Clinton’s Appeal to Gays and Lesbians
It has to be said that part of Hillary Clinton’s appeal to many voters, regardless of their orientation, is due primarily to her husband’s time as President. It’s not due to her record as a Senator in New York, nor is it due to her time as the first lady of Arkansas, and its certainly not due to her career as a lawyer. The bulk of her campaign is built around her “experience” in the White House, whether it be representing her husband overtly around the world or, as many suspect, covertly running things behind the scenes. For many, many supporters, Hillary as President would be tantamount of having Bill back.
Though I did not start out this way, I grew to really like Bill Clinton as our President. I thought the whole Lewinsky-gate was a really unfortunate distraction to what I felt like were many more important issues that the Clintons were fighting to achieve. I didn’t always agree with those issues (eg. socialized healthcare), but I was happy to see our nation’s budgets being balanced and our national debt diminishing steadily. In spite of his personal flaws and nauseatingly lawyer-ish doublespeak (eg. “what the definition of ‘is’ is”), I was proud of his era.
Perhaps “proud” wasn’t the best choice of words there. For gays and lesbians, Clinton’s era was, shall we say, underwhelming. Bill Clinton supported/signed-into-law the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy against gays in the military, and more unfortunately, the Defense of Marriage Act. Though the former would at least prevent gay soldiers from being forced to lie about themselves, its pretty well considered a ridiculous and fatally flawed policy that has done little to protect gays and lesbians in the service. DOMA, on the other hand, seemed like a policy that only a gay-fearing conservative would endorse, hoping to stave off a rash off gay marriages by firewalling states and taking it definition away from states for any federal usage. This is all part of the proud legacy of the Clintons!
As if this wasn’t enough to cause concern, there’s also this account that recalls how the Clinton re-election campaign used DOMA as a selling point for Clinton’s support of “family values”. For any gay or lesbian that reads these words, that article is worth a few minutes of your time. Here’s just a bit:
From the Associated Press, October 17, 1996:
After angry complaints from gay-rights advocates, the Clinton campaign on Wednesday replaced an ad running on religious radio stations that boasted of the president’s signature on a bill banning gay marriages….
The Clinton spot also touted his signing of the Defense of Marriage Act, in spite of earlier White House complaints that the Republicans’ use of the issue amounted to “gay baiting.”
Note that I’m also not saying that Hillary Clinton personally felt that “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” or DOMA were good or bad, but given that her campaign has been built on her “experience” as First Lady, it is reasonable to say that she, at least officially, supported her husband’s decisions both in policy and in campaigning.
Given all of the above, I think its way past time that gays and lesbians stopped unquestionably supporting another Clinton for President!
