Obama Continues to Redefine the Family

This weekend we had the first Father's Day proclamation to laud gay couples, and now this:

The Labor Department intends to issue regulations this week ordering businesses to give gay employees equal treatment under a law permitting workers unpaid time off to care for newborns or loved ones.

Labor Secretary Hilda Solis planned to announce Wednesday that the government would require employers to extend the option that has been available to heterosexual workers for almost two decades, two officials briefed on the plan said Monday. Neither was authorized to speak publicly ahead of the announcement.

The move, coming less than five months before November's congressional elections, seemed likely to incite conservatives and Republicans who stood in lockstep against the Obama administration's earlier efforts to repeal a ban on gays and lesbians serving openly in the military. It also appeared likely to be popular with loyal Democrats and organized labor.

The Family and Medical Leave Act allows workers to take up to 12 weeks of unpaid leave each year to take care of loved ones or themselves. The 1993 law, which also allows employees to take time off for adoptions, has previously only been applied to heterosexual couples.

The Labor Department planned to extend those rights based on a new interpretation of the law, the officials said. There was no plan to ask Congress to change the law, which means future presidents could reverse the decision.

President Barack Obama and his administration have slowly rolled out policies to help gays and lesbians, who supported his candidacy but have soured on what they consider his slow pace in making incremental instead of wholesale changes. He planned to meet with gay activists Tuesday at the White House, the second time such a reception has been held at the executive mansion.

The problem with these incremental movements is they become politically difficult to undo later on, though without an actual law defining "family", Obama sets up his gay supporters for disappointments later.  If the Dems had any courage at all they'd propose and attempt to pass a law rather than operate on fiats handed down by Obama.

If this continues, at some point soon we won't have a definition of "family" that will have any meaning at all, much as the definition of "marriage" will eventually be meaningless and more and more combinations are called "marriage".

And then there's this Tweet from Mark Knoller:

This evening, Obama reaches out to a bloc of supporters, hosting a reception marking Lesbian Gay Bisexual Transgender Pride Month.

When is Heterosexual Pride Month, and what is it about our sexual preferences that are supposed to make us proud?