Let me say up front, no one doubts that we in the LGBT community are currently light years better off than during the last horrible eight years of the Bush Administration. Of course I am thrilled about that. However, it seems to me that the LGBT community somehow has disappeared over the last month or so. Hispanics, African Americans, Asians and others have been granted major cabinet appointments, their caucuses courted and invited into the White House and their concerns addressed. Yet the issues of paramount concern to the LGBT community seem to have publicly vanished from the national agenda.

Hopefully our national organizations are not buying into the misguided rhetoric that we are so toxic that we have to wait for just to right moment for our issues. We have no representation in the cabinet, no LGBT ambassador has been appointed to a major assignment, there was no mention of us in the address to Congress, nary a word about "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" has emerged over the last month. We have fallen off the map.

Of course, we have been included in meetings from which we were excluded over the last eight years. Our leaders are getting invites to events in Washington. There have been some mid-level appointments. Unfortunately, that level of involvement is so 'sixteen years ago' with President Clinton.

This is nearly two decades later and we should have a broader vision, higher trust in our talents to receive major appointments at the Cabinet level, and access to have our concerns seriously considered. For example, President Obama appointed anti-Gay Senator Judd Gregg as Secretary of Commerce and no one made a sound. The legislation we are pushing needs to be updated and made much more inclusive. We need visibility now from our leaders and our national organizations.

If anyone wants to see us and hear us it would be hard to find us in Washington right now. Quiet meetings are crucial. Private discussions are imperative. No one doubts their importance. Our leaders should continue those meetings with great preparation and professionalism. However in the midst of one of the great battles of our times for civil rights, we need visibility, action and power.

We need a couple of Dustin Lance Blacks speaking up for us and making us a real part of this great administration.