More evil compliments of George W. Bush

LGBT Federal Workers Lose Job Protections

by Paul Johnson

365Gay.com Newscenter

Washington Bureau Chief

Posted: March 17, 2004 2:01 p.m. ET

(Washington, D.C.) Gay and lesbians in the entire federal workforce have had their job protections officially removed by the office of Special Counsel. The new Special Counsel, Scott Bloch, says his interpretation of a 1978 law intended to protect employees and job applicants from adverse personnel actions is that gay and lesbian workers are not covered.

Bloch said that the while a gay employee would have no recourse for being fired or demoted for being gay, that same worker could not be fired for attending a gay Pride event.

In his interpretation, Bloch is making a distinction between one’s conduct as a gay or lesbian and one’s status as a gay or lesbian.

“People confuse conduct and sexual orientation as the same thing, and I don’t think they are,” Bloch said in an interview with Federal Times, a publication for government employees.

Bloch said gays, lesbians and bisexuals cannot be covered as a protected class because they are not protected under the nation’s civil rights laws.

“When you’re interpreting a statute, you have to be very careful to interpret strictly according to how it’s written and not get into loose interpretations,” Bloch said. “Someone may have jumped to the conclusion that conduct equals sexual orientation, but they are essentially very different. One is a class . . . and one is behavior.”

It is the first time that Bloch has explained his position on the issue of gay workers despite pressure from unions and Federal Globe an organization that represents LGBT government workers after the OSC began removing references to sexual orientation-based discrimination from its complaint form, the OSC basic brochure, training slides and a two-page flier entitled "Your Rights as a Federal Employee." (story)

Bloch's position is a marked departure from how the previous special counsel, Elaine Kaplan, enforced the law. “The legal position that he is taking, that there is some distinction between discrimination based on sexual orientation and discrimination based on conduct, is absurd,” Kaplan told Federal Times.

Bloch indicated that he may amend his position. He said he is initiating a review of the issue and plans to meet with the Office of Personnel Management and congressional staff to hear their opinions before making a final decision on how his office will handle complaints alleging sexual orientation discrimination. The review will not get completely under way until next month, when Bloch’s senior legal adviser begins work, he said.

Bloch was appointed by President Bush to a five year term beginning in January.

©365Gay.com® 2004

I don't know if I'm alone in this, but I feel very optimistic about the Dem's outlook in November. I think the progressives' chances increase as the Republicans show themselves to be more and more inhuman.

What do you all think?

I think if Bush is re-elected the U.S. is down the tubes and I'm personally applying for political asylum here in Brazil. He and his appointees are unremittingly evil. Period. And Americans who obstinately keep telling themselves "it can't happen here" had better pull their heads out of the sand. It can happen anywhere, including the U.S., and religious fascism is happening in the U.S. as fast as Bush and his creepy cohorts can shove it through. And believe me (as a recent ex-Federal employee) the Bushwhackers are gutting every progressive and forward-looking measure and program they can as fast as they can while they can get away with it under the radar screen. Our tame press and Congress have been big helps to him, keeping everyone's attention focussed on Iraq and other smoke-and-mirrors distractions while Bush & Co. turn the U.S. into an "evangelical" theocracy. Bleah!

>I think if Bush is re-elected the U.S. is down the tubes and

>I'm personally applying for political asylum here in Brazil.

There's a courageous citizen for you. He thinks things are going badly in his country and he thinks evil forces are taking it over and ruining it.

So what is he going to do? Fight against those forces and stand up for his convictions? Naahhh . . . he's going to flee to the bathhouses of another country and beg them to let him hide there. That's very commendable.

>He and his appointees are unremittingly evil. Period. And

>Americans who obstinately keep telling themselves "it can't

>happen here" had better pull their heads out of the sand. It

>can happen anywhere, including the U.S., and religious fascism

>is happening in the U.S. as fast as Bush and his creepy

>cohorts can shove it through.

I love how you know so much about what's going on here. Where do you get your news from? The Rio Sauna Journal?

And it's so interesting, and so sad, how so many Jews were raised with their mommies whispering endlessly and hysterically in their little ears about the Holocaust and about how everyone is out to get them, and so they constantly interpret every news event as foreshadowing the imminent creation of concentration camps, and they constantly screech over and over how fascism is coming and how anyone who doesn't share their paralyzing paranoia, persecution complex, and fear-driven view of the world is just blind and naive. How tragic.

