What is Howard Dean’s goddamn problem?

John at Americablog posted this open letter from gay Democratic party insider Paul Yandura the other day.  It pretty much speaks for me too, and I’d intended to blog a little about it…

Dear Friends:

The Republicans have announced that they intend to use gay equality issues as a divisive election year tactic- AGAIN this year. Neither the DNC, nor any of the national committees (DCCC,DSCC), have a strategy to combat this hatred (unless you count avoidance as a strategy).

Dont believe me? Ask Howard, Ask Nancy, Ask Harry, Ask Rahm, Ask Chuck.

For many months a number of us have made appeals to Howard Dean and party officials to care about and defend the dignity of gay and lesbian families and friends, in the same way they defend the dignity of other key constituencies.

As the enclosed article shows, the DNC is fighting the vicious attacks being waged upon immigrants by the Republican party. Its the right thing to do and I applaud their action. Why then is it so difficult for them to do the same for us?

Why are gays and lesbians continually left to fight these battles alone? Where are our allies?

All progressives need to be asking how much has the DNC budgeted to counter the anti-gay ballot initiatives in the states. We also all need to know why the DNC and our Democratic leaders continue to allow the Republicans to use our families and friends as pawns to win elections.

We need answers to these questions. Until we get them my advice is don’t give any more money to the Dems.

-Paul

Well, that’s not my advice.  My advice is to give to specific democratic candidates who are willing to stand up for justice and equality for gay and lesbian Americans, and To No One Else until they all grow backbones.  But then Dean has to go and do something you’d think was worthy only of Petulant George…

Democratic Party Chair Howard Dean on May 2 fired the party’s gay outreach advisor Donald Hitchcock less than a week after Hitchcock’s domestic partner, Paul Yandura, a longtime party activist, accused Dean of failing to take stronger action to defend gays.

Howard Dean sacked the party’s gay outreach advisor just days after his domestic partner publicly criticized the party chair for failing to stand up for gay families.

Dean immediately hired gay former Democratic Party operative Brian Bond to replace Hitchcock, according to DNC spokesperson Karen Finney, who called Bond a "proven leader."

…

"It was not retaliation," Finney said of Hitchcock’s dismissal. "It was decided we needed a change. We decided to hire a proven leader."

Sell it to the White House Press Corps Finney.  I’m not a republican.  You can’t expect me to believe transparantly obvious bullshit just because the party leadership tells me to believe it.

Hitchcock declined comment Tuesday night except to confirm that Dean informed him May 2 through a surrogate that he had been terminated. He said he was considering consulting an attorney to decide whether to contest the firing.

"This is retaliation, plain and simple," said Yandura. "This shows what they think about domestic partners."

Yandura said Tuesday night that Dean was using Hitchcock as a "scapegoat" for problems of Dean’s own making.

"All I did was ask questions about what the party and Dean are doing about its GLBT constituency, Yandura said. "I have yet to see any answers."

Well, you just got one.  And so did the rest of us.  Howard Dean just retaliated against a gay man whose spouse spoke out about the party’s cowardly behavior in the face of republican gay bashing.  The same Howard Dean who eliminated the GLBT Outreach Desk, telling the Gay community when we started raising a stink that it was all really an effort to improve outreach to all constituencies.  The same Howard Dean who enjoyed much gay support for his 2004 presidential run, based on his signing into law Vermont’s Civil Unions.  Somehow, when he became chair of the DNC, some of us expected that the party would actually start fighting back against the bigots, instead of picking a lot of pointless fights with gay democrats.  But I guess not.  Well…we always were the easy targets…

My advice is still, and now more then ever, to give to, and work for, democrats who are willing to stand up for us.  But then it seemed, once upon a time, as though Dean was one of those democrats, didn’t it.  I can almost envy the republicans.  Life must be so much simpler when all you have to think is what the party tells you to think, and all you have to do is what the party tells you to do.