Petrelis Files

Gays & White House Easter Egg Roll;
Follow Eartha Kitt's Example

(LBJ gets an earful of honesty from Eartha Kitt. Photo credit: White House Museum.)

Florida's veteran lesbian leader Nadine Smith writes at the Bilerico Project that a gay family at the center of a controversial anti-gay law, will be at President and First Lady Obama's Easter Egg Roll on Monday:

Even as they await a ruling on the constitutionality of Florida's law banning gay people from adopting, Frank Gill and his recently adopted sons have reason to celebrate this Easter. Frank and his boys will attend this year's White House Easter Egg Roll. They are one of two families for whom Equality Florida has secured invitations to the annual family event. [...]

As they depart for their Washington adventure, the Third District Court of Appeals still has not issued a decision reversing or upholding the lower court's finding that the ban is "unconstitutional." [...]

I hope Gill and all the other gay families that are privileged to be at the White House Easter fun on the lawn, with nothing but crumbs on the menu for homosexuals, act up and push back against Obama's "the gays can wait" approach.

Challenge the President. Speak up clearly for him to sign a stop-loss order over gays in the military. Ask where is our promised fierce advocate. Do not pass up the chance to deliver a political message.

I recommend all gays at the Easter Egg Roll emulate the great entertainer Eartha Kitt and her historic and mild, by today's standards, zap of the President and the First Lady. Excerpted from Mrs. Johnson's biography "Texas Bluebonnet," written by David Murphy:

As the president was contemplating his future, Lady Bird went on with her official duties and hosted a Women Doers lunch on Jan. 18, 1968 that was to focus on crime. Singer and actress Eartha Kitt was invited upon the recommendation of Sharon Francis and Liz Carpenter since Kitt had testified to Congress in favor of the President's anti-crime legislation.

When President (Lyndon) Johnson entered the room, Kitt confronted him, "Mr. President, what do you do about delinquent parents, those who have to work and are too busy to look after their children?" He told her that Social Security legislation was just passed that provided millions of dollars for daycare centers.

Kitt was not pleased but Johnson told her those were issues for the women to discuss at the lunch.

During the question period, Kitt stood up and confronted Lady Bird, "Boys I know across the nation feel it doesn't pay to be a good guy."

She moved into (sic) closer to the First Lady and said that boys don't want to behave for fear of being sent to Vietnam saying, "You are a mother too though you have had daughters and not sons. I am a mother and I know the feeling of having a baby come out of my guts. I have a baby and then you send him off to war. No wonder the kids rebel and take pot. And Mrs. Johnson, in case you don't understand the lingo, that's marijuana."

Who among the gays at the White House on Monday will pull an Eartha Kitt, in the name of liberty and justice for America's gay community?

Here's another shot of Miss Kitt and Mr. President, in black and white, to inspire a gay or two to follow her courageous example: