"Mistakes were made."

By any measure, Bill Clinton made life a disaster for gay Americans. His fumbled gays-in-the-military gambit resulted in the ruin of thousands of military careers and the waste of hundreds of millions of dollars in training costs; among the collateral costs was the decimation of the military's cadre of Arabists just before 9/11 left America most in need of them. One insider has written of Clinton's naive post-inaugural stunt:

But soon after Clinton took office, in 1993, it was apparent that his tenure was off to a rocky beginning. The early days of the Administration were marred by opposition within the military and the Democratic Party itself to Clinton’s idea of gays and lesbians serving openly in the uniformed armed forces. The White House was unprepared to shepherd a major social-policy change through Congress. The Senate Armed Services Committee chairman, Sam Nunn, a Democrat from Georgia, led opposition to Clinton’s gay-rights policy, working behind the scenes with General Colin Powell, who was a Bush-holdover as Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. The so-called Don’t Ask Don’t Tell compromise was born: gays and lesbians would be allowed to serve so long as they kept their sexual orientation secret. Gay-rights advocates were outraged that Clinton had agreed to a bad compromise, but at this point, in the spring of 1993, it was clear that the President was going to lose this battle. (Don’t Ask Don’t Tell, in fact, turned out to be a policy and personnel disaster.)

After what was regarded as a fiasco on gays in the military, the Administration entered a phase of deep reluctance to tackle substantive gay-rights issues on the national stage. Although Clinton made a number of first-ever, high-profile appointments of gay leaders to his team (I was one of the minor ones), any kind of gay-rights policy agenda seemed stalled as a result of the Don’t Ask Don’t Tell hangover.

The President alienated gay leaders- and lots of gay voters who read about it- with stunts like inviting them to the White House, only to have them searched by rubber-gloved security guards. He welcomed their fund-raising but held them at arm's length even as he was hiring out the Lincoln Bedroom.

And then came the Defense of Marriage Act, about which Clinton developed amnesia in his cinder-block-sized memoir. First he said it was  unconstitutional and he'd veto it; then he not only signed it but ran re-election ads on Christian radio stations taking credit for it.

Now, the Big Dog's thinking- and memory of events- has evolved. In a Washington Post op-ed published March 7, President Clinton has called for the Defense of Marriage Act to  be overturned by the Supreme Court.

"Although that was only 17 years ago, it was a very different time," he says. Marriage equality was not legal anywhere, but "Washington...was swirling with all manner of possible responses, some quite draconian." When it came to his desk, he buckpasses, "it was "opposed by only 81 of the 535 members of Congress."

One of Clinton's advisers just disclosed that the inner circle in the White House was a bunch of election-driven dopes:

Inside the White House, there was a genuine belief that if the President vetoed the Defense of Marriage Act, his reëlection could be in jeopardy. There was a heated debate about whether this was a realistic assessment, but it became clear that the President’s chief political advisers were not willing to take any chances. Some in the White House pointed out that DOMA, once enacted, would have no immediate practical effect on anyone—there were no state-sanctioned same-sex marriages then for the federal government to ignore. I remember a Presidential adviser saying that he was not about to risk a second term on a veto, however noble, that wouldn’t change a single thing nor make a single person’s life better.

What we didn’t fully comprehend was that, sooner than anyone imagined, there would be thousands of families who would be harmed by DOMA—denied federal benefits, recognition, and security, or kept apart by immigration laws.

Here's a copy of a letter the President got from the Human Rights Campaign in 1996, urging him to be then what he claims to be now:

Here's a letter Human Rights Campaign Director Elizabeth Birch sent President Clinton, urging him to be then what he claims to be now:

September 13, 1996

The Honorable William Jefferson Clinton
President of the United States
The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW
Washington, DC 20500

Dear Mr. President:

The Human Rights Campaign and the vast majority of gay Americans want nothing more than to re-elect you and your Administration to a second term. I believe we have consistently demonstrated our loyalty since our early endorsement in February of this year. We appreciate all you have done and most recently for including us once again on your bridge to the 21st Century. From time to time in American history, moments come which require the highest order of moral leadership. You will face such a moment next week. Despite Herculean efforts, we have been unable to keep the so-called Defense of Marriage Act from your desk. Besides being a clear instrument of hate and division, DOMA will institute apartheid for gay and lesbian Americans for the first time in history. It is wrong. And more than the fact that you have a healthy lead in the polls, more than the fact that you have already done more than any other leader for gay Americans in the history of this country and more than for us, we want you to veto DOMA for yourself. You should be able to look back when you are 90 years old, sitting on a rocker in Little Rock and when asked whether you acted with integrity when you faced your Plessy v. Ferguson -- you will be able to say to yourself and to history a resounding "yes."

Sincerely,

Elizabeth Birch
Executive Director

Seventeen years later, Clinton's thinking has- in President Obama's recent formulation- evolved. "I have come to believe that DOMA is contrary" to principles of freedom, equality and justice above all, and so is, "in fact, incompatible with our Constitution."

Of course, the same arguments against it were heard in 1996. Bill Clinton just ignored them to get an electoral advantage. That's of course, what politicians, do. But the former President's  tardy sign-on with "the many other dedicated men and women who have engaged in this struggle for decades" rings hollow in light of the damage he did to good Americans' lives and careers.

They deserve an apology.