Dan Choi Arrested at the White House - Again

Lt. Dan Choi, Capt. Jim Pietrangelo, Petty Officer Larry Whitt, Cadet Mara Boyd, Airman Victor Price, and Petty Officer Autumn Sandeen - a transgender woman who regularly blogs on Pam's House Blend - were arrested at the White House today after chaining themselves to the fence.  Newsweek's Human Condition blog has short profiles on the group here.  Choi and Pietrangello, you remember, were already arrested for doing the same thing just last month.  Raw video of today's arrests from CBS:



And in an unprecedented move, White House Police cleared reporters from the area and barred them from covering the story:  this from "the most transparent Administration in history":



The President was heckled during a speech yesterday by protesters demanding an end to DADT, to which the President responded, "I agree"; both this and the White House protest were organized by GetEqual:



An apt quote from Rep. Barney Frank, speaking over the weekend to the Victory Fund about the passage of ENDA:

Here's my radical homosexual agenda:  Let us get married, join the military and hold down a job. Very few radicals in history would have thought much of that.

Dan Choi: Not Guilty, Not Ashamed, Not Finished

From Newsweek's interview with Dan Choi on his arrest with Capt. Jim Pietrangelo after handcuffing themselves to the White House gates last week:

Why not now? Within the gay community so many leaders want acceptance from polite society. I think there's been a betrayal of what is down inside of us in order to achieve what looks popular, what look enviable. The movement seems to be centered around how to become an elite. There is a deep schism [in the gay-rights movement], everyone knows this. But this shouldn't be about which group has better branding. There is a tremor right now in every gay and transgender youth that these groups are not grasping. I would say to them—you do not represent us if all you are looking for is a ladder into elite society.

When I get messages from people who want to be a part of this I ask back: what are you willing to sacrifice? We are tired of being stereotyped as privileged, bourgeois elites. Is someone willing to give up their career, their relationships with powerful people, their Rolodex, or their parents' love to stand up for who they are? I'm giving up my military rank, my unit—which to me is a family—my veterans' benefits, my health care, so what are you willing to sacrifice?

They say freedom is not free, but it doesn't have to cost anything either. Jesus up on the cross did not have a party with all his major donors to raise money for his cause, his cross was free. Ghandi did not need three-course dinners and a cocktail party to get his message out. These are people who sacrificed their lives. For them it was hemlock, a cross, the bullet that shot Harvey Milk . . . it was not the size of their distribution list, but their message that endured. . . .

When I was handcuffed to the gate someone else asked me what's next. I'm standing there with hands lifted skyward and I just told him, "This is." I have fully committed my life and all the sacrifices necessary to manifest equality and America's promises. Like I said at court, "I'm not guilty, I'm not ashamed, and I'm not finished."

A trial date is set for April 26.  They will also likely face courts-martial by the military.  Below, the two men after being released on bail last Saturday at the D. C. Courthouse: