“I’m old enough to remember John F. Kennedy taking office and though I was a kid then, there was the same sense of getting rid of those old guys and moving the country out of a big ditch and getting it going forward again. That ended up working out for that very embattled administration of A Thousand Days. Which was why we were so devastated when he was taken from us so quickly. Any person who can say of our current economy that it ‘hasn’t had adult supervision in quite a while,’ seems to me to be sensible enough to help full GLBT rights eventually get on his lists of things to do. Even if he doesn’t get around to it until the very last year of his eight-year term.”

“Despite a still-mounting financial crisis, the disappearance of my already petty retirement fund thanks to the lawlessness of Wall Street, the monumental disasters in Iraq and Afghanistan, and an anti-gay atmosphere in California that harkens back to Anita Bryant, I feel hopeful enough about our future to exercise some personal budget savings by abandoning the anti-depressants, sleeping pills and copious amounts of red wine that have been my coping mechanisms over the last eight years. Obama and Milk (the movie) came along just in time to pull me out of the dumps. Is that a queer coincidence or what? I think we need to look at what Obama will do for America that will ensure our inclusion, not what he will do for GLBT America. The financial crisis does not affect me because I am a lesbian, but it sure is making my future and that of my children feel a bit bleak. So let’s see if we can shore up the economy through public policies that include our families in the process as a piece of the puzzle, not an independent, marginal part. We are in a post-civil rights moment here with a president who is flashing back to New Deal politics. Let’s build something new from this opportunity.”