Sullivan to HRC's Solmonese:
Resign, Resign, Resign!
Over the weekend, gay blogger and person living with AIDS, Andrew Sullivan, wrote a scathing post against the nation's largest gay Democratic Party front group, the Human Rights Campaign. He also direct much-deserved ire at HRC's executive director Joe Solmonese. From Andrew's weekend post:
Essentially, Solmonese is asking for patience and silence until the last day of Barack Obama's second term for any sort of movement on gay equality. Now I can understand how, say, Brian Bond, who is paid to defend the administration on these issues, might say that to mollify activists. I can understand Rahm Emanuel saying that behind closed doors. But what on earth is the head of the biggest gay lobby doing saying that? Can you imagine AIPAC's head or La Raza's head pre-emptively telling the administration that we won't mind very much if you do nothing for us until the end of your second term? They would be forced to resign, pronto.Apparently writing those words wasn't enough. Andrew also gave an interview to David Badash of the New Civil Rights Movement site, at Saturday night's AIDS vigil in DC, and in it he gives voice to what many angry, demanding gays, lesbians, bisexuals and transgender people believe is an answer to getting productive, effective gay leadership - Joe must go!
I cannot accept the notion that Solmonese is among the best and the brightest gay leaders, worthy of following in any political battle before us. He was just okay during the Bush/Cheney years, but is totally unequipped to get assertive with President Barack Obama and his advisors.
Let Solmonese step down from HRC and go back to working on abortion rights. And, please, dear Gay Gods, let HRC find a new leader with a backbone and real pride, someone non-HRC donors can respect.
Here's the video interview with Andrew:
4 comments:
I'm willing to be patient with Obama for a while longer but delaying demands for action until 2017 is absurd.
David Webb/The Rare Reporter
Maybe we don't trust the whole HRC/Obama "second term" business because of, I don't know, that waffle-eater named Clinton?
We're expected to believe that the Big O doesn't want to fall into the "Clinton trap." Maybe so, but if we're going to kill "Don't Ask" we should do it during wartime. Oh, wait.... we probably won't have to worry about that, either.
Clearly, Obama has exhibited more backbone on lgbt issues than his Dem predecessor, but HRC should stop demanding that we cultivate selective amnesia.
Keep up the good work, Michael.
KD
Are you trying to re-merchandise Andrew Sullivan as a good guy? Thinking I'd gone totally senile, I refreshed my memory of the past decade over at Wikipedia. This George Bush apologist, Dick Cheney lover, war monger and professed enemy of women's right to abortion has less than nothing to tell anyone about right and wrong. He's a mental defective about these things.
I respect Solomonese way more, at least as someone who seems to have a conscience. OK, he's not the greatest LGBT leader. But few have expected HRC to perform this function for years. HRC is a semi-useful and often benevolent figurehead, like the Queen of England. Social progress will spring from other places, not ground zero of the A-list gays.
More than that, our community can't be so desperate for talking heads that we need to stoop several levels below HRC to Andrew Sullivan. Thanks.
"This George Bush apologist, Dick Cheney lover, war monger..."
Yes, Homask, Andrew Sullivan was all those things until Bush endorsed a federal marriage amendment and Sullivan underwent a political enantiodromia. But Sullivan's politics in general weren't the subject of Micheal's post, nor of the video.
Your 'to hell with the message because of the messenger' attitude is just plain silly.
As for the purported "women's right to abortion," I'm sure that most abortion foes would drop their objection if it could be shown that all aborted babies would grow up to be angry, bitter leftists like yourself.
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