Homo The State Department
posted by on December 5 at 9:40 AM
Did you know that the State Department will pay travel expenses for the pets of career diplomats—and evacuate those pets in an emergency—but won’t do the same for their same-sex partners? Well we do now, thanks to Michael E. Guest, former ambassador to Romania, resigned from the State Department yesterday.
But last month, after 26 years in the Foreign Service, [Guest] did something uncharacteristically undiplomatic.Guest resigned from the State Department, giving up a career he loved, in order to protest rules and regulations that he believes are unfair to the same-sex partners of Foreign Service officers, giving them fewer benefits than family pets. He had spent the years since his return from Bucharest trying to win changes in policies, appealing directly to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, but said his proposals were met with indifference and inertia.
“I’ve felt compelled to choose between obligations to my partner, who is my family, and service to my country,” Guest told a crowd of 75 senior State Department officials, a few steps from Rice’s office, at his retirement ceremony on Nov. 20, according to a transcript of his remarks. “That anyone should have to make that choice is a stain on the secretary’s leadership, and a shame for this institution and our country.”
The same-sex partners of gay or lesbian diplomats are denied security training, foreign-language training, travel benefits, access to embassy medical facilities—all benefits granted to the spouses of heterosexual diplomats. And, again, there’s that hugely insulting thing about pets. If your same-sex partner pays his own way to Bucharest, where you’ve been posted, and then there’s a little revolution and armed insurgents are marching on the American embassy, the State Department will evacuate your pet parakeet and your standard poodle. But not your boyfriend. He’s on his own.
Barf. That's just barbaric.
My cat will be glad to know that, at least as far as the State Department is concerned, she ranks higher than my boyfriend. Ugh.
Sounds like the state department is endorsing beastiality over homosexuality to me.
That's a pretty gutsy thing for an obviously very dedicated civil servant to do, and it's a real embarassment to the Administration. Hopefully, this story will be lots of publicity. It certainly seems to have a strong public interest angle.
That's horrifying. One more reason we HAVE to get a dem in office in 2008. If only I felt reasonably sure that will happen....
Well they think we're animals, anyway. This really isn't at all surprising. I agree with #4.
This is gold.
I think we're all missing the obvious work-around here.
Clearly the thing to do is to claim your partner as your pet.
Dreadful. And good for him. But Dan. How can you even compare a parakeet and a standard poodle? I'm insulted. And so is my standard poodle.
...of course, then you're having sex with your pet, and I'm not sure how that goes over, diplomatically speaking.
It's all so complicated.
This isn't an either/or situation -it's a stupid policy that needs to be changed on its own merits. It would be just like the State Department to exclude the benefits for pets because someone made an issue of it.
Dude actually expected Condi something? Puh-leaze.
To paraphrase Princess Sparkle Pony, keeping track of Condi's weekly accomplishments is easy because they're always the same: Absolutely nothing.
After they started that idiotic DipNote Blog and the whole Iraq diplomat draft thingy went from flap to row, I realized that our Foreign Service people really are kinda stoopid. No wonder State is a total hot FUBAR mess.
And he'd better zip it, 'cause you just know they're gonna ship his ass to Somalia or Sudan for an Enhanced Exit Interview over this.
Not that it excuses anything but wouldn't they help evacuate the partner just on the basis of his American citizenship? Or did The Killing Fields lie to me?
I applaud him for resigning.
Too many people sit by and do nothing, he did what he could.
No link? I'd like to show this to other people, but I need to be able to cite something more than a blog post.
careful, if the partners get the same rights as pets they have to go through quarantine; my cat didn't like it all.
What if my partner is wearing a dog collar and a leash at the time of evacuation?
Maybe the state department reads Savage Love and wasn't sure the relationship would last... Maybe the partner had gained weight and was due to be chucked anyway.
Those of us who love our pets never stop. Human companions are apparently more disposable.
Depends on where you're stationed, No. 17.
Some countries may require that he be neutered as a condition of entry.
@15: Try this:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/12/04/AR2007120401801.html?hpid=sec-nation
There's also a transcript of his farewell speech here:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/12/04/AR2007120401785.html?nav=rss_nation
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