I support Hillary Clinton as the Democratic Party nominee and as the next President of the United States for reasons which I've expressed over the last 6 months. So, most of you here on MyDD know that I'm an ardent supporter of Hillary Clinton. But, you don't know that I'm like 1 in 10 Americans who many still refer to as a sinner, a sexual deviant, or as an abomination. So, today, in honor of Gay Pride month, I'm coming out of the closet on MyDD to share my very personal story why I will continue to support and stand by Hillary Clinton.

I grew up in a small town in central Virginia in the 1980's. Luckily, I passed. Passed? Passed as a heterosexual. It helped that I was popular and my quirkiness wasn't questioned. I wasn't subjected to the harassment, bullying, and teasing of which other tomboys or sissies became targets. But what happened to me was just as harmful. I hid. I hid from my family, my friends, and my community. In my last two years of high school, I was confused, alone, and becoming increasingly more depressed to the point of suicidal. By sheer will (and maybe a touch of grace), I made it to college. I started meeting people who were different, men and women who weren't afraid to express themselves outside of the norm, outside of social expectation, outside of heterosexuality. They didn't conform.

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I think a discussion that we need to have about both canidiates is if they are truly "progressive" on social issues. Right now, I want to make the case that Barack Obama has proven that his rhetoric does not match up to his actions on GLBT treatment--let's take a look. His associates with bigots and homophobic people are very disconcerting to me as a LGBT person, and while we certainly aren't the most important lobby, I don't see why triangulating on GLBT issues are important to winning the Democratic primary, especally since Senator Clinton has done so and while she is trailing, I do't think gay issues have much to do with it. Let's take a look:

I thought it would be useful to discuss Bill and Hillary Clinton and whether they support the LGBT community. This the below is from a 2007 article by John Aravosis:

Go back to the Clinton re-election campaign in 1995. Clinton hired Democratic strategist Mark Penn as his pollster and political adviser along with now-conservative pundit Dick Morris. (Mark Penn is also Hillary Clinton's chief strategist for her current presidential run - more on that later). Penn, Morris and Clinton had decided that Clinton was going to win the re-election based on his support for "family values." And family values meant "bashing gays."

From TIME:

By the time Clinton arrived in Chicago for his party's convention in August, nothing that hinted at liberalism was left hanging on him. When the President, who had begun his term advocating the rights of gays in the military, came around to supporting the Defense of Marriage Act, which barred federal recognition for gay and lesbian unions, Dole was wide-eyed. "Is there anything we're for that he won't jump on?" Dole asked. The answer, essentially, was nothing...

It's no coincidence that after hiring Penn, Clinton signed the anti-gay Defense of Marriage Act and then ran radio ads on Christian radio touting his support for DOMA.

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."

DOMA wasn't something Bill Clinton was forced to do, it's something he chose to do, wanted to do, was happy to do. And that explains why Bill Clinton has never repudiated his support for DOMA. I thought at the time, and still thought up until a few days ago, that Bill Clinton was forced to sign DOMA. That the only reason he hadn't repudiated that support - hadn't said "look, it was GOP gay-baiting and I didn't have a choice, no Democrat had a choice" - was because it might put Hillary in a bind, forcing her to also repudiate DOMA, something she of course would WANT to do but couldn't because it might prove politically dangerous. But now it seems Clinton's Choice was much clearer, and more calculated, than that. Clinton thought DOMA was a great idea for him then, and thinks it's a great idea for his wife now. It's not a necessary evil, it's manna from heaven.

The final proof that legislative gay-bashing is still something President Clinton recommends as smart Democratic politics? Bill Clinton wanted to make sure that John Kerry's presidential defeat in 2004 would be blamed on Kerry's unwillingness to sufficiently bash the gays. That's the most sensible explanation for why he made the following leak to Newsweek within days of Kerry's loss (Kerry-Edwards campaign staff tell me that they were not the ones who leaked this to Newsweek, and Clinton and his people were the only other party involved).

From Newsweek:

President Clinton, who signed the Defense of Marriage Act when he was in the White House, advised Kerry in a phone call early in the campaign to find a way to support the state bans. Kerry never considered abandoning his principles to that extent, but he also didn't take seriously enough the threat.

So now the gays lost Kerry the election. Priceless.

It gives me no joy to bash Bill Clinton. I cannot express sufficiently how much I admire the man's intellect and his political acumen. We had lunch with him last fall, and my first thought was "this is what a real president is like." He possesses so many of the qualities that our party and our politicians lack nowadays. But the man is politically amoral. Not immoral - amoral. And he, along with his amoral campaign aide Mark Penn, are the top advisers to Hillary Clinton's presidential run. And that should give every supporter of gay rights, civil rights, or any other issue, serious pause.

There's already a growing concern in the gay community that Senator Clinton, while "good on paper" on gay issues - and once considered remarkably good personally - will throw us under the bus if and when she becomes president. And let's be clear. We're not talking about some arcane tax policy issue. We're talking about our lives. Having the Democratic party's top two legislative gay-bashers as her top two advisers, men who will betray any cause, any principle, any supporter, for a bump in the polls (read more about Mark Penn's own loyalty problems here and here), does nothing to assuage those growing concerns.

PS And if I'm wrong, if Bob Shrum is wrong, if the senior Kerry-Edwards campaign official is wrong, if history is wrong, then let Bill Clinton and Hillary Clinton publicly repudiate DOMA in its entirety.

Our voice needs to be heard as much as any other minority group in the upcoming election. I get really scared when I hear, over and over again, that Senator Obama refuses to have his picture with any openly gay individual or supporter (most notably Gavin Newsroom). We as a community must band together and stand behind the person who will take her picture with anyone and stand up for everyone: Senator Hillary Clinton.

Please go to the following link: http://www.nlgja.org/newyork.htm
In March there will be a huge fundraiser with prominent members of our community in attendance. We cannot just sit by and hope for the best.
We have never been passive before - now is not the time to start.

Start emailing major LGBT organizations to get behind Senator Clinton. With her in the Whitehouse, our voices WILL be heard!

Or, the alternative, someone who wants to ammend the Constitution of the United States to be in line with "God's Standards"!

Cross-posted from Daily Kos

Words like "metrosexual" have entered the vernacular, and 'gay' can earn big bucks at the box office, but when popular culture is juxtaposed with our actual culture, a crowbar separation remains. There are a multitude of reasons why there is a high incidence of depression and suicide among gay teens, and, in her latest "Ask Hillary" Web video, Hillary Clinton had the courage to speak up and address what remains largely unspoken.

Watch it for yourself:

Cross posted from SquareState.net

One of my goals on my recent trip to Iraq was to find a way to help the gay and lesbian population. Even the best case scenarios for the general population are still abysmal for gays and lesbians in Iraq. Yet I never suspected the intrigue and danger I soon found out surroud the mere discussion of the topic.

Hoping to learn more about the community, and the unique challenges it faces, I searched the web for information and resources relating to Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgendered (LGBT) issues in Iraq.

I sent the following email to a number of contacts I found on the Internet :

I am visiting Iraq in two weeks and am interested in meeting with and helping agencies working with the LGBT population in Iraq. I will be in Baghdad on November 21st, 22nd, and 23rd. Can you help arrange for me to meet with representatives of the LGBT population and agencies who help them?

A new poll, conducted by Hunter College, finds Hillary Clinton is the strong favorite among LGB voters.  The poll, a first of it's kind "ever conducted by a university-based team of scholars with a nationally representative sample of lesbian, gay and bisexual (LGBs) Americans", shows Clinton with 63% of the vote, a full 41 points ahead of her closest rival.  The poll was  conducted with 768 respondents by from November 15th through November 26th, 2007.

Sen. Obama posted this defense of his inclusion of "ex-gay" gospel singer Donnie McClurkin at a campaign stop on The Bilerico Project. Read the rest here. My thoughts, after the jump.

The question of GLBT equality was placed on center stage by the appearance of Donnie McClurkin at one of my campaign events. McClurkin is a talented performer and a beloved figure among many African Americans and Christians around the country. At the same time, he espouses beliefs about homosexuality that I completely reject.

The events of the last several weeks are not the occasion that I would have chosen to discuss America's divisions on gay rights and my own deep commitment to GLBT equality. Now that the issue is before us, however, I do not intend to run away from it. These events have provided an important opportunity for us to confront a difficult fact: There are good, decent, moral people in this country who do not yet embrace their gay brothers and sisters as full members of our shared community.

Read the rest!