The American Spectator

Print Email

Text Size

The Spectacle Blog

President Obama is scheduled to speak to Human Rights Campaign's dinner this Saturday in order to quell concerns within the gay community about his failure to act on gay marriage and the military's "Don't Ask Don't Tell" policy. I think that this is a telling metaphor for his presidency. Faced with a difficult dilemma  -- whether to keep his promises to an important political constituency at the risk of causing a huge controversy that will threaten other domestic priorities -- his solution is to just give a speech. In this case, the matter happens to be gay rights, but it could just as easily be any other issue. The problem for Obama is that while speeches are enough during a campaign, they have diminishing returns when you're president, because at some point you have to actually make decisions that are sure to anger one side or another.

UPDATE: Obama booster Andrew Sullivan is harsher:

If Obama wants to support gay equality, he knows what to do. If Pelosi and Reid want to support gay equality, they know what to do. If HRC believes in gay equality, they also know what to do.

So spare us the schmoozing and the sweet-talking and do it. Until then, Mr president, why don't you have a nice steaming cup of shut-the-f***-up?