Uh oh, Bill Clinton went to “AIPAC for libtards” yesterday, and what did his audience do immediately? Get up and yell about all of those terrible laws against gay people he signed during his presidency: Don’t Ask Don’t Tell and the Defense of Marriage Act, the “Gog and Magog” of 1990s federal gay people legislation. First Bill calls the gay shouter (he must be gay, otherwise why would he care about gay rights?) a wingnut, and then explains his rationale for signing those wretched things. Bill Clinton speaks so well that we believe every single word he says! (?) [Slog]
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{ 43 comments }
Um, excuse me, Mr. Clinton, but what does Hillary think of the multi-billion dollar loan package China is giving the Congo in exchange for mining rights?
He’d hit it.
“You want me to tell you what I think? I am not the President, Obama is.”
Hey, it just wasn’t politically feasible to support gay rights back then. Let’s all give Clinton a break here — just like we do when we forgive
LBJ for not supporting the Civil Rights Act back in the mid-60s. It wasn’t feasible then either.
Wait, what? LBJ did what?
I, for one, admire Bill for refusing to squander our precious gay resources, fighting in some crappy Islamic Republic backwater, where they would probably be stoned to death if it was discovered that they did what EVERY Islamic man knows that you should keep secret! Let’s keep our gays at home, and safe! (well, as long as they stay away from the red states).
Plucky Bill.
Bill Clinton: The Defining Moment Of Late 20th Century American Liberalism.
(Or maybe Teddy Kennedy’s brain cancer is TDMOL2CAL. Same thing, really.)
Anti-DADT guy FAIL — he should have started reciting the Pledge of Allegiance or singing God Bless America.
How did Clinton not have support in the Congress? Mark Foley, Michael Huffington, Jim Kolbe, tons!
Notice the difference in styles. Bill talks his way out of it and Hillz jut bitch slaps them over the partition and into the next conference room.
Elections have consequences people.
yiff. yiff. yiff.
No, it was the haircut that made him gay.
I like how he blamed it on liberals not bringing him enough support in Congress.
We should do better by our Presidents people!
Ladies and Gentlemen, our first Black gay President American (in his own mind).
So, I can’t help but find it continually funny Clinton is in favor of gay marriage and against DOMA *now*, years after it’s too late for him to do anything. His justification for why he signed DOMA here is pure nonsense. It doesn’t make to say he wanted to “leave it to the states”– DOMA is only half about state sovereignty, the other half is about banning federal recognition of gay marriages *even where the state wants to give one out*. In fact when DOMA was put into law it was specifically with the impetus of preventing Hawaii, a state, from beginning to perform gay marriages. The comments about a reactionary Congress and an FMA don’t hold up either. He didn’t have to sign it. Vetoing DOMA and sending it back to Congress to pass over his veto would have been a painless act, with only political consequences (okay, two months before an election, but an election Clinton was winning by rather a lot). He chose not to. There would not have been an FMA, Congress would have just done a veto override or passed DOMA in weaker form.
…but, that past: I’m actually rather liking the rest of his statement here, and happy he was willing to be candid about it. I don’t think DADT was Clinton’s fault except to the extent that he made political errors (serious errors, as he did with health care), and I think what he says about DADT here is fair. I also can’t help but notice that the behavior he’s complaining about is being replicated today. That is, most of the gay blogosphere right now is putting rather a lot of effort into relentlessly attacking Obama for not having passed his entire gay rights agenda yet, while putting relatively little effort into actually creating circumstances that could get that agenda passed faster. In fact, amusingly, one of the common complaints against Obama over this is that his strategy of working with Congress and the military to repeal DADT is too slow, and that he should just jam through an executive order. This is, of course, the exact approach Clinton tried to take with permitting gays in the military, and it backfired and brought us DADT– in other words, Obama is being attacked for refusing to make the same mistakes on DADT which Clinton did.
Clinton’s generic regret is that he didn’t go far enough.
“But the other guys would love to HAVE you! Ha Ha Ha. Double Entendre? Wow, Big Dawg is master of the smackdowns.
I would SO hit that.
I’ve never cared about the opinions of the Secretary of State’s spouse before, and I don’t see the point of starting now.
did bill actually use the word “devilment”? god, he’s so old-timey.
I do not care for angry shouting by gay men. Gay men should lisp and simper as is traditional and appropriate.
