition, and e-mail campaigns & other events. And they get creative:
http://equalitync.org/news1/se…
And I’ve done the occasional one off donations to other LGBT groups outside of my state when they seemed to really need extra support in when battles have gotten heated.
But until I see a real change in leadership style, and real progress on national bills, HRC is off my donation list.
HRC doesn’t speak for meI didn’t go to Pentagon a few weeks ago and meet with Jeh Johnson to make Joe Solmonese or Fred Sainz look good. I did it – on my own time and dime – to be a voice for those veterans and partners who are suffering in silence.
Jeh Johnson’s suits may not have been as nice as Joe’s, but at least he was honest in his conduct.
You don’t know WHAT THE FUCK you’re talking about Desi!
If you had written “repeal,” you would have been correct, but you wrote “stop DADT.” From the SECOND he was sworn in Obama had the LEGAL authority under a law passed by Congress in 1983 giving the Presidencey UNILATERAL, UNEQUIVOCAL power to override ANY other law and STOP ANY discharges in the name of national security.
The law is 10 United States Code § 12305- “Authority of the President to Suspend Certain Laws Relating to Promotion, Retirement, and Separation.” It reads:
It has already been ruled constitutional by the US Supreme Court.
In order for Congress to override an Executive Order it requires a supermajority which they couldn’t get.
HRC NEEDS TO DIEI stopped giving 2 years ago. It’s a pathetic, parasitic organization — totally useless, if not an outright embarrassment and impediment to those truly doing the work of fighting for full LGBT equality.
Solomese and Sainz need to crawl back under their rocks.
Michael is right, and…Desi, nothing in your comment does anything to excuse Obama’s contemptible behavior this year. He hasn’t just failed to secure passage of DADT repeal–HIS TEAM HAS ACTIVELY FOUGHT AGAINST PROGRESSIVE MEMBERS OF CONGRESS WHEN THEY HAVE TRIED TO PUSH REPEAL. And don’t think for a second that it was just a coincidence that Obama set the deadline for the ridiculous Pentagon “study” at a couple of weeks AFTER the midterm elections, do you? It was a deliberate tactic to make passage of repeal a practice impossibility during this Congress. And let’s not forget the brief and brief that Obama is filing defending DADT as well as DOMA on the theory that gay people have no meaningful right to the equal protection of the laws under the U.S. Constitution–a disgusting legal theory that is indistinguishable from the Bush Administration.
TOO BAD THIS IS OVER A LIMP DICK IDEA IN THE FIRST PLACE…
….begging Jarrett to meet with SU even though there isn’t any sense under the sun in imagining that she would respond any differently than she did to Dan Choi’s personal entreaty or at Netroots Nation a year ago below….OR ANY DIFFERENTLY THAN WHATEVER WHITE HOUSE SHILL SU MET WITH IN MAY when Alex was kowtowing to HRC’s insistence that no one call out the President’s betrayal….that the hundreds of gay vets brought to DC not go near the White House except to kiss ass….going into smile fucking Obama Mafia talking points auto pilot. Is THIS the best SU has to offer? Instead of issuing a press release they COULD have organized a protest of her appearance at the Hilary Rosen Champagne fund dinner but that would have required leaving the comfort of their keyboard.
ExactlyI’d like to know when the HRC ever did anything really useful for the community. They’ve hosted formal banquets around the country for years. People attending these could feel like they were doing something “positive” for gay civil rights by paying the donation to attend and hear assuaging speeches by two-faced politicos.
I’ve been complaining about them for years in my own writing and probably the nastiest letter I have received in my career came from the HRC liaison here.
The truth is that the organization is a perfect lapdog for the cowardly Obama admnistration. The little dog won’t bark at Obama, but let anyone in the gay community (like Nicholson) criticize them and they turn into angry gremlins.
And this is, with few exceptions, the way it has always been with the HRC.
Lexicon, please
I hereby demand to see the Oxford HRC English Dictionary definitions of “without” and “substance.”
Somehow, I think that dictionary’s definitions of those words will be as close to mainstream understanding and usage as its definition of “inclusive.”
“Angry gremlins”? You mean the way SU acts whenever anyone criticizes them….
…e.g., for their going along with HRC’s refusal to use the hundreds of gay vets brought to DC in May for protests against the President. Imagine 300 “Dan Chois” protesting in front of the White House….and they wouldn’t even have had to get arrested.
…Or SU’s praise of Gates’ phony turnabout on the ban in February and their own version of his “wait until ‘The Study’ is over to end discharges” con?
