Yesterday after the Senate finished listening to John McCain cherry pick soundbites, the White House invited a dozen repeal advocates to an hour-long meeting to assure everyone the president did not cut a deal to throw DADT repeal under the bus. “They fought back against all of the rumors that a deal has been cut,” one attendee tells Politico. “They said, ‘The best evidence [against a deal] is that we would never have sent [Defense Secretary Robert] Gates and [Joint Chiefs Chairman Mike] Mullen out there if we weren’t serious about getting this done.'” Or is the best evidence for a deal is so vigorously professing no deal has been struck?
Representatives from the following groups attended: National Black Justice Coalition, the Center for American Progress, Outserve, People for the American Way, the Palm Center, Third Way, Servicemembers United, Servicemembers Legal Defense Network, Human Rights Campaign, the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force, and the Log Cabin Republicans.
In case you missed yesterday’s hearings, here are the worthy parts:
AndrewW
Of course it’s all a charade and Gay Inc. is on the scheme. This is just supposed to look like “we were so close,” followed by fundraising requests from Democrats and the LGBT-advocacy industry.
The votes aren’t there (60 in the US Senate) for DADT repeal, no matter how much anyone wants to pretend.
Patty
Under Senate rules, 60 votes are required to end debate and proceed to a (majority) vote. Senate rules, however, can be amended with a majority vote,
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_option
Considering that there have been at least 50 votes for repeal since the 2006 elections, Democrats who don’t attempt to change the rules are just as much to blame as McCain if repeal fails. Tragically, Democrats are too stupid or other compromised to realize that the 60-vote threshold only applies to their priorities and not the GOP’s, which always seem to come to a majority vote.
Legal Eagle
@Patty: They don’t use that option because it can be filibustered. Look it up.
Gay issues are going to require 60 votes as long as there ar Republicans.
Cam
What everybody seems to be forgetting, is that DADT is attached to a funding bill. According to the rules, since the House has already passed it, the Majority leader of the Senate can force a funding bill through and approve it with only a simple Majority. Reid has already done it on a different bill. But he isn’t doing it with this because he doesn’t want to upset republicans.
reason
@Cam: For the millionth time you are wrong. For starters only one reconciliation bill can be passed per year, the Health Care and Education Reconciliation act of 2010 was that bill. Number two in order for the option to be available both chambers must pass a bill which has not happened in the senate and will not without crossing the 60 vote threshold after that the two bills can be reconciled on an up or down vote. Makes it easier for a liberal or conservative bill, depending on who is in power, coming out of the House to make it through the “water me down or ki!! the bill” senate. Number three there is that pesky old Byrd rule that can be invoked to automatically strip out things that don’t effect entitlements or taxes i.e. policies like DADT unless there are 60 votes to keep them in. So, if you magically made it to number 3 you would flip everything on its head with a 60 vote requirement to keep DADT in the bill rather then the 60 vote requirement to take it out. That would be horrible, it would strip the democrats of their barging power allowing the GOP to strip DADT with out lifting an arm and put the burden of not passing a bill,thus putting the military on a collision course with destruction, on the democrats. Legislating is much more difficult then you think, and as dumb as you may think the dems are they actually know the rules of the chambers.
If you recall in the Health Care scenario the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act passed in both Chambers, a Bill on the side The Health Care and Education Reconciliation Act changed things in the bill that were consistent with the Byrd Rule. Both bills were signed into law by Barrack Obama. If health care relied purely on the reconciliation bill their wouldn’t be much of anything there.
jason
Obama designed this DADT repeal to fail. Therefore, don’t be fooled by him. He’s the one who schemed and tricked us. This charade playing out before Congress is designed to make us gays think that “oh, Obama and the Democrats fought so hard for us”. Yeah, right.
Don’t be fooled, guys. Every step of this path has been laid by the schemers and tricksters in the Democratic Party. They are frauds from top to bottom.