>Our tame press and Congress have been big helps

>to him, keeping everyone's attention focussed on Iraq and

>other smoke-and-mirrors distractions . . .

Yeah - like that 9/11 distraction, and that terrorist distraction. Why do they keep talking about all of these irrelevant distractions, therefore obscuring the fascist theocracy that they're building? Hey, trilingual - I think Christian Gestapo agents are knocking on your bathhouse door - you better let them in, or else.

>Bloch said gays, lesbians and bisexuals cannot be covered as a

>protected class because they are not protected under the

>nation’s civil rights laws.

Constitutionally, neither are women. But they should be at home making babies as god intended anyway...

You know, I may be with Tri. I will fight it as long as I can, but with rigged elections and now rigged, proprietary, sealed, un-auditable voting machines, it could end in civil war. I say "end in" because unlike the last civil war, this time the forces of darkness have got better weapons and no shyness about using them preemptively. So at some point the smart get going as the US (and the rest of the world?) descend into a new dark age, maybe hastened by a nuclear winter or eventually from unchecked global warming.

>>Bloch said gays, lesbians and bisexuals cannot be covered as

>a

>>protected class because they are not protected under the

>>nation’s civil rights laws.

>

>Constitutionally, neither are women. But they should

>be at home making babies as god intended anyway...

Nobody was talking about the Constitution. They were talking about federal "civil rights laws." Under those laws, gender is a protected class, whereas sexual orientation is not. I disagree with this interpretation by Scott Bloch, and worse, find it reprehensible that they would seek to undo this policy (as though protection of gay federal workers is some problem that needs fixing), but the putative legal point you made is just mistaken and irrelevant.

>You know, I may be with Tri.

That's great. Good riddance.

I will fight it as long as I

>can, but with rigged elections and now rigged, proprietary,

>sealed, un-auditable voting machines, it could end in civil

>war.

Translation: "Boo hoo - I can't win. I'm a victim. I'm being attacked and persecuted. I need to flee. I need some nice country to shelter me and help me. The big, bad Wolf is coming to eat me and I'm scared. I care so much for my country and the principles I endlessly claim I believe in that the minute they're in jeopardy I am going to be fightened and run away and hide."

Our country began by its founders standing up to the Goliath of the British Crown and, against all odds, defeating it. It's going to end with a bunch of wimpering, scared cowards fleeing as fast as possible in order to live out their days spinning around on Brazillian cock. What else does anyone need to know?

I say "end in" because unlike the last civil war, this

>time the forces of darkness have got better weapons and no

>shyness about using them preemptively. So at some point the

>smart get going as the US (and the rest of the world?) descend

>into a new dark age, maybe hastened by a nuclear winter or

>eventually from unchecked global warming.

These are truly the ramblings of a deranged madman.

Where do I get my news? Have you ever heard of the Internet? I read five or six newspapers on-line almost every day, including the NY Times, the San Francisco Chronicle, my hometown paper, and Clarín and La Nación (the two major Argentine dailies). I also get O Globo and Jornal do Brasil (the two quality dailies in Rio) and watch CNN International, BBC World, GloboNews and Televisión Española on cable TV here. Frankly, I'm better connected and informed here in Brazil than you are wherever your little cave is located in the U.S. And now that I'm retired, I've got all the time in the world to stay informed.

As for your gratuitous anti-Semitic musings, just remember that Jews (and most Germans) didn't believe in 1932 that "it could happen there," either. Lots of people thought Hitler's bluster was just electioneering, and he'd act more reasonably once elected. Well, they were wrong. There weren't any more elections after the fateful one that brought Hitler to power, and before long the police state apparatus of oppression and revenge effectively silenced almost all opposition. You talk tough, Dougie, but if you were in Germany in the 30's and the Gestapo came after you, I'm sure you'd be squealing fruitlessly for mercy in no time flat!

