Senator Feinstein recalls traumatizing days of Milk

[JackBeck]

www.pageoneq.com

Marriage on the Rocks

By MAUREEN DOWD
Published: November 22, 2008

Los Angeles


Dianne Feinstein is not sure she’ll ever be able to watch the movie “Milk,” even though she’s in it.

There is 1978 footage of a stricken Feinstein in the opening minutes of the new Gus Van Sant biopic of Harvey Milk, her colleague on the San Francisco Board of Supervisors and the first openly gay elected official in American history. (Sean Penn soars as Milk.)

“I was the one who found his body,” the California senator told me Friday, on route from the airport to her home in San Francisco. “To get a pulse, I put my finger in a bullet hole. It was a terrible, terrible time in the city’s history.”

(snip)

“I think people are beginning to look at it differently, I know it’s happened for me,” Feinstein said of gay marriage. “I started out not supporting it. The longer I’ve lived, the more I’ve seen the happiness of people, the stability that these commitments bring to a life. Many adopted children who would have ended up in foster care now have good solid homes and are brought up learning the difference between right and wrong. It’s a very positive thing.”

More, including a hilarious exchange between Dowd and Larry Kramer, at http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/23/opinion/23dowd.html?ref=opinion

[LeftyMom]

1. What's that I feel? Sympathy for Diane Feinstein??? Nevermind, just gas.

Dark days, when such good men are taken from us, and weak, self-interested people such as her are what's left to carry on.

[JackBeck]

2. If her support of the LGBT community is her only redeeming quality, I'll give her that much.

I've disagreed with her on just about everything else, which is why I hesitated even posting this.

Did you see this article about Sean Penn?

http://pageoneq.com/news/2008/Penn_Harvey_Milk_would_have_saved_gays_lives_during_AIDS_c_1121.html

[EFerrari]

3. Maureen Dowd, facile and wrong again.

This is not a news story, it's a blogger. But, it's what I remember, too:

Diane Feinstein, opportunist.

Dianne Feinstein managed last week to avoid censure from her colleagues in Congress. Still, I take heart at the effort to hold not only all Democrats to an ethical party standard, but her in particular. She has a constant legacy of being in league with corporate and AIPAC interests at the expense of liberal issues. I think it's time we remind ourselves of how she got her political start.


Feinstein first ran for public office 1969, earning a position on San Francisco's Board of Supervisors at a time when elections were conducted by general vote of the entire city. She had enough money and influence to retain her seat but never the popular support to win election as mayor, despite running in 1971 and 1975.

In 1977, San Francisco switched to a system of electing its board of supervisors by district rather than city-wide. This system was strongly supported by George Moscone, and it had the effect of opening up more supervisor positions to those who had neighborhood backing rather than big money buying elections. Following the 1977 election, among those who opposed Moscone on most of his liberal initiatives were Feinstein, along with Dan White, a former cop and firefighter who was elected to the board of supervisors from a mostly white, conservative district of San Francisco. Supporting Moscone were supervisors Harvey Milk (first openly elected gay), Carol Ruth Silver (single mother and attorney), Gordon Lau (Chinese-American progressive), and others. By a vote of 6-5, Feinstein was elected head of the board of supervisors over Lau.

In the autumn of 1978, Dan White decided he was in over his head, financially and politically. He had a new baby and additional expenses that he thought could be met with a private sector job. More to the point, he was used to the authoritarian hierarchy of the police and fire departments, where people of color "knew their place" and he would never have to deal with queers as equals. Without talking it over first with the business interests who had paid for his election, he submitted his resignation to Moscone. Who managed not to show his glee at this development: The power bloc on the board of supervisors now might shift toward the liberal end.

When White's backers found out what he had done, they were appalled and demanded he go to Moscone to beg for his job back. One of those who lobbied White to plead with Moscone was Dianne Feinstein.

http://maggiesmetawatershed.blogspot.com/2007/11/dianne-feinstein-opportunist.html

[xultar]

4. Wow, DiFi supports gay marriage. That's effin kewl.

[LeftyMom]

5. She lives in San Francisco.

She has to say that or she'll never eat a spit-free meal again. :shrug: