LGBT POV

False Choice: Obama’s National HIV/AIDS Strategy vs ABC’s “The View”

By guest blogger Nii-Quartelai Quartey

Change without a plan is change without a chance.

Like the thousands of other HIV/AIDS activist across the United States, I was proud to see President Obama and his Administration make good on a campaign promise to change the way we fight against HIV/AIDS with the first National HIV/AIDS Strategy in the history of the U.S. epidemic

The goals of this inaugural National HIV/AIDS Strategy include:

1. Reducing HIV Infections by 25%
2. Lowering the rate of HIV transmission by 30%
3. Increasing the number of infected people who know their status by 10%
4. Increasing the number of people accessing care within three months of diagnosis by 30%
5. Increase the proportion of gay and bisexual men, Blacks, and Latinos with undetectable viral loads by 20%

According to the National HIV/AIDS Strategy Executive Summary: “In 1995, 44 percent of the general public indicated that HIV/AIDS was the most urgent health problem facing the Nation, compared to only 6 percent in March 2009.” I can’t help but firmly agree with the 44% of the general public, especially in light of the fact that HIV/AIDS stigma, lack of quality and affordable health care, and poverty most severely impact the lives of African-Americans.

After reading through the executive summary of the National HIV/AIDS Strategy I kept asking myself this simple question about the largest risk-group in the community most impacted by HIV/AIDS in the United States: Do African-American heterosexual, gay, and bisexual men have a chance to be saved with this strategy?

Please click inside to read the rest of Nil-Quartelai’s essay – and what he has to say about the controversy at “The View.”

‘
There’s a lot going on at the XVIII International AIDS Conference in Vienna, Austria, which opened to fanfare and demonstrations on Sunday.  The fanfare includes reports of new scientific advances in HIV vaccine research, including the partial efficacy of a vaccine regimen and the discovery of new broadly neutralizing antibodies against HIV.

The demonstrations included a march and “die-in” disrupting opening ceremonies.  (Photo courtesy Riekhavoc on Flickr) One issue was the failure of President Obama to provide sufficient new funding in the just-released National AIDS Strategy – a point former President Bill Clinton took issue with Monday. Here’s an excerpt from the Examiner:

“I completely understand why the advocates for greater AiIDS funding have loudly protested, but I do not think it is either fair or accurate to say the president has gone back on his promises, as if it was a callous walking away.”

Carl Schmid,
 Deputy Executive Director of
 The AIDS Institute, emailed me his response:

“I think AIDS activism is always alive and well at the International AIDS conferences as it should be. I would be shocked if there wasn’t a demonstration and hope it continues. I disagree with what Bill Clinton said today. We need demonstrations AND working the halls of congress. It shouldn’t be one or the other.”

Conference organizers have produced an easy to navigate website for the event – which runs from July 18-23. The Kaiser Family Foundation is the official webcaster of several of the panels – including this hour-long panel from a global perspective on “Is Activism Dead?” Please click inside for a number of press releases from different groups announcing news and opinions.

Sunday, March 21, the House passed the healthcare reform bill with much nail-biting and fanfare.  Everyone at our small gathering stopped and watched as Speaker Nancy Pelosi talked about the late Sen. Ted Kennedy and cited a letter Kennedy wrote to Obama saying that “Access to health care is the great unfinished business of our society…..At stake are not just the details of policy but…the character of our country.” Pelosi then said: “Americans will look back on this day as one which we honored the character of our country and honored our commitment to our nation’s founders for a commitment to ‘life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.’”

No doubt Democrats will be referring to those gleaming words as they seek to retain their majority in Congress. Additionally, with sagging polls numbers, the healthcare reform package, minus the grievous amendment by Rep. Bart Stupak to restrict insurance coverage for abortions, is considered a major accomplishment for the Obama administration.

But just as the Justice Department legal briefs in the federal lawsuits against the Defense of Marriage Act and Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell startled LGBT rights advocates for their reliance on right wing arguments, a new declaration issued Monday by the U. S. Department of Health and Human Services has the ACLU and Planned Parenthood sending up urgent alerts. One birth control advocate says the HHS proposal, “in a spectacular act of complicity with the religious right,” now seeks to define contraception as abortion.

The long-awaited National AIDS Strategy will be  unveiled Tuesday at 2:00p.m. at a White House-sponsored event, followed by a reception with many of the nation’s leaders on HIV/AIDS. The White House press conference will feature Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, White House Domestic Policy Council Director Melody Barnes, Office of National AIDS Policy Director Jeffrey Crowley, and HHS Assistant Secretary for Health Dr. Howard Koh.

A White House press release says the heavy-hitters will “unveil the National HIV/AIDS Strategy (NHAS) and discuss its goals and details”

But there has been a lot of concern over the plan and how much community input has really been taken seriously, as well as how quickly the administration has acted on the growing lists in several states for AIDS Drug Assistance Program funding. Los Angeles – based AIDS Healthcare Foundation (AHF), which is the largest global AIDS organization, is planning a counter-press conference Tuesday at 3:30 PM Eastern, to discuss some of those issues and to specifically criticize NHAS at the National Press Club with Michael Weinstein, AHF President and Tom Myers, General Counsel & Chief of Public Affairs for AHF.

In a press release, Weinstein previewed his comments:

“The ‘New York Times’ obtained a copy of the President’s AIDS strategy, and from what we’ve learned of it so far, there is really no ‘there’ there. This strategy is a day late and a dollar short: 15 months in the making, and the White House learned what people in the field have known for years. There is no funding, no ‘how to,’ no real leadership.”

Please click inside for more details.

There’s no doubt that President Obama is under a lot of pressure – we see Tuesday how the Dow Jones dipped, raising serious concerns about whether Europe’s economic troubles are lapping at America’s shores. Additionally, the military is undergoing a profound change as they deal with and possibly re-think the strategy in Afghanistan. Some LGBTs want Obama critics such as Richard Socarides and David Mixner to back off,  give Obama some breathing room and for heavens sake, thank him for what he’s done for LGBTs already.  OK – thank you, Mr. President. No one wants Obama to fail. We only want Obama to be who he promised us he’d be. Because for now, many of us feel like the poor hungry orphan kid in “Oliver” reaching our empty bowl up and saying, “Please, sir. I want some more.” The point is – we shouldn’t have to beg for full equality – equality that is already ours but is being denied us. And acknowledging that denial without “fierce” advocacy makes one complicit in the denial. As Gloria Nieto explains here, we are in double jeopardy because of that inequality – which is unfair, unjust and unAmerican.

Poverty is a queer issue

By Gloria Nieto

Over the weekend, Pride weekend in many parts of the world, I visited with old friends.  What was completely astonishing to me was the state of poverty that we find ourselves in right now.

All of us are well over 50.  We are the only ones to lose our home at this point.  The other friends are barely holding on.  Of the four of us out the other night at the Egyptian museum, only one of us has a job.  The other three hobos, I mean homos, have all been gainfully employed all our adult lives.  One has owned and operated several businesses over time.  Her unemployment just ran out on Friday.  She is one of the 1.3 million who were dropped that day.

My unemployment ran out back in April.  No income since then so my spouse is trying to keep both of us afloat….

Please click inside for the rest of Gloria’s essay.

The Advocate’s Kerry Eleveld just posted her fine report on the event at the White House with interviews from across the political spectrum, including a 26 year old activist from a St. Louis-based youth organization who is angry that there hasn’t been more “blanket support” for LGBT issues. Please read her report. Meanwhile, here’s President Obama. Decide for yourself.

President Obama was received with applause and cheers as he entered the White House reception for LGBT Pride Month. He spoke for about 15 minutes about promises he’s made to LGBT activists – looking very present, despite having a day filled with breaking news about Gen. Stanley McCrystal, who he may force to resign as the commander in charge of US troops in Afghanistan over remarks the general made to Rolling Stone magazine. Please click inside for the transcript of Obama’s remarks, but here’s an excerpt:

“Now, look, the fact that we’ve got activists here is important because it’s a reminder that change never comes — or at least never begins in Washington.  It begins with acts of compassion -– and sometimes defiance -– across America.  It begins when ordinary people –- out of love for a mother or a father, son or daughter, or husband or wife -– speak out against injustices that have been accepted for too long.  And it begins when these impositions of conscience start opening hearts that had been closed, and when we finally see each other’s humanity, whatever our differences.

Now, this struggle is as old as America itself.  It’s never been easy.  But standing here, I am hopeful.  One year ago, in this room, we marked the 40th anniversary of the Stonewall protests.  (Applause.)  Some of you were here, and you may remember that I pledged then that even at a time when we faced enormous challenges both on the economy and in our foreign policy, that we would not put aside matters of basic equality.  And we haven’t.