I am so damn tired of HRC.We all know they’ve never accomplished a damn thing. We all know they’ve thrown a) trans people and b) our entire community in the trash so they can keep getting invited to cocktail parties at the White House. We all know they raise obscene amounts of money and spend it on nothing more significant than fancy suits for Joe. This latest piece of villainy is par for the course. They have been a major impediment to our equality on every front they’ve touched.
I only hope that GetEqual, the Task Force or some other entity is waiting in the wings, prepared to take up the fight once HRC falls into the crapper of history. And that can’t happen soon enough for me.
HRC has a vested interest in inequality…IF GLBT people had equality, HRC would have no need to exist. I think they, better than anyone, realize that and would like to keep things just the way the are.
This blatant bullying garbage doesn’t surprise me at all. I used to just think Solmonese and his professional fucktoys just didn’t give a shit about trans folk. Now I realize they don’t actually care one whit about ANY of us; they’re society whores. They’re willing to completely overlook the cool kid (the White House) beating up and bullying the nerds (the rest of us), and pretend it never happened, as long as they keep getting invited to all the best parties so they can delude themselves into thinking they’re actually popular when they’re really just a bully shield, the cool kids’ excuse to say “See? We have nerd friends, so we can’t REALLY be beating up the nerds!”.
Fuck HRC. They’re greedy corrupt lying self-serving douchebags, and they DO NOT HONESTLY CARE about GLBT Rights advancement. All they care about is sucking up to the “cool kids”.
I stopped giving any money to HRC more than five years ago. Whenever they’re needed for help, they do NOTHING. When the Michael Moore v. Virginia Museum of Natural History matter first got started, I was actually told by an HRC staffer that HRC would not get involved in any way since HRC did not want to “offend” Tim Kaine in any way. Meanwhile, Kaine did NOTHING to support his own executive order supposedly protecting gay state employees. And now Kaine is DNC chair – and the pattern of doing nothing continues. I am beyond disgusted by it all.
Sorry. You’re wrong.
Wrong. The also spend it on facials for Joe, manicures for Joe, eyebrow-plucking for Joe, and body wax for Joe.
Those are pretty significant, don’t you think?
It was the same, if not worse, under Bill Clinton, too.At least this time around, there are bloggers providing countervailing commentary.
(I think in many areas — gay rights, environmental law, anti-war, preserving Social Security — we do just as well with Republican presidents, because when they’re in power, no one is fooled by false hopes, smooth talk, or a “seat at the table.”)
The problem is……if Obama suspends DADT under wartime emergency authority, it’s only a Band-Aid solution which goes away even under an LGBT friendly President the moment the troops are brought home. It would be nothing more than a George W. Bush “Mission Accomplished”, and it would be a huge setback for actually getting DADT repealed.
that is scandalous, Michael, but not surprisingProtecting a relationship with Tim Kaine at that case’s expense. It’s the story of HRC – instead of pushing to show allies that our community is tough as nails in pursuit of equality, it ensures access and reward for rolling over. Again and again. If it actually had the progress to show for it relative to the amount of rolling over, we’d actually have more rights in place.
NopeIt would prove that with DADT in abeyance, there is no drop in efficiency. Positive and undeniable proof that the arguments against DADT repeal are bogus.
And in the meantime it would do something concrete for real people. Deeds, not words.
Smoke and mirrors, bait and switchFact is, that the White House and its
beltway allies and lickspittles are LYING….
They attatched a “sort of, maybe someday, if no homophobe is offended greatly hedged promise to possibly take steps towards repeal if..” amendment to a bill that the President had already Publicly and Loudly stated his intention to veto if it passed.
How exactly is that being our advocate?
And remember Election 2008, where millions of Obama supporters in three states were freed by his words “God is in the Mix” to simultaneously vote for him and against US, since Liberalism now publically included a position that discriminated against the minoriy that we belong to. Poeple could now be good Democrats and Progressives while maintaining intact their homophobia.
As for the HRC, well, their kind have always existed in politics and always will, people selling out their own for their personal power. The Latinas of America are sold out by the Latino evangelical leaders like Ruben Diaz, Black Americans are sold out by Bishop and BP promoter Harry Jackson, and we have Joe…
Desi, Desi, Desi!
Have you been in a coma for the last 20+ months…or are you Desi Arnaz risen from dead whose understanding of English isn’t so good? Let me ‘splain, Lucy!
Thanks to Obama going from passive to active betrayal, “repeal of DADT” NO LONGER EQUALS “an end to discharges.” He ran on an explicit promise to PERSONALLY fight for the five-year old Military Readiness Enhancement Act [MREA] bill which contained a Congressional mandate banning ANY kind of discrimination against gays in the military, not just discharges but in evaluations and duty assignments, etc.
