It's great that this is getting into the mainstream media. I recently had a conversation with a friend of a friend who didn't know anything about DADT. "Gays can't be in the army? Really? I didn't know that!"

starting to think "linguist" is the gayest profession after "navy" or "marine" ...

The more pressure Maddow and Savage and the other screeching harpies put on Obama the better.
Either he resists and the Liberals and Gays pout and cry and get sullen or he gives in and Red America remembers why they need the GOP.
Either way Obama is going to be pissed because if he wanted to do it he would have already and if he is pressured into doing something he personally objects to he is going to remember that and if he sticks to his principles and has to pay hell for it he will remember that too.

@2, "linguist" might be gay but not "cunning linguist"--except for the ladies of course.

Senator:

"I like the cut of your gib"

Soldier:

"Stop!"

7
A- You conceed Dan sounds like a screeching harpy, right?

B- It is an attitude as well as acoustic effect.

"On this point, I wanted to tell you guys about a discussion I had with a friend a couple of days ago about ERW....

So, I met up with a friend I used to work with who was laid off by ERW [recently]. He was actually XXXXX's direct supervisor until that point, a Field Organizer. We talked for several hours and he just totally went off on ERW top-down organizing style.

Part of his job was to try and organize things with smaller groups around the state. He told me that the problem is that ERW continually fucks people over because they're only really concerned with where the money is coming from, though they put up a front that they want to help the community. As an effect, he said that he'd have people from these different community groups calling him all the time cussing him out because ERW would last minute decide that plans with a certain group weren't profitable, and would just get the order to ditch out on them. He said that it felt like 80% of the groups they would work with would be so angry at them, because they were really only worried about the most profitable 20%: the big donaters.

He also said that he felt bad for the people that worked there because they're massively overworked and underpaid, working on average 60 hours a week, and more during big events. The bosses don't listen to the suggestions of any of the volunteers, but give orders to them based upon the wants of those with the dollars.

So basically I'm saying that our assessment of ERW as a top-down, conservative organization is pretty accurate, straight from the horse's mouth itself. Should we still work with them, yes. But should we be prepared for them to fuck us over if we can't bring them money? Yes. Let's just be as careful with them as possible. This is why I personally prefer a grassroots approach in which all of our opinions are valid and help shape the outward focus of the groups' activities. We're not tied down to donations, and they are. This is also why they're not prepared to "rock the boat", and why we have a very important role to play in building this movement."