I haven’t heard Gog and Magog in ages. Loved their first album, though.
Naked Bunny with a Whip, not even Condoleeza Rice’s husband?
…my apologies to Condoleezza Rice for misspelling her name. Not classy.
The next time that idiot stands up would someone please put a cock in his mouth and shut him up. Anyway, Bill is right, he did as much as he could given America’s attitude at the time. Bottom line is a lot of those old Fucktards have died off. So just like the African slaves, you’ll get your rights in due time. So sit the fuck down and shut the fuck up.
My gay brothers and sisters, fear not! For times have changed indeed. Ok, not so much progress that you can actually be considered the equal of another human being in the eyes of the law – I mean, let’s not get carried away here – but we are certainly on the right road. A really, really long shitty road where we have to fight for every goddam thing and they are always telling us, “No, not yet, but we’ve stopped hanging you in most countries, and you know Will and Grace really softened a lot of people up, no really it did, so you know, put a smile on that gay face of yours and just put up with it for a couple a more decades til the straights are done with their adjusting to reality.”
Hey, have a nice weekend everyone!
yea, well, he can explain that. good, but[re=386900]wheelie[/re]: right on.
but I will never understand NAFTA that left out worker rights and environmental protections. Bills single worst decision. After Monica of course.
So the idea is to do nothing until there is no political consequence for doing something. Got it.
Fuck that noise.
[re=386864]mcc[/re]: I especially didn’t want to hear from him.
Yea, that’s what he SAID. But what he WANTED to say was, “Looks like the best part of you ran down Monica’s chin and wound up as a stain on a dress”.
[re=386813]mcc[/re]: Too long. Confused.
[re=386900]wheelie[/re]:
Ohhkay – now I have to pull my race card on you. How long was it between then end of slavery and the passage of the civil rights act? And how long was slavery legal in this country before that? And then there’s the women’s rights movement, too, same thing. Don’t talk to me about how you have to fight for your right to be seen as human beings in this country, okay? It’s not fair, at all, but that’s how it’s always gone. The alternative is sitting down and shutting up and not saying anything, and nothing gets changed that way. I’m right behind you, though – let’s go.
[re=387033]taylormattd[/re]: Short version:
“Meh”
[re=387175]NotthatLC[/re]: Oh noes, the dreaded race card! “Don’t talk to me about how you have to fight for your right to be seen as human beings in this country, okay?” Yes I fucking will talk to you about it!
And Black/women/gay are not mutually exclusive . . . Barbara Jordan has got practically written out of history these days.
But we are on the same track: “The alternative is sitting down and shutting up and not saying anything, and nothing gets changed that way.”
Amen.
“I’m right behind you, though – let’s go.”
Thank you. Thank you.
Clinton is such a weasel and a lying ass. (Sigh) But he’s still my favorite Republican president.
Yes, Bill, the gays are to blame for homophobia.
[re=386943]trickyrick[/re]: So many bad decisions to choose from. Don’t forget the repeal of Glass-Steagall. Or “Welfare Reform.”
Clinton’s forehead looks like 3″ of bad road.
[re=386858]x111e7thst[/re]: “I do not care for angry shouting by gay men. Gay men should lisp and simper as is traditional and appropriate.”
Reminds of me Homer Simpsons’s great, eternally fabulous line when he found out that a straight-looking guy was gay: “I like my beer cold and my homosexuals flaming!”
Wait, how is anyone going to criticize Clinton on this, and this nation still has a Democratic president who has gone no further than Bill has on the issue despite being in a much more favorable social climate on the issue? Did you guys forget the Bush arguments Obama has used for the DOMA?
[re=386797]ChernobylSoup v2[/re]: I hear you. But LBJ didn’t have an opposition Congress to deal with.
[re=386887]widget09[/re]: Spoken like a true bigoted asshole. Remember, you’re supposed to walk on your feet, not your hands.
I agree…..my apologies. I was offended by the heckler as, I am with all hecklers. President Clinton’s face was beet red and ready to explode. The climate for equal rights is still not there yet. If Clinton would have went all-out and granted equal rights, then the Democratic party would be in the same shape as the Republicans are now, perhaps a permanent minority. I fully support gay rights and have voted against all of those dumb DOMA laws, which always pass. Bill did all he could.
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