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This article from Kerry Eleveld.

No one can deny this was a savvy move. Richard Socarides, former LGBT adviser to President Bill Clinton, said he wished the directive had come sooner but acknowledged that it was a strategic win.

“Politically, I think it’s very smart,” he said. “It’s a horrible problem with an easy and inexpensive solution. No one isn't for hospital visitation rights. Obama needed to show that he was taking action, and now he can point to this — a small step but certainly better than nothing. And it shows that he is thinking about gay rights.”

The problem with these advances is that almost every one of them could essentially be swept away by the next administration. Just look at what kind of havoc Virginia governor Bob McDonnell has wreaked in Virginia in terms of rolling back discrimination protections for LGBT people.

Die-hard Obama supporters often complain that the president never gets enough praise for his pro-LGBT achievements. And while the president certainly deserves credit for pushing the hate-crimes bill and giving life to “don’t ask, don’t tell” repeal with his State of the Union address, LGBT advocates cannot afford to wallow in those victories.

The problem with Obama's "pro-LGBT achievements" is exactly as Eleveld points out: they're small, they're politically safe, they're relatively insubstantial, and they're potentially ephemeral. (We saw how that works when Bush's head of OPM stripped protections for gay and lesbian government employees from the books.)

He promised us a leader. We got a Chicago politician.