After a rough week for LGBT rights, another slap in the face comes from the Senate Majority Leader. Previously Obama has clung to the idea that because another President can institute changes in policy later, and because DADT is legislature, he has his hands tied on the issue. He has said repeatedly that the only durable solution is legislative repeal, and has refused to start any stop-loss measures on DADT. Today, The Advocate is reporting that Sen. Reid is 'hop[ing] that [repealing DADT] can be done administratively'. He went on to further say that he hasn't identified any sponsors for the legislative repeal of DADT. Or, for short: Charlie Brown, what happened to your football again?
So here we are. Yet again neither leader of the Democrats is willing to pony up and fight for the right of LGBT armsmen and women to serve openly in the military. The Supreme Court recently dismissed a case against the policy, so effectively now every single branch of the government has abdicated on it's ability or need to affect this policy. So, riddle me this then - if the Senate won't sponsor a bill for the repeal of DADT, the President won't put a stop-loss measure in place (at the very least), and the SCOTUS won't hear a case about this issue - where do LGBT citizens go to have their voices heard?
And where are the senators from LGBT-heavy states on this issue? Why is our leadership so spineless on an issue that has huge support nationwide?
While I understand and respect that there are a lot of issues on the table right now, and that allowing armsmen and women to serve openly will cause issues initially, why is everyone punting? I've not heard a good answer to this yet. I've talked to people in military families and they are cautious about this type of integration. However, I honestly feel that for the stereotypical military homophobia to end we need military members to be able to serve openly. We need LGBT members of the military to be able to take pride not only in their service to our country but also in their home life, just like the rest of our military families. To me this is yet another issue of decency, and another reason why it's mind boggling to me that no one gets that.
Sadly now, Sen. Reid's leadership has amounted to, 'If the house moves on this, I would be happy to take it up.'
UPDATE: edited out reference to Sen. Barney Frank since I had misplaced him into the Senate, not the House.