Hillary Clinton and the State Department, "It Gets Better"

I think I feel the same way about Hillary Clinton that most of gays seem to feel about Lady Gaga... (that she should be president).

Of course Hillary Clinton has a special role to play, as Secretary of State, in assuring young gays that it does get better. During the height of the Cold War, the State Department was ground zero for government persecution of gay men and women as many were investigated and fired during a witch hunt that is generally overshadowed by the Red Scare. Termed "security risks," it was believed that homosexuals posed a threat to state security due to the possibility that they could be blackmailed by Soviets over their sexual behavior, and as a result of their general moral inferiority...

Historian David K. Johnson has written a fantastic book about the subject that I highly recommend called The Lavender Scare: The Cold War Persecution of Gays and Lesbians in the Federal Government. He discusses the origins of the State Department's purging of homosexuals, which spread throughout the rest of the government, and also the role it may have played in the early development of the gay civil rights movement. The fact that sixty years later the Secretary of State would be making an emotional appeal to young gays should make us feel hopeful for the future and out the civil rights struggles of our own era.