Obama punted, now he gets to catch the ball?

[sfwriter]

What did I miss? Last I heard, the administration was telling activists like Dan Savage, the guy behind "It Gets Better" that DADT would have to wait until next TERM.

Now, the Senate gets it together and it is a presidential victory? If I'm not mistaken, all he is doing is signing. I suppose an argument could be made that not negotiating an 11th hour compromise with Republicans is progress, but hardly a victory on HIS part.

Please someone explain to me why this goes into the "Because of Obama" column instead of the "In Spite of Obama" column.

Speculative arguments on a McCain presidency will be ignored. I want to know why this win is justified as an Obama accomplishment.

[davidinalameda]

1. because he was in the right place at the right time

and not much else

[The_Casual_Observer]

2. Who cares?

[liberal N proud]

3. It happened on his watch and that is all that matters

PERIOD!

[TBF]

4. The buck stops with him - he gets the credit for DADT being repealed -

and he also gets the "credit" for the fall-out from his supply side economics. He owns the high unemployment, continued wars, and attack on social security. It is about time for civil rights for all - no matter what your sexual orientation happens to be. But that doesn't mean I'm voting for the dude. Hoping for a primary challenge, hoping for people in the streets protesting, because his economic policies are horrible for working class folks.

[nykym]

5. Who cares

The archaic, insane, homophobic law has been repealed.

[Lisa D]

6. I'll let Rachel Maddow explain it

Rachel Maddow: You know, a lot of people said that once it was clear that it was going to pass that it would open the door to some unexpected "yes" votes. And I always am, I always tend to be a little cynical about these things so I'm not sure that I believed it. But it's true. To see Richard Burr, in particular, move on this, to see John Ensign move on this -- John Ensign indicated that he might move on this -- it just shows you that the politics of this are unpredictable and that people who will try to denounce this as "a traditional right-left issue" the way that John McCain I think in particular has tried to demagogue it, it's just, they're just wrong. They're talking about something that might have been true 20 years ago and isn't true now.

I think that politically, though, the thing to not lose touch of, to not lose touch with here, this is the President's victory. The President took a lot of criticism, a lot of abuse, a lot of skepticism from his otherwise most loyal supporters on this. But this is an issue on which the President did not waver. He continually insisted that this was possible. That it would get done.

It, in fact, was not possible for the President to do this through Executive action. This is something that had to happen legislatively if it was really going to happen in a definitive way.

The President did not waver. He DID work on the Senate to get this to happen. He insisted that this was possible against a lot of people, including me, saying it was not possible.

This is a difficult promise kept. It's not just a promise that was kept. It was one that was hard to keep, that cost a lot of political capital and a lot of work and this is the President's victory today and his base will reward him for it.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=433x571393

[stray cat]

10. She made it clear as a bell to anyone who really wanted to understand it

instead of complaining

[phleshdef]

7. Because he is responsible for taking away reasons from Republicans to block it.

He is the one that got the Pentagon study rolling. That study alone provided the results that gave the Republicans that voted for it the cover they felt they needed to have to do so. Had he not provided a comprehensive study that showed overwhelminly positive results in favor of repeal, then cloture never would have ultimately been achieved with this Senate.

Aside from that, he is the President that called for the repeal in his State of the Union. And he is the President that will sign the repeal.

He will rightfully get credit for it, history is going to tell it that way and there isn't a damn thing you can do about it. So you might as well get over it, deal with and learn to live with it, otherwise you are in for a lot of unnecessary misery, gnashing of your teeth, tearing of your garments, etc.

[obxhead]

12. It was not the Pentagon study alone

The Pentagon asked the Congress and Senate to repeal DADT in order to give them time to implement it. The Pentagon was afraid the SCOTUS would rule DADT unconstitutional which would make it an over night change for the military. This move allows them time to implement.

It was a request from the Pentagon that got this repeal moving not the study itself.

[phleshdef]

13. Right, so there was no movement for repeal at all before that.

All that talk Reid did a whole year or so ago about how he intended to work it into a defense bill never actually happened.

And the study itself was never ordered because of an existing movement for repeal, the President just ordered a random, expensive study for the hell of it, he wasn't even sure why he was doing it.

And Pentagon officials, and secretary Gates and other military leaders attending hearings to tell Congress to repeal it, nope, C-SPAN just hired some look-alikes and made the whole thing up.

[obxhead]

14. No

The Pentagons request was what finally got it done though.

Read whatever you want to in my post though.

[phleshdef]

18. All of it got it done. There were a lot of things that needed to happen to make it passable.

Maybe I'm reading you wrong, but it seemed to me like you were attempting to discount a lot of effort by a lot of people.

[vi5]

8. Victories are the president's...

Defeats belong to Congress (which Obama doesn't have any control over. Except when he does).

It's really quite simple.

[stray cat]

9. you missed the explanation the administration gave about court versus legislation

and why they wanted it accomplished more permanently at the legislative level. However, knowing this requires knowing the details instead of the rhetoric

[dionysus]

11. you can still think he's a lousy person if it makes you feel better.

:shrug:

[SwampG8r]

15. comparison is incorrect

its more like he recovered an onside kick

[Egnever]

16. LOL

Please dont let me stop you from making shit up as yopu go along. You seem to have quite the imagination.

[backscatter712]

17. We made an onside kick and got the ball back? n/t

[MilesColtrane]

19. It's more of a halfback option play.

Obama lateraled the ball to Congress, then ran downfield past the Republicans and caught the the halfback's pass.