On the Other Side of the Glass

It’s easy to get caught up in the excitement of the moment. For someone like me, this is really the first time I’ve seen a Democrat win on the national stage. The historic nature of the candidacy only adds to the emotion.

But I wanted to focus on some other things. First, an open letter to my conservative friends, who still have a valuable role to play in our democracy for the next four years. I look forward to your engagement.

And second, and more somberly, it’s important to remember that while Obama broke a tremendous barrier yesterday, this election was an out-and-out catastrophe for the equality of gay and lesbian citizens. Our repudiation of their equal humanity — particularly when the electorate was primed to be thinking about discrimination, prejudice, and exclusion — is a shame upon the nation. And the pain that these men and women must feel — to have been affirmatively and explicitly written out of perhaps the greatest public expression of the American ethos of equality under the law — is unimaginable to me.