Family Research Council angry at Obama for cleaning up its mess

FRC's Tony Perkins

As to be expected, the Family Research Council didn't care for President Obama's State of the Union address.

The organization particularly didn't care for the part where President Obama mentioned equal treatment for same-sex military couples. FRC especially didn't like the announcement before the SOTU speech that the Pentagon would be giving some benefits to these same-sex couples. And the brazen hypocrisy in which FRC engages in to criticize this will astound you:

 . . . Hours before his State of the Union address, the commander-in-chief gave his Pentagon the thumbs up to hundreds of thousands of dollars in new spending for homosexual partner perks. Starting August 31, the same-sex boyfriends and girlfriends of service members will be eligible for privileges that even cohabiting heterosexuals are not: military ID cards, access to military commissaries, gymnasiums, and movie theaters, participation in family support programs on bases and posts, and the chance to fly on Defense Department aircraft on the taxpayers' dime.

For a liberal movement so intent on policing discrimination, this policy is full of it! The U.S.government has decided that what you do in the bedroom qualifies you for federally-subsidized benefits (unless you happen to be heterosexual, like 96.6% of the U.S. population). Once again, it's exclusion in the name of "inclusion." Under this policy, Washington is officially in the business of incentivizing homosexual behavior in our military--an observation that appalls veterans like Senator Jim Inhofe (R-Okla.).

"The President is eroding our military's apolitical stance and forcing conformity onto the rest of society by pushing his liberal social agenda through the Department of Defense. In a weak attempt to not violate the Defense of Marriage Act, the administration is using a play on words by saying 'same sex domestic partners' can have access to benefits instead of 'spouses.'"

What's more, Sen. Inhofe points out, America is on a "slippery slope" with this kind of preferential treatment. "Why would the DOD extend benefits to same-sex partners and then deny cohabiting heterosexual couples the same benefits? The Department of Defense is essentially creating a new class of beneficiary that will increase costs and demand for limited resources that are currently available for military families, active and reserve forces, and retirees.

Why indeed would the DOD extend benefits to same-sex partners and then deny cohabiting heterosexual couples the same benefits?

Maybe because the cohabiting heterosexual couples generally have the option to get married, whereas the same-sex couples do not have that same option in most cases.

Also while some states offer same-sex couples the option of marriage, there is that annoying little pesky law called DOMA (Defense of Marriage Act) which precludes the federal government from recognizing same-sex marriages.

And here is the kicker. Anti-gay activist Robert Knight helped to craft DOMA while he was an employee of the Family Research Council.

In other words:

• FRC is claiming that the Obama Administration is discriminating against cohabiting heterosexual couples by offering same-sex couples benefits that cohabiting heterosexual couples cannot receive.

• However, the reason why these benefits had to be given is because by law, the federal government cannot recognize the marriages of same-sex couples no matter if these marriages are legal via state law.

• And the reason why the federal government cannot recognize these marriages is because of DOMA, a law which was partly crafted by an FRC employee.

It's not the Obama Administration which is practicing discrimination. If anything, the Obama Administration is cleaning up the mess that the FRC helped to become law.

The sad irony is that while FRC dismissively refers to same-sex couples as "boyfriends" and "girlfriends," it is because of efforts like groups like FRC that these couples aren't considered to be more than that by the federal government.

It's the equivalent of criticizing someone for being in a hole while omitting the fact that you are the one who put them there in the first place.