Some people manage to learn from history. (One of the reasons the Jewish people has managed to survive for more than 4000 years!) The U.S. is in danger, and the handwriting is on the wall. The danger isn't irreversible, but it's there, and if Bush is re-elected (or hangs on to power through some other trick) it's all over. And kindly remember that Hitler and his thugs didn't just go after Jews. Homosexuals were targeted, too, and you fall into that class. Bush's happy warriors are on a crusade against homosexuals like you (and the rest of us) and if they get their way you'll be meat loaf! As you so cogently pointed out, we're about the only minority group left that it's still legal to discriminate against under federal law. There may not be concentration camps, but there sure could be mass purges to get homosexuals out of the work place, just like the Nazis slowly but relentlessly squeezed the Jews out of the economic life of Germany during the 30s. And then faggots can just die of starvation, like many people did in Germany before the death camp system came into being.

Of course, lots of smart people saw the handwriting on the wall in Europe during the 30s and got the hell out. Other fools just stayed put, because they kept telling themselves that the Germany of Schiller, Goethe and Beethoven couldn't sink into barbarism. By the time it became completely evident that the bottom had dropped out of the nadir in Germany it was too late, both for the Jews and for any decent people left in Germany. Telling yourself something similar couldn't happen in the America of Jefferson, Franklin, Madison and Hamilton is gross self-deception. And there are signs that such bad things ARE happening in the U.S., from the losses of personal freedom in the name of security to the real live concentration camp we're running in Guantanamo, to the complicity of the courts in maintaining the fiction that Guantanamo is beyond the reach of U.S. (or any other) law, to detaining U.S. citizens indefinitely as "enemy combatants" and denying them access to contacts with lawyers or their families. Then there are all the "faith-based" initiatives (of course, the "faith" in question is fundamentalist Christianity of the Pat Robertson school) to install a theocratic government that's a "Christian" version of Iran. Let's not forget the invasion of Iraq based on flat-out lies and deception, just like Hitler's invasion of Poland based on flat-out lies and deception (Hitler claimed the Poles attacked a German border post and actually killed some German prisoners and had them dressed in Polish and German uniforms to show off to the press as evidence of the dastardly deed!). If you don't like the Hitler example, try Saddam's invasion of Iran, also based on lies and deception. (Guess where Saddam got the idea?) Maybe you don't see them, but many of us see the parallels and are seriously alarmed!

Oh, and Dougie, your nativist burblings are REALLY unappetizing. The U.S. (pre-Bush) was a good place to live. But so are lots of other countries, from Canada to South Africa, from Australia to Finland. People in those countries also enjoy freedom, prosperity and security, in many cases more so than do people in the U.S. If you ever left the confines of your little cave, you might find out that life can indeed be good outside the U.S. All the strutting propaganda notwithstanding, the U.S. isn't the last great hope of humanity, nor is it the examplar of democracy and freedom you think it is. The U.S. could learn a LOT about democracy, freedom and humane treatment of its fellow citizens from countries across the globe. Even from countries like Brazil, which with all its problems has an effective democracy, a vibrant free press, and some model programs like its AIDS treatment and prevention effort which have been far more successful than those in the U.S. Not to mention (getting back to the main focus of this website) that it isn't illegal ANYWHERE in Brazil or most other enlightened countries to be gay or to engage in commercial sex. You can't say that for the "bastion of freedom" you shill for.

'Nuff said.

>>>Bloch said gays, lesbians and bisexuals cannot be covered

>>>as a protected class because they are not protected under the

>>>nation’s civil rights laws.

>>Constitutionally, neither are women. But they should

>>be at home making babies as god intended anyway...

>Nobody was talking about the Constitution. They were talking

>about federal "civil rights laws." Under those laws, gender

>is a protected class, whereas sexual orientation is not. I

>disagree with this interpretation by Scott Bloch, and worse,

>find it reprehensible that they would seek to undo this policy

>(as though protection of gay federal workers is some problem

>that needs fixing), but the putative legal point you made is

>just mistaken and irrelevant.

I also disagree with the interpretation, and pointed out how far it could go with people like Bloch and Ashcroft in charge of doing the interpreting, especially if Bush gets to make any Supreme Court appointments. Would they actively repeal women’s rights? Some say they already are, there's a thread in here about Texas for example. At the least, it shows the danger of tolerating their point of view.

>That's great. Good riddance.

><...usual dougie bile...>

It's OK honey, it'll hopefully be a while before I go, I'll keep you company in the meantime. You clearly need further adult guidance...