Olson and Boies Act, While Obama Talks

Gay rights is yet another issue on which the President speaks big words but has offered little in terms of actions to accompany them. Constitutional lawyers Ted Olson and David Boies, however, who argued against each other in Bush v. Gore are actually joining forces to fight for real change.

On Saturday, President Obama presented a rousing rhetorical defense of gay rights to the nearly 3, 000 people attending the annual Human Rights Campaign’s dinner in Washington.  Rhetorically, President Obama is all that the gay community hoped and dreamed the President would become when they most enthusiastically supported his campaign. “I’m here with a simple message: I’m here with you in that fight," Obama said on Saturday.  Obama spoke passionately to the crowd about his commitment to equality for the gay community and hinted that he was working with military leaders to address the military’s “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy.

Yet despite the President’s powerful statements, gay rights is yet another issue on which the President speaks big words but has offered little in terms of actions to accompany them.  The President believes "don’t ask don’t tell" is unequivocally wrong… but, as he told gay leaders in June, “As Commander-in-Chief, in a time of war, I do have a responsibility to see that this change is administered in a practical way and a way that takes over the long term.”  Of course, the President left that line out of last night’s address.

The President may mean what he said last night: he may be ready and willing to risk a portion of his rapidly diminishing supply of political capital to not only end “don’t ask, don’t tell” but also to support gay marriage initiatives, and he may simply be waiting for the right moment to attack these issues head on.  But until that day, the most important leaders as far as the fight for equal rights for the LGBTQ community goes is not the President but rather two Washington lawyers: Ted Olson and David Boies.  In a city with more lawyers than it knows what to do with, these two stand out: Besides being possibly the best two constitutional lawyers in the United States, the pair famously argued against one another in Bush v. Gore.  In any event, the unlikely pair came together after the California Supreme Court upheld the legality of Proposition 8, which banned gay marriage in the state of California.  The team has joined forces to appeal the constitutionality of the decision, if necessary, all the way to the United States Supreme Court, a venue where these two men have, to put it mildly, proven track records of success.  The case is far from a slam dunk, but at this juncture, it seems that Olson and Boies, and not Obama, are the ones leading the real fight for change.