Wow. Anderson Cooper refereed Lt. Dan Choi and Elaine Donnelly of the Center for Military Readiness on Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell (DADT), and it wasn’t even close. Good television, and a nice antidote to Rep. Gohmert’s ant-gay statements yesterday. Watch:

Reps. Barney Frank (D-MA), Tammy Baldwin (D-WI) and Jerrold Nadler (D-NY) defended the Matthew Shepard Hate Crimes Prevention Act in Congress today against Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-TX) and other Republicans seeking to strip it from the Defense Authorization bill by sending it back to conference. Rep. Gohmert and his eloquent “rebuttals” below:

Reps. Frank, Baldwin and Nadler defending the hate crimes act below.

Perhaps the president won’t be golfing after all. The White House is expected to announce today that President Obama will be attending the annual HRC dinner in Washington, DC on Saturday evening, the day prior to the National Equality March.

Mr. Obama’s appearance on Saturday at the annual dinner for the Human Rights Campaign, a leading gay rights advocacy group, represents a significant show of support for gay rights at a time when many prominent gay and lesbian activists have been questioning the president’s commitment to their issues.

Many gay rights activists have become increasingly vocal about their frustration over what they see as tepid support from Mr. Obama. While the president has professed support for overturning the ban on gays in the military and called the law that precludes federal recognition of same-sex marriages discriminatory, he has not engaged on gay rights issues as actively as some had hoped.

The Justice Department is defending the federal marriage law, known as Defense of Marriage Act, much to the dismay of many gay rights advocates. And Mr. Obama has been noncommittal about when he will move to end the “don’t ask don’t tell” policy. In June, he acknowledged their irritations at the slow pace of change at a gathering of about 250 gay rights leaders who had been invited to the White House.

While it remains to be seen what Mr. Obama’s appearance at the dinner will do to his standing in the eyes of gay rights activists, his speech may mollify some of their concerns.

His appearance will mark only the second time a sitting president has spoken to the Human Rights Campaign. The first time was in 1997 when Bill Clinton spoke to the group. That was the first time a sitting president had ever addressed a gay rights organization.

Here’s hoping the President will hang around and make an appearance at the Equality March on Sunday. But I wouldn’t count on it, despite this warmly worded invitation.

Update: Newsmax has removed the article, but an archived version is available here.

John L. Perry, a newspaper editor who served on the White House staffs of both LBJ and Carter, wrote in his column for rightwing news site Newsmax that the U.S. military may be considering a “bloodless” coup to overthrow President Obama.

There is a remote, although gaining, possibility America’s military will intervene as a last resort to resolve the “Obama problem.” Don’t dismiss it as unrealistic.

America isn’t the Third World. If a military coup does occur here it will be civilized. That it has never happened doesn’t mean it wont. Describing what may be afoot is not to advocate it.

…

Will the day come when patriotic general and flag officers sit down with the president, or with those who control him, and work out the national equivalent of a “family intervention,” with some form of limited, shared responsibility?

Imagine a bloodless coup to restore and defend the Constitution through an interim administration that would do the serious business of governing and defending the nation. Skilled, military-trained, nation-builders would replace accountability-challenged, radical-left commissars. Having bonded with his twin teleprompters, the president would be detailed for ceremonial speech-making.

Military intervention is what Obama’s exponentially accelerating agenda for “fundamental change” toward a Marxist state is inviting upon America. A coup is not an ideal option, but Obama’s radical ideal is not acceptable or reversible.

While Perry is sure to make it clear he is not “advocating” an overthrow of the government, he is trumpeting the notion to all that drink the kool-aid, I mean tea, and to them it makes no difference.

Expect this to be making the rounds in the MSM tomorrow.