{"id":263421,"date":"2010-02-02T00:01:05","date_gmt":"2010-02-02T05:01:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.rhrealitycheck.org\/blog\/2010\/02\/02\/repealing-dont-ask-dont-tell-the-first-sotu-promise-broken"},"modified":"2010-02-02T00:56:16","modified_gmt":"2010-02-02T05:56:16","slug":"repealing-dont-ask-dont-tell-the-first-sotu-promise-broken","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/263421","title":{"rendered":"Repealing Don’t Ask Don’t Tell: The First SOTU Promise Broken?"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

\n\tThis year, I will work with Congress and our military to finally repeal
\n\tthe law that denies gay Americans the right to serve the country they
\n\tlove because of who they are.\u00a0 It’s the right thing to do.\u00a0\u00a0 President Barack Obama, State of the Union Address, January 27th, 2010<\/em>\n\t<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

\nThe thing with politics is that politicians promise lots of things and then find reasons not to do them.\u00a0 The change we needed was a Democratic President and a Congress that said what they meant, and meant what they said…and weren’t afraid to stand up for it.\n<\/p>\n

\nA year after Obama’s election, many of those of us who worked hardest to get him there are deeply disappointed…on a range of issues and for a range of reasons.\n<\/p>\n

\nBut then you get to the first State of the Union (SOTU), hopes are raised and you think…let’s give it a chance. One such hope hinged on promises made<\/a> by the White House and Democrats in Congress in the weeks before the SOTU that they would try to get a repeal of the "Don\u2019t Ask, Don\u2019t Tell" (DADT)
\npolicy and include the costs of implementation into
\nthis year’s Defense Appropriations bill.\n<\/p>\n

\nShort-lived dream.\n<\/p>\n

\nBoth gay rights blogs and some mainstream media reports suggest that repeal of DADT–which prevents gays from serving openly in the military–did not appear in the budget released by the White House today.\u00a0 These same reports suggest the issue will be relegated to a "study panel’ to be convened by Secretary of Defense Bob Gates.\n<\/p>\n

\n"Observers have been eyeing
\nthe DoD budget<\/a> as a possible place for DADT repeal for a while," writes David Dayen at Firedog Lake<\/em><\/a>.
\n"This," he continues, "would be the most effective way to ensure that repeal passes
\nCongress," because:\n<\/p>\n

\n
\n

\n\t"if it is in the DOD authorization, not a single Democratic senator has said they
\n\twould vote to take it out,\u201d said a Hillsource. \u201cI\u2019m hard-pressed to
\n\tbelieve that Democrats would vote with the GOP to strip it out.\u201d\n\t<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n

\n

\nBut, the source suggested that if ending the gay ban is not in the Pentagon\u2019s original bill and
\nrepeal has to be added as an amendment, that could
\nshift how senators view the vote.\n<\/p>\n

\n

\n\t\u201cThat\u2019s a whole different dynamic \u2014
\n\tthen it becomes not a vote to support the administration, but a vote to
\n\tgo against the Department of Defense.\u201d\n\t<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<\/div>\n

\nNow after assuring advocates repeal of DADT would in fact be reflected in
\nthe budget, Administration officials are now are saying its absence in the FY 2011 budget package is inconsequential.\u00a0 On a conference call, OMB Deputy Director Rob Nabors told Dayen that DADT \u201cdoes not have a
\nbudgetary impact,\u201d and is therefore not addressed.\u00a0 But, Nabors added, "he didn\u2019t want gay rights
\nadvocates to read anything into the issue."\n<\/p>\n

\nBut research indicates there is in fact a budgetary effect.\u00a0 Dayen cites a University
\nof California study<\/a> showing that discharging gay service members
\ncost the government $363 million dollars over a ten year period from
\n1994-2003.\n<\/p>\n

\nIf it isn’t in the budget, does the Administration really intend to push for it?\n<\/p>\n

\nAnd will the Administration’s efforts on DADT be relegated to the dreaded "commission?"\u00a0\n<\/p>\n

\n "It appears," writes John Aravosis of America’s Blog<\/a>, "that Secretary Gates
\nis going to announce a special team of advisers at [today’s–February 2nd 2010] DADT
\nhearings in the Senate, and that team will take a good year or so to
\nthink over all the really hard issues confronting us with the potential
\nrepeal of DADT, such
\nas gay marriage<\/a>."\n<\/p>\n

\nAravosis continues:\n<\/p>\n

\n\tTheir review is expected to look at
\n\tseveral sensitive issues, including whether the military should extend
\n\tmarriage and bereavement benefits to the partners of gay soldiers, said
\n\tthe sources, who spoke on condition of anonymity.\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\nBut…as Aravosis points out, there is
\nno gay marriage at the federal level, and Defense of Marriage Act forbids the federal
\ngovernment from providing marriage benefits.\n<\/p>\n

\n\t So why is DOD even
\n\tbringing up gay marriage?\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\nAs a distraction, maybe?\n<\/p>\n

\nOh, and in the meantime, writes Aravosis:\n<\/p>\n

\n

\n\tThey’re going to
\n\timplement the discriminatory policy in a more humane manner.\u00a0\n\t<\/p>\n

\tFunny,
\n\tbut I don’t recall that being Barack Obama’s promise to my community.
\n\tTo more humanely discriminate us against us. He promised to lift the
\n\tban. He promised to get ENDA passed. He promised to repeal DOMA. And
\n\tnone of those are currently being discussed. What is being discussed is
\n\tanother study to add to the pile of studies we already have. What is
\n\tbeing discussed is a proposal to "change" DADT, rather than repeal it – just
\n\tas Joe and I have been predicting<\/a>.\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\nIf the Republicans take back the House in the fall, says Aravosis:\n<\/p>\n

\n\tYou can kiss the repeal of DADT, DOMA, and the
\n\tpassage of ENDA goodbye for years to come. President Obama promised us.
\n\tHe promised us again in the State of the Union. And now he has
\n\tapparently signed off on the Pentagon coming to the Hill and presenting
\n\tus with a stall tactic, while they promise to discriminate against us
\n\tslightly less in the coming years.\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\n"There is no reason the White House can’t work with the
\nCongress to repeal the ban this year, and simply delay implementation of
\nthe repeal until next year when the "study" is done," Aravosis states.\n<\/p>\n

\n\t But if the White
\n\tHouse doesn’t get Don’t Ask Don’t Tell repealed this year, then gay and
\n\tlesbian Democrats, and our allies, need to make the White House, the
\n\tDNC, and OFA pay a steep price
\n\tfor this betrayal<\/a>. And any of our gay rights groups who condone and
\n\tenable this betrayal, should be held just as accountable.\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\nSounds like a similar conversation to those I am hearing in other sectors of "the base."\n<\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This year, I will work with Congress and our military to finally repeal the law that denies gay Americans the right to serve the country they love because of who they are.\u00a0 It’s the right thing to do.\u00a0\u00a0 President Barack Obama, State of the Union Address, January 27th, 2010 The thing with politics is that […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4575,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-263421","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/263421","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4575"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=263421"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/263421\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=263421"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=263421"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=263421"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}