But in May, after doing NOTHING, as President for over a year, about DADT except continue discharges and defending it in court, this is what happened:
“Talking Points Memo,” May 26, 2010:
BUT, instead of getting on board, and using his powers as POTUS and real head of the Party to help our allies in Congress wrangle Dem holdouts, he DERAILED the train to a GUARANTEED end to discharges, virtually wadding up, at the insistence of Gates, the REAL “repeal” bill, the MREA, and forced them to throw it out the window.
“The Huffington Post,” June 3, 2010:
“‘At the end of the day, extraordinary power was given’ to the Pentagon.” - SLDN Director Aubrey Sarvis, “Politico,” May 26, 2010.
The result is that the “delayed trigger” replacement amendment [unlike the MREA] would NOT GUARANTEE an end to discharges along with repeal of the law EVER even IF Obama/Gates/Mullen [read: Gates] agree to confirm to Congress at some UNSPECIFIED date after “the study” ends December 1st that “repeal” would not harm the military.
Even IF they do, there is no longer anything that would prevent the military from going back to its own internal pre-DADT policies that had resulted in well over 100,000 discharged. Not under this President, not under a future President.
But, of course, Obama didn’t even fight to get the toothless, temporary bill passed.
How much more proof does any SANE person need that he DOESN’T WANT DISCHARGES TO END IN ANY WAY?????????
Yuck!Did you have to take it all the way to body waxes for Joe?
“Positive and undeniable proof that the arguments against DADT repeal are bogus.”And that’s exactly why he won’t do it.
My bad!
If no federal players are involvedHRC can be an effective partner at the state level. They certainly were here in Washington during the R-71 campaign in 2009. But they do seem to have a serious spinal problem if any federal players are involved. It may have been a reasonable tactic in the past when it was a major risk for politicians to be seen talking to gays. But that isn’t the case any more, and it is well past time for tactics to change.
Fred Sainz’s unwarranted personal attack on Alex Nicholsona leader who’s shown commitment, passion and worked tirelessly for LGB servicemembers, is added to my assessment that there is no way to save HRC and they are indeed the enemy of Equality.
And furthermore, HRC is obviously in over their headin real political battles, and should concentrate on fluffy matters that involve celebrities and sending kid’s cereal to congressmen.
They clearly don’t have the ovaries or willpower to hold anyone accountable to use their power for our best interests.
Inappropriate coffehouse behavior.Personal attacks are a violation of the PHB Terms of Service to which all commenters agree when creating a PHB user. Let’s keep PHB a safe and inspiring place to come and debate the issues.
“Deeply care” … but we won’t do jack s*** What does HRC do, really? Other than the “champagne & caviar” parties and paling around with Obama who does NOTHING to help advance equality, what are the goals. Has HRC become the logcabin organization of gays? I don’t get them at all.
I used to give to them, but stopped when I knew they were all about parties and not much about working hard to get equality going for all soon. Here is is, 18 years after President Clinton was elected and we thought with Democrats we would get GLBT equality, and we are sill dealing with this.
HRC pretty much is persona non grata as far a community leaders are concerned.
They are part of the problem as much as the homophobic Obama is.
NahI would argue that the people who are open to factual proof have already been convinced; the only thing left is political momentum. Call me a cynical bitch, but if Obama signed a moratorium on DADT enforcement, the cowards in Congress would instantly seize on it as an excuse to declare “Mission Accomplished” and drop the issue like a hot potato.
Of course
You faggots out in the fields have no idea just how hard those of us in the big house have to work to keep the Masser’s abode clean, his fine clothes washed and ironed and his family fed.
If you had any brains at all you would realize that you are too dumb and ignorant to appreciate just how lucky we all are to be under the protection of such a great man. He cares about us. He really cares. If he didn’t he wouldn’t give us the scraps of food that his family leaves on their plates, he wouldn’t promise us that when we die we will be free in heaven, and that while he can’t allow us to get married like real people, he does allow us to have sex, as long as we don’t do it where he and the other gentle-people might accidentally see us doing it.
So you faggots shut the fuck up. You loud mouths are going to get the Masser mad and then we are all going to suffer. And for God’s sake, quit teaching each other to read. A dumb faggot is a happy faggot.
I think “Bread and Circuses” is more appropriateRather than actually fix the underlying problems, all the HRC and the White House offer is cheap food and violent entertainment.
(The Latin word circus means any entertainment within an arena, such as chariot races, mock battles, trained animals, executions and gladiatorial combat.)