This get-together they had in the White House could almost be like the last supper. Pity they can’t see the Judas.
brian
Obama is a liar. Nothing more need be said. I don’t trust him to get the job done on repealing DADT. He said he was going to repeal DADT and he has failed thus far.
Don’t believe anything he says. Note how he keeps defending DADT in the courts. Assuming DADT isn’t repealed through legislation, is he going to continue defending it in the courts. If he does, he’ll have zero credibility left. A big fat zero will his achievement.
And to all you Obama apologists out there, we don’t want you in the gay rights movement. Call yourselves the Democratic Party ass-lickers.
customartist
WHEN, and not if, the Courts find in favor of the Plaintiffs, THEN this will apply not only to Currently Serving and Recently Discharged Service Memers, but it will also affect the entire body of Previously Discharged Veterans who shall then embark upon a mission to gain full remuneration for injustices and Pensions due to them, as well they should!
customartist
Brown mised his Golden Opportunity to demonstrate himself as a True Leader when he signed onto the “Letter of No Action” (unless the Rich get tax cuts) along with the entire Republican Party.
Had be not taken this extremist stand, he could had shown himself to be unlike Pandering Palin, and he could have set in motion his ascension to the Presidency.
reason
@customartist: haha, Brown is not ascending anywhere but out of the congress in 2012. The tea party will likely put Brown out of his misery before he even gets a chance to run for the seat.
Legal Eagle
I don’t even expect them to even ‘debate’ DADT Repeal. Without 60 votes this is all just bull-shit theater. I expect HRC and all the other gay charities to start asking for money soon. We shouldn’t keep giving them money – they are only interested in their own salaries.
STOP FUNDING ALL LGBT ADVOCACY AND ACTIVIST GROUPS. DONATE LOCALLY.
Queer Supremacist
The only way we can ever have gay interests represented in this country is with gay congressmen and women, gay senators, gay governors, and a gay President.
Vote gay ticket. Stop throwing your votes away on breeders who have perpetrated 99.9% of man’s inhumanity to man. From now on it’s gay votes for gay candidates, and gay dollars for gay businesses (and the so-called “activist” groups will not be among them).
Go ahead and cut taxes for the rich if that’s what it takes to repeal DADT. Everyone, rich or poor, should be paying the same income tax rates anyway: zero percent. You “eat the rich” lefties have the morality of pirates.
And I can’t wait for the first openly gay Five-Star General to lead the charge against the homophobic third-world hell holes who are leeching off the misplaced guilt of Western nations.
Cam
@reason:
Wow, you are so desperate to defend OBama that you are actually lying, or you are completely uninformed. Reconciliation is NOT a bill that can only be passed after the Senate has approved something by 60 votes. The 60 vote number is a B.S. number triggered to break a filibuster. Reconciliation is a way around the filibuster for the exact fact that it ONLY requires a simple majority vote. The only time a Reconciliation cannot be used in a funding bill is for the following reasons.
1.if it does not produce a change in outlays or revenues;
2.if it produces an outlay increase or revenue decrease when the instructed committee is not in compliance with its instructions;
3.if it is outside the jurisdiction of the committee that submitted the title or provision for inclusion in the reconciliation measure;
4.if it produces a change in outlays or revenues which is merely incidental to the non-budgetary components of the provision;
5.if it would increase the deficit for a fiscal year beyond those covered by the reconciliation measure, though the provisions in question may receive an exception if they in total in a Title of the measure net to a reduction in the deficit; and
6.if it recommends changes in Social Security.
I get that you want to defend the party, but seriously, making stuff up is just evil.
reason
@Cam: Why don’t you read my post and get back to me. DADT repeal by reconciliation can’t even get past number one. If you think so please enlighten us Sen. Cam Magician.
I don’t see what Obama has to do with the rules of reconciliation, he is not in the senate nor is he the rule master. Your obsession with the president is weird.
S E N A T U S
@reason: Get used to it Reason – some people think Obama has a magic-wand or something. They think if we bitch enough he’ll use it. It’s childish.