Obama's bone-headedness, day 2

Tuesday, December 23, 2008 by Dave Winer.

There's an epic discussion taking place under yesterday's piece about Rick Warren and the Obama inaugural. Really something to behold. Lots of intelligent discourse about something that's very emotional. That's a huge milestone. And people say blogging is dead. Feh. We're just getting started. 

A few notes. 

1. People who say this is a brilliant political stroke by our incoming President are wrong. It's bone-headed. As in he is only using the bone in his head, not the gray matter. In the days after the election there was a huge cry of angst from the gay community about Prop 8 in California. I didn't support the outcry, because basically I don't think that highly of marriage, and I'm sure not going to fight for the supposed right of gays to get married. Equal protection under the law, that I'll fight for. Obama makes gay marriage the issue by honoring the loutish bigot Warren. It was quieting down, now it's totally re-stoked.  

2. I was wrong about Obama and Rev Wright. I always wondered if it was political expediency or true belief. Obviously it wasn't true belief.  

3. Gay marriage is now on track to becoming Obama's Don't Ask Don't Tell, a morass that newly installed President Clinton had to deal with in his first days in office. What an unfortunate detour for our country when we have a financial crisis, unemployment, a depression, two wars, and god knows what else looming in front of us.  

4. It may be too generous to call it bone-headed, it might be Rove-headed. This is a total wedge issue. Thanks so much Obama for uniting us (not).  

5. There are few things I'm totally ideological about without a hint of pragmatism and that's the equal protection of the Constitution to minorities, like blacks, Jews and homosexuals. If you don't like one of us, that's fine -- you're entitled to your opinion, but you won't get the government's support. It's illegal for the government to do it. And if the inauguration is anything it's an act of government. Ooops. Bing! I rest my case. 

6. One more time. I am not a liberal, I am not "the left" -- I could be a total card-carrying Conservative and I'd still be opposed to singling out one minority for exclusion. Find someone more suited to inaugurating your Presidency, Mr. Obama. 

7. This column in the Washington Post perfectly sums up my point of view. No party on January 20. As long as Warren is the moral leader of Obama's presidency, then fuck you Obama. 

Update #1: Unfortunately today the comments are not so nice and people are getting personal That's okay of course. You can express your opinions about me on your own blog. I've closed comments on the two Rick Warren threads. Have a happy!  

Update #2: Then I started getting some comments via email that I think belong on the blog, so let's try to weather the flamers and see what happens. I turned on moderation after re-opening the comments, so if you post a personal attack against me or another commenter, it just won't go through, so don't bother.