We’ve got a lot of hard work that we still have to do, but we can already point to extraordinary progress that we’ve made over the past year on behalf of Americans who are gay and lesbian, bisexual and transgender.”

‘

Janice Langbehn, the accidental activist most responsible for securing hospital visitation rights for LGBT families, will be a guest at the White House Pride event Tuesday night.  Lambda Legal represented Langbehn last September in a federal lawsuit against Jackson Memorial Hospital, which had refused to allow Langbehn to see her dying partner, Lisa Pond, until a priest was admitted for last rites. The lawsuit was rejected by a federal court in Florida because there is no law requiring hospital visitation rights for gay people and their families. (This photo was taken of the whole family just before they boarded the R Family Cruise, on the day Pond was suddenly stricken fatally ill.)

White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emmanuel read about Langbehn’s story and brought it to President Obama, who signed a memo in April directing the Secretary of Health and Human Services to issue regulations to allow hospital visitation rights for LGBT families. Obama personally called Langbehn to say he was sorry for what happened to her. The HHS regulations are due to be published on June 25th.

But Langbehn is a proud woman and will probably not tell Obama or anyone else that she suffers from MS, is in constant pain from back surgery and other ailments, and is in financial trouble because she no longer has two incomes to help pay for her medical care and to take care of the couple’s three teenagers.  Her current situation underscores how important federal benefits such as Social Security are.

Langbehn discussed her situation with me for Frontiers as I followed up on a Human Rights Campaign initiative about rating hospitals. She has a fund set up on her website – but it has not been publicized.  Hopefully, members of the LGBT community can express their gratitude for her work getting hospital visitation rights by stopping by her website and making a contribution.

Please click inside to read my story on Langbehn’s dire situation.

President Obama will hold his first solo news conference in 10 months this morning at 9:30am Pacific time (12:30 Eastern) where the main topic will be the administration’s handling of the BP oil crisis. Some critics are calling this disaster Obama’s Katrina. Politico outlines 7 questions they’d like to ask, one of which includes how he might govern if the Republicans win back Congress this November.

It is not known whether The Advocate, the Washington Blade or MetroWeekly will be able to attend the news conference or if Obama would call upon them. But the New York Times reports this morning that

“the chiefs of the Army, Navy, Air Force and Marines objected on Wednesday to a compromise plan to repeal the military’s ban on allowing gay men and lesbians to serve openly, a position that put them at odds with President Obama and Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates.

In letters solicited by Senator John McCain, Republican of Arizona, who is opposed to repeal, the chiefs said they wanted Congress to delay voting on the issue until after Dec. 1, when the Pentagon is to complete a review of how the military should carry out the changes.”

Debate in the House and Senate on compromise amendments attached to the Defense Authorization Bill to repeal Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell are expected to occur Thursday and perhaps Friday. UPDATE: Please click inside to read a report from the American Forces Press Service indicating Admiral Mullen’s support for the repeal.

Protesters stood in the rain outside Fairmont Hotel in San Francisco while inside President Barack Obama seemed to enjoy his warm reception and was clearly prepared for an interruption at his second fundraiser for Sen. Barbara Boxer in California Tuesday night. According to ace San Francisco Chronicle political reporter Carla Marinucci, who shot this video, the two events (where he helped raise $600,000 for Boxer’s tough re-election campaign and $1.1 million for the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee) “were sold-out and packed to the rafters, with folks in friendly San Francisco giving Obama a racous greeting. Except for the guy who interrupted Obama’s speech by yelling, ‘Move faster on Don’t ask, don’t tell!’

Marinucci said Obama appeared “bemused” by the heckler – Kip Williams for GetEqual – and he “joked that he agreed with the guy, who he’d seen before at another fundraiser in Los Angeles. His final quip: ‘Come on, man. I’m dealing with Congress. It takes time.’”

RealClearPolitics has a better full-face view of Obama – but Marinucci’s shaky shots reveal the audience’s reactions.

Please click inside to read the POTUS account of the incident. UPDATE: READ THE FULL TRANSCRIPT OF THE PRESIDENT’S REMARKS (AND EXCHANGE WITH KIP WILLIAMS) AS PROVIDED BY THE WHITE HOUSE.

