Sometimes change occurs so gradually that it takes a while to figure out when a fundamental transformation has occurred. On a day-to-day basis it’s hard to see your hairline receding, waistline expanding or credit card debt compounding. And then one morning we start looking at vacation pictures or paying bills and suddenly realize that we’re bald, fat and broke.
Sometimes we need to take a step back, and a deep breath, in order to see things as they really are.
The same is true when it comes to politics. We’re frequently so invested in day to day partisan combat that we are completely unaware when the country has moved significantly on an issue.
This has happened in the area of gay rights.
Last Monday, President Trump said that he would leave in place a 2014 Obama administration order that created new workplace protections for gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people.
In a written statement the White House said, “President Trump continues to be respectful and supportive of LGBTQ rights, just as he was throughout the election. … The president is proud to have been the first ever GOP nominee to mention the LGBTQ community in his nomination acceptance speech, pledging then to protect the community from violence and oppression.”
In response, the usual suspects attacked him and the usual suspects defended him.
Chad Griffin, president of the Human Rights Campaign, an organization chartered to fight for LGBT rights, offered partisan criticism instead of praise.
“LGBTQ refugees, immigrants, Muslims and women are scared today, and with good reason. … Donald Trump has done nothing but undermine equality since he set foot in the White House,” he said.
Meanwhile, Florida Republican Congresswoman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen took to the House floor and offered her full support to President Trump’s statement, explaining, “I am heartened by the administration’s announcement that it will preserve workplace protections for LGBT federal contractors. This is a meaningful and positive step toward ending discrimination against hardworking LGBT Americans who only want to earn a living and provide for themselves and their families.”
Think about this for a moment — in his first month in office, a duly elected Republican president went on the record in favor of expansive workplace protections for LGBT Americans — and it largely fell on deaf ears.
A few short years ago this was unthinkable.
As recently as 2012, President Obama ran for re-election opposed to gay marriage.
In 2008, deep blue California voters passed Proposition 8, which declared that “only marriage between a man and a woman is valid or recognized in California.”
In 2004, incumbent President George W. Bush ran for re-election on the platform of instituting a constitutional amendment barring gay marriage. And while she opposed Bush’s amendment, then-Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., spoke on the senate floor saying that she took “umbrage at anyone who might suggest that those of us who worry about amending the Constitution are less committed to the sanctity of marriage, or to the fundamental bedrock principle that exists between a man and a woman.”
In 1978, hardly ancient history, California voters were presented with Proposition 6, otherwise known as the Briggs Initiative, which would have banned gays, lesbians and potentially anyone who supported gay rights, from working in California’s public schools. Ultimately, the measure was voted down, but public opinion polls initially showed the initiative sailing to victory.
And today, we have a Republican president who has no problem proclaiming to the world that he’s a friend of the gays.
If gay rights advocates had the ability to take off their partisan goggles for five seconds they’d realize that they’ve scored a huge victory. And so has the country.
John Phillips is a CNN political commentator and can be heard weekdays at 3 p.m. on “The Drive Home with Jillian Barberie and John Phillips” on KABC/AM 790.
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