Memo to Lisa Williams: Harvey Milk Did Not Die for Bank of America’s Sins

At the outset, I want to say that those who have trepidations about jumping on the Bradley Manning bandwagon shouldn’t be dismissed out of hand.  It is not completely clear yet what the full effects of his document-dumping will be.  While it is without debate that he exposed some wrongdoing that needed to be exposed, what he divulged  may – emphasis on that word may – have serious unintended, and possibly even unjustified, ramifications.

That having been said, I really wish that everyone would think about whether anything that he’s done could possibly. even extrapolated out as riduculously as might be possible, cause as much damage to as many people (in the uniformed services or otherwise) as what we know – emphasis on that word as well – has been done to tens (hundreds?) of thousands of Americans of all sexual orientations and gender identities by Bank of America, Wells Fargo, and Clear Channel Media.

News reports yesterday indicated that Bradley Manning, widely known to be gay [KAT’S NOTE: also asserted by some to be trans, though this is something I offer no opinion on here], had been selected to be one of the Grand Marshals of the annual San Francisco gay pride parade, named by the LGBT Pride Celebration Committee. When the predictable backlash instantly ensued, the president of the Board of SF Pride, Lisa L Williams, quickly capitulated, issuing a cowardly, imperious statement that has to be read to be believed.

Williams proclaimed that “Manning will not be a grand marshal in this year’s San Francisco Pride celebration” and termed his selection “a mistake”. She blamed it all on a “staff person” who prematurely made the announcement based on a preliminary vote, and she assures us all that the culprit “has been disciplined”: disciplined. She then accuses Manning of “actions which placed in harms way [sic] the lives of our men and women in uniform”

Now, here’s the money shot:

Williams decreed to all organization members that “even the hint of support” for Manning’s actions – even the hint – “will not be tolerated by the leadership of San Francisco Pride”. Will not be tolerated.

Jawohl!

Not.

Again, in spite of what Greenwald has to say below, I can see room to debate whether or not this particular honor should have been bestowed on Manning.

[T]he authoritarian, state-and-military-revering mentality pervading Williams’ statement is striking. It isn’t just the imperious decree that “even a hint of support” for Manning “will not be tolerated”, though that is certainly creepy. Nor is it the weird announcement that the wrongdoer “has been disciplined”. Even worse is the mindless embrace of the baseless claims of US military officials (that Manning “placed in harms way the lives of our men and women in uniform”) along with the supremely authoritarian view that any actions barred by the state are, ipso facto, ignoble and wrong. Conduct can be illegal and yet still be noble and commendable: see, for instance, Daniel Ellsberg, or most of the leaders of the civil rights movement in the US. Indeed, acts of civil disobedience and conscience by people who risk their own interests to battle injustices are often the most commendable acts. Equating illegal behavior with ignominious behavior is the defining mentality of an authoritarian – and is particularly notable coming from what was once viewed as a bastion of liberal dissent.

But the more one learns about the parties involved here, the less surprising it becomes. According to her biography, Williams “organized satellite offices for the Obama campaign” and also works for various Democratic politicians. It was President Obama, of course, who so notoriously decreed Bradley Manning guilty in public before his trial by military officers serving under Obama even began, and whose administration was found by the UN’s top torture investigator to have abused him and is now so harshly prosecuting him. It’s anything but surprising that a person who was a loyal Obama campaign aide finds Bradley Manning anathema while adoring big corporations and banks (which funded the Obama campaign and who, in the case of telecoms, Obama voted to immunize).

What we see here is how even many of the most liberal precincts in America are now the leading spokespeople for and loyalists to state power as a result of their loyalty to President Obama. Thus do we have the President of the San Francisco Gay Pride Parade sounding exactly like the Chairman of the Joints Chief, or Sarah Palin, or gay war-loving neocons, in depicting any meaningful opposition to the National Security State as the supreme sin.

Its the authoritarianism within LGB( ) circles that has me most disturbed here.

Williams’ bio says nothing about having been assimilated by the HRC Borg, but based on her Napoleonic attitude, I suspect that if, anyhwhere in the world, there is even a single vibrator shaped like Elizabeth Birch, I now know who owns it.

According to that bio of hers:

Since 2006, Lisa has served on the San Francisco Pride Board and currently serves as Board President. As President, she has recruited diverse community leaders to implement new ideas and programs that enhance the success of San Francisco Pride.

Well, in addition to Williams, there are 8 other people on that page and if any of them are trans-anything its not evident from the page.  There is, on the other hand, one person whose bio indicates that in his “free time” he enjoys “political engagement, macro-economic monetary policy, music venues and swimming.”

Seriously?

Bank of America…

Wells Fargo…

Clear Channel Media….

All ‘yes’.

Makes sense now – in a Mr. Creosote sort of way.

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