CORRECTED: President Obama is flying back to California Tuesday night to appear at two fundraisers in San Francisco for Sen. Barbara Boxer’s re-election campaign. MSNBC describes Boxer as an “imperiled incumbent” as she seeks her fourth-term. The last time Obama stumped for Boxer, he was confronted by GetEqual protesters calling for an immediate repeal of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell through an amendment to the Defense Appropriations Bill. Late Monday, Obama signed off on a compromise repeal amendment that would repeal the law, but not take effect until after the Pentagon’s study on Dec. 1 – as well as a host of other conditions that have since cause concern.

Rep. Patrick Murphy introduced a repeal DADT amendment to the DOD bill Tuesday – he’s scheduled to appear on Rachel Maddow’s Tuesday night to discuss the repeal. Murphy’s amendment is expected to be debated on Thursday, as is a similar DADT amendment, introduced in the Senate Armed Services committee by chair Sen. Carl Levin and Sen. Joe Lieberman.

(CORRECTED) A number of activists are “VERY displeased and are tired of being a political football” – saying the compromise repeal amendment is “far from equal and removes any accountability to the people.” Please click inside to see their call to action to protest this compromise repeal DADT amendment.

“Stories from the Frontlines: Letters to President Barack Obama” is a new media campaign launched to underscore the urgent need for congressional action and presidential leadership at this critical point in the fight to repeal “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” (DADT). Every weekday morning as we approach the markup of the Defense Authorization bill in the Senate and House Armed Services Committees, SLDN and a coalition of voices supporting repeal, will share an open letter to the President from a person impacted by this discriminatory law. We are urging the President to include repeal in the Administration’s defense budget recommendations, but also to voice his support as we work to muster the 15 critical votes needed on the Senate Armed Services Committee to include repeal. The Defense Authorization bill represents the best legislative vehicle to bring repeal to the president’s desk. It also was the same vehicle used to pass DADT in 1993. By working together, we can help build momentum to get the votes! We ask that you forward and post these personal stories.

Please click inside to read former Sgt. Manzella’s letter, in which he writes: “After an investigation into my statements and the harassment, I was told I was an exceptional Soldier and to “drive on” with my work. It was a great a relief to break the silence.”

“Stories from the Frontlines: Letters to President Barack Obama” is a new media campaign launched to underscore the urgent need for congressional action and presidential leadership at this critical point in the fight to repeal “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” (DADT). Every weekday morning as we approach the markup of the Defense Authorization bill in the Senate and House Armed Services Committees, SLDN and a coalition of voices supporting repeal, will share an open letter to the President from a person impacted by this discriminatory law. We are urging the President to include repeal in the Administration’s defense budget recommendations, but also to voice his support as we work to muster the 15 critical votes needed on the Senate Armed Services Committee to include repeal. The Defense Authorization bill represents the best legislative vehicle to bring repeal to the president’s desk. It also was the same vehicle used to pass DADT in 1993. By working together, we can help build momentum to get the votes! We ask that you forward and post these personal stories.

This mother in the closet to protect her son’s identity writes: “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell throws more than just service people into the closet; it throws moms, dads, siblings, grandparents, godparents, friends and loved ones in there as well.” Please click inside to read the rest of her letter.

For Obama, Gays & PWAs = Shit: by Larry Kramer

Cross-posted with permission from Michael Petrelis’ Blog.

(Protesters demonstrated Thursday night in Manhattan against President Obama’s sloooow course of action on HIV/AIDS issues. The sign reads “Obama to People With AIDS: Wait to Die.)

Like so many other AIDS activists, I applauded President Obama when he overturned the terrible U.S. travel and immigration ban on HIV positive people, but I am have a difficult time thinking of other significant steps he has taken on AIDS issues.

A fine example of the administration’s good intentions is the loooong process the White House Office of National AIDS Policy is employing in developing the National AIDS Strategy. Here we are, more than 16 months into the Obama tenure, countless discussions and meetings have taken place to create the strategy, and all we have to show for it are promises for more talking.

Let me remind the Obama administration and all the AIDS Inc orgs that are not raising their voices demanding a National AIDS Strategy forthwith — people with AIDS are still fighting for our lives. We’d like some old-fashioned passionate and public advocacy.

Well, tonight thanks to members of ACT UP/NYC, ACT UP/Philly and HealthGap, including many people living with HIV, there was a serious effort to deliver a message to Obama to move his butt on our issues.

Writer and longtime gay and AIDS activist Larry Kramer was at the protest, and he sent around his comments, which I’m reposting in full. Maybe, just maybe, Obama’s senior advisers and AIDS Inc leaders will find some inspiration in Larry’s remarks, and will end the silence about failed presidential leadership.

The time for the National AIDS Strategy from Obama was yesterday.

Please click inside to read Larry Kramer’s protest.

San Diego-based Autumn Sandeen, who expertly and passionately covers transgender issues for the very important blog Pam’s House Blend, issued an open letter today to President Obama to complain about her treatment after she was arrested during a protest of the military’s Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell policy.

I encourage you to read the whole letter – but here is an excerpt:

My name is Autumn Sandeen, I’m a retired, disabled Fire Controlman, First Class Petty Officer; I retired in 2000 from the U.S. Navy after twenty years of service.

You may know my name already, as I was one of the six military veterans who handcuffed ourselves to the White House fence on Tuesday, April 20th, 2010, to put pressure on you to include the repeal of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell in your submission of the Defense Authorization Budget. I am writing today to bring to your attention the discriminatory behavior I was subjected to as a transgender woman by your federal law enforcement officers.

I am a strong, confident transgender woman. I served proudly as a Persian Gulf War Veteran onboard the USS Gary (FFG-51) as a Close-In Weapons System technician during that war. I was awarded both a Navy Achievement Medal and a Gold Star in lieu of a second award for my service at Naval Station Long Beach’s Shore Intermediate Maintenance Activity. I served onboard the USS Coronado when the ship was awarded a Unit Commendation. I’m also a disabled veteran; my VA Disability Rating is 100%, and is a service-connected disability. When I handcuffed myself to the White House fence, I wasn’t an impersonator wearing a costume; I was proudly wearing an appropriate uniform for my gender identity.

Sir, I engaged in civil obedience to pressure you because you told us we should.

[cut]

My peer female protesters — Cadet Mara Boyd, and Cpl. Evelyn Thomas — were in a holding cell behind the U.S. Marshal’s station. They heard that same U.S. Marshal in the fuchsia blouse state the following to one of her peer officers (emphasis added):

“Did you see it? The nerve of it to be wearing a Navy uniform. Did you see the shim in the Navy Uniform?”

Calling transgender people “it” is clearly a way of dehumanizing transgender people. “Shim” a relative to “she-male” is also a dehumanizing term to identify transgender people. President Obama, your U.S. Marshal calling me “it” and “the shim” is the equivalent to calling an African-American by the n-word, or calling a Gay-American by the antigay f-word, it is absolutely unacceptable.

I believe the behavior of your U.S. Marshal’s sent the message to the prisoners that your representatives wouldn’t protect me if these prisoners had sought to physically harm me — because I was a less than human, a “shim.” At no time did any officer correct or dissuade any of the other officers from such offensive behaviors. In fact, they seemed to feel comfortable in doing so around each other, even in front of other prisoners.

The big news coming out of the California Democratic Convention Saturday was Attorney General Jerry Brown’s launch of his gubernatorial campaign with a challenge to his Republican rivals to an unprecedented, “honest, prime-time” three-way, pre-primary debate.

But the underlying story is just how worried the Democrats are about voter anger and apathy in the huge blue state that is pot-marked with deep pockets of conservative red.

In fact, the November mid-term elections are shaping up to be a conflation of the culture wars, the rise in California’s version of the Tea Party’s fierce anti-government attitudes and hate groups – just as President Barack Obama comes to Los Angeles Monday – on April 19, the anniversary of the Oklahoma City bombing.

President Obama is flying to Los Angeles today to star at a fundraiser for US Sen. Barbara Boxer . Though Boxer was well received at the California Democratic Convention on Saturday, she faces a tough reelection campaign because of anti-incumbant fever.

The new LGBT activist group GetEQUAL is planning to demonstrate over Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell. GetEqual is the group Lt. Dan Choi and Capt. James Pietrangelo represented when they handcuffed themselves to the White House gates last month over DADTand conducted a sit-in at Speaker Pelosi’s DC and SF offices to protest Congress’s failure to to pass the Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA ).

Rep. Barney Frank told Chris Geidner over the weekend that he expects ENDA to be marked up either “this weekend or the next.”

In their press release, GetEQUAL says they are protesting:

” To demand that President Obama include DADT repeal language in his Defense Authorization budget that is in the process of being sent to Congress, and that he publicly state his support for repeal this year. While the President firmly committed to repeal DADT in his State of the Union this past January, since that time he has gone silent on whether he wants to see the anti-gay law repealed this year. Congressman Barney Frank (D-MA) recently said that he is “disappointed” and “frustrated” with the Obama administration’s silence on DADT, and Frank has called on President Obama to publicly state his desire to repeal DADT this year.”

CORRECTED TIME: The protest is scheduled for Monday, April 19 at 3:30 pm EDT, 6:30 PDT at the California Science Center – Wallis Annenberg Bldg, Exposition Park, 39th St. & Figueroa St, LA.

Some of us find it odd that Boxer was still sending invitations out over the weekend for what one might ordinarily think would be a sell-out dinner. However, the California economy still in dire straights and this event is a pre-primary event when scores of candidates are in hotly contested races and $2,500 for a VIP reception and $17, 600 per person for the dinner is pretty steep.

The timing is also difficult and it is unlikely the protesters will get anywhere near the event. This is the 15^th anniversary of the Oklahoma City bombing and on Saturday there were clashes at a rally in front of LA City Hall between neo-Nazis commemorating Hitler’s birthday (Tuesday, April 20) while the California Democratic Party held their convention not too far away. The Lyndon La Rouche singers posted themselves outside the convention hall with signs depicting Obama wearing a Hitler mustache.

Here is the invitation to the two Boxer events:

Dear Friends

Please join President Obama and Senator Boxer on April 19th at a VIP reception with President Obama and Senator Boxer at the California Science Center at 4:30 p.m. The contribution requested is $2,500 and will support Senator Boxer’s upcoming Senate campaign.

You’re also invited to a dinner that same evening with the president and Senator Boxer (which will include a photo line) at the Natural History Museum. The requested contribution of $17,600 per person will support Senator Boxer’s campaign and the DNC.

Please let me know if you’re interested by either emailing me or calling me at 562 402 9323. Since the dinner is only 175 people, it will sell out quickly. This will be a night to remember. We hope you’ll be able to enjoy it with us.

Sunday night I went to a small birthday party for my friend Bernadette Abbruzze, who just turned 59 years old. Fourteen friends were scattered around the house Bern and Diane Abbitt, her life and business partner of 15 years, share off Mulholland Drive in Los Angeles – playing with the dogs, laughing, eating, and enjoying each other’s company. But we are also a bunch of politicos so when the healthcare debate came closer to a vote, we huddled around the TV to watch the closing speeches – intensely aware that we were witnessing history unfold. We also thought how the bill would impact our own lives.

Please click inside to read about how we experienced the healthcare debate.

(UPDATE: PRESIDENT OBAMA JUST SIGNED THE HEALTHCARE REFORM BILL. CLICK HERE FOR A REPORT FROM LGBT VETERAN JOURNALIST LISA KEEN.)

President Obama and First Lady Michelle celebrated International Women’s Day at a White House reception on Monday. In his remarks, Obama noted the contributions of from First Lady Abigail Adams to Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor to Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, and longtime African American activist, Dorothy Height. Also at the reception were actress Kerry Washington, Afghan singer Mozdah Jamalzadah and singer Katharine McPhee.

USA Today reported that the First Couple, who have two daughters, also revealed their more humorous side – telling “one-liners reminiscent of the old vaudeville routines of George and Gracie Allen, or perhaps of Sonny and Cher Bono.”

The President also includes lesbians and gays:

“The story of America over the past 200 years — past 233 years is one of laws becoming more just, of a people becoming more equal, of a union being perfected. It’s a story of captives being set free and a movement to fulfill the promise of that freedom. It’s a story of waves of weary travelers reconsecrating America as a nation of immigrants. It’s a story of our gay and lesbian brothers and sisters making the most of that most American of demands –- to be treated the same as everybody else. And it’s a story of women, from those on the Mayflower to the one I’m blessed to call my wife, who looked across the dinner table, and thought, I’m smarter than that guy. (Laughter.)”

Click inside for the full text of his remarks.

As expected, former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, Sen. John McCain’s running mate in the 2008 presidential election and a parallel star on Saturday Night Live, was a huge hit at the first Tea Party convention in Nashville, Tenn. Saturday night.

I watched on C-SPAN as the largely white, older crowd facially fawned over every mention of “the Constitution” and “the people,” as if they were insiders watching the run-up to a presidential bid. — Please click inside to read the rest of my quick thoughts on the event.