Obama secures his base - gay, federal employees.By James Tillman
In a memorandum issued Wednesday, President Obama ordered executive departments and agencies to extend to same-sex partners the same benefits enjoyed by married couples, to the maximum extent permitted by the law.
President Obama said the memorandum "paves the way for long-overdue progress in our nation's pursuit of equality."
The new memorandum is the result of a review Obama ordered the Office of Personnel Management to conduct in order to determine what benefits could be extended to homosexual federal employees under existing law.
As the openly-homosexual John Berry, Director of the Office of Personnel Management, wrote in a directive detailing implementation of the President’s memorandum, these new benefits include: access to fitness facilities, adoption counseling, childcare services, medical treatment, lodging, accidental death and dismemberment insurance, and dental insurance, among many others.
In June of 2009, President Obama had extended a few federal benefits to same-sex partners; however, the new directive goes well beyond that measure.
Obama's order ensures that "all agencies that provide new benefits to the spouses of Federal employees and their children should, to the extent permitted by law, also provide them to the same-sex domestic partners of their employees and those same-sex domestic partners’ children."
Such measures did not satisfy President Obama, however, who said he would support the Domestic Partners Benefits and Obligations Act - which he called "crucial legislation" to guarantee "the full range of benefits enjoyed by heterosexual couples" to same-sex partners.
Furthermore, President Obama again vowed to work with congress to repeal the Defense of Marriage Act, which he called discriminatory and an interference with states’ rights.
The Defense of Marriage Act was passed in 1996 by a veto-proof majority, and says that no state will be forced to consider a relationship between two persons of the same sex as a marriage, even if the relationship is so considered in another state. It also says that the federal government defines marriage as a legal union exclusively between one man and one woman.
After the President's memorandum was announced, the homosexualist Human Rights Campaign (HRC) crowed that some of the benefits announced were part of the HRC's "Blueprint for Positive Change," a document outlining a homosexualist agenda.
HRC President Joe Solmonese, however, agreed with Obama that the benefits' limitations are "a glaring reminder that the Defense of Marriage Act ultimately stands in the way of providing true equality to LGBT Americans."
The Family Research Council's Tony Perkins called the move "a gratuitous swipe at the Defense of Marriage Act, carving out a position that's well outside the mainstream of most Americans (72%) who define marriage as the union of a man and woman."
Contrary to Obama's claim to have worked within the law, Perkins said the "special perks already violate U.S. marriage law and 31 state marriage amendments."
"Interestingly enough, the benefits don't apply to unmarried heterosexuals, meaning that this White House is promoting the same kind of 'discrimination' it's supposedly working to end!" he added.
