They Saved Some Goodies for When it Counts

[babylonsister]

http://www.boomantribune.com/story/2010/9/16/22200/7484

They Saved Some Goodies for When it Counts

by BooMan
Thu Sep 16th, 2010 at 10:20:00 PM EST


Back on October 24, 2007 a majority of U.S. Senators voted for the DREAM Act but failed to reach the magic number of 60 to proceed to a vote on final passage. The DREAM Act provides a path to citizenship for people who entered the country illegally before the age of sixteen, and who have served at least two years in the military or have completed at least two years of college. It's an idea the Pentagon embraced during the height of the war in Iraq when they were suffering from recruitment shortfalls. The cloture vote on the DREAM Act wasn't a strictly partisan affair. Democratic senators Robert Byrd, Jon Tester, Max Baucus, Kent Conrad, Byron Dorgan Claire McCaskill, Mark Pryor, and Mary Landrieu voted against it. Republican senators Bob Bennett, Sam Brownback, Norm Coleman, Susan Collins, Larry Craig, Chuck Hagel, Orrin Hatch, Kay Bailey Hutchison, Trent Lott, Mel Martinez, Dick Lugar and Olympia Snowe voted for it. Overall, the bill won the support of 52 senators. John McCain didn't bother to cast a vote.

Today McCain took to the Senate floor to strongly object to the DREAM Act being attached to the Defense Appropriations Bill, stating that the Act has nