Amen Michael
But some elements of the gay community are so quick to conclusion jump on Obama and attack him before he's even gotten the chair warm in the Oval Office they have overlooked the fact that a civil rights icon is also on the inauguration program.

But then again, it points to on of the reasons why many African-Americans have a problem with the 'Gay Is The New Black' slogan: Lack of appreciation of the history of the Civil Rights Movement

Warren is giving an invocation. He is not setting policy. I agree with Bil and Monica that Warren's inclusion is not worth the cause celebre that it has created. He's not giving credibility to Warren's every opinion; he is making the statement that he intends to be the President of all the people, and will take alternate points of view in consideration. I believe that the GLBT community is reading too much into this. I've often stated that the favorite exercise of the T community is the conclusion jump, and that's happening in the GL community over this.

As for Reverend Lowery, I can't wait to hear what he has to say at the inauguration. He is the real deal.

This is an excellent post, Michael. Thank you for introducing me to the words and work of Rev. Lowery. While I am profoundly disappointed that the President-Elect chose to play politics with the Warren invite, it is encouraging to see the Rev. Lowery will be closing things out.

No, Crawford, we shouldn't forget that Warren is a rightwing scum whose being honored and given a huge national audience by Obama. We're going to be living with that kind of open bigotry from Obama's administration for the next 4-8 years so we might as well be clear about it.

The Warren debacle began with a sick bigoted attack on our rights by Obama and McCain at's Warrens southern baptist megachurch that ended our hopes to defend ourselves against same sex marriage rights. Those who say the appearance of Warren is no big deal are shortchanging the GLBT movements as all of Obama’s supporters have done from the beginning (just like those of McCain and Clinton).

This isn’t Obama’s first or his only attack on our rights. He’s been a consistent bigot. He didn’t lift a finger when Barney Frank gutted ENDA as a favor to the Chamber of Commerce bigots who make big bucks underpaying us. His lips were zippered when Ted Kennedy and Nancy Pelosi quietly dropped the hate crimes bill after it’d passed both Houses of Congress. (They did it so no one could accuse the Democrats of being soft on child molesters, as Warren describes us, as if we all wore roman collars.)

He began his campaign in the bible belt with a series of revival meetings featuring anti-GLBT scum like MaryMary and ex-gay bigot KcKulkin. Obama pandered from day one because he wanted to chip away at the Rovian strategy that collared the bigot vote for Bush and was far more successful at it than Bill Clinton. Polling shows that he succeeded, especially after Warren gave him an intro into the southern baptist milieu. Opposition to the basic right to marriage is the cornerstone of Obama’s bigotry. When he spoke at Warrens cult center in California shortly before the election he empowered the bigots by telling them that he was a bigot just like them and gave them the go ahead to vote their bigotry.

His success insured our failure because the bigots he empowered wiped us out with Prop 8 and 102 and 2 in Arizona and Florida.

Then he excluded us from any major government appointments and all Cabinet positions.

Then, likely as not as the result of some pre election arrangement, Obama invited Warren to speak at the inaugural.

On top of that Obama appointed a cabinet so right wing it’d make Reagan blush, exhibited a total and unflinching support for the multitrillion giveaways to the rich and all his appointments reiterate his commitment to continue the murder of GIs and muslims by enlarging the oil war. Obama is a right winger who fooled a lot of people and we’ll all have to pay the price for their gullibility.

We don't attack Obama, Monica, we attack his choice of invocation leader and we attack the values he is promoting and giving credibility to in doing so.

News flash for y'all: African American peeps gay and straight are STILL pissed about how easily the hateful anti-Black rhetoric flowed from the gay community after the Prop 8 loss.

Becky, that's not the way it's being interpreted in some quarters of the African-American community.

From their point of view, they see the Rick Warren controversy it as another attack from gays.

BTW, did you know Rick Warren is being slammed by the Religious Reich for ACCEPTING the invitation?

The politics of negatives is always that they glare brighter.

Marla, The Black GLBT community will remember that the next time we ask you White GLBT peeps for support in shutting down Chuck Knipp's insulting Shirley Q. Liquor minstrel show.

Michael,

Excellent post. Thank you for reminding us of Joseph Lowery's elequence. He will be a superb closer for the best day America has had in many, many years. The Obama years will be remarkable for its accomplishments. Naysayers be damned.

oops, eloquence, of course

By all means, if he's done something wrong, call him on it. I'll be doing that myself.

But unlike y'all, I'm not holding him to an impossibly high standard of leadership that you don't subscribe to for politicians that share your ethnic heritage.

The problem Rebecca, is that this is being seen by some peeps in the African-American community as another in a series of attacks on him by white gays going back to the campaign.

Just dip into the Bilerico archive and read the attacks on Obama about Donnie McClurkin. Then it was the lukewarm support and being called 'unqualified' from some white gays who threatened to bolt to McCain after he beat Hillary in the primary.

Now once again, he's being attacked as 'unfriendly to the gay community' for choosing Rick Warren to give a prayer.

Some of us in the African-American community are looking at the big picture of behaviors over the past year and see this as part of the ongoing pattern of negativity directed at him by some white gays.

We're also more than a little sick of hearing 'he's the same as Clinton' when he hasn't spent five seconds in the Oval office yet.