I don't think I've ever seen so many phrases in such a short comment.. "fairweather friend" "taking flack" "under the bus" "clue-by-four" "hope springs eternal" - very impressive!

I agree, I'm happy to hear this.

Barney Frank is a congressman from southeastern Massachusetts, and the only openly gay elected official on the federal level. He's a liberal Democrat with a fairly impressive mastery of the rules of the house, and a potential successor to the ailing Ted Kennedy in the Senate.

The irritation noted in this thread about Frank is mostly not warranted. ENDA, or the Employment Non-Discrimination Act, is a current bill in the house and senate that would prevent discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation. The initial version, cosponsored by Frank and other Democrats, included protections for gender identity that would cover trans citizens. In order to get the bill passed, Frank later introduced a bill that did not have the gender identity protections. This bill passed 235-184, and didn't get out of committee in the Senate. President Bush would have vetoed the bill.

Given the victories of the Democrats in the past election, and the general improvement in the views of the public towards gay and trans Americans, there's a strong chance at least some form of ENDA will be passed and signed into law within the next two years. Hopefully, with 20 more house seats and 8 more senators Democrats will focus on the original bill, that Frank helped write himself, and not have to compromise to get something passed. The biggest issue now won't be the congress, it'll be getting to a final vote in the senate. That's something Frank has very little to do, unless he again undercuts the more expansive bill with a more limited one (unlikely, given what I noted above).

Yes, because for one Obama chooses congressional aides, and for another Obama takes all his cues on gay rights from Rick Warren, a guy who at best he views as someone he can work with on some issues and way better as a major leader of the nearly 90 million evangelical Christians in the country than utterly irredeemable jerks like Tony Perkins and James Dobson. I guess that's why Obama supports expanding EDNA to cover transgendered people, allowing gays to serve in the military, and going to at least the point of civil unions that give full substantive rights to gay and lesbian couples.*

* I personally disagree on the last, I believe that separate but equal cannot be truly equal. And I certainly believe that a very strong argument can be made, and has been made, about not accepting Warren because of his beliefs and actions in the prop 8 fight. But lets fight the battles that actually need to be fought- instead of creating ones that don't actually exist and that are absolutely specious. The idea that Warren would affect who Obama would hire, much less who Barney Frank, our only openly gay congressman, is simply not helpful to the real fight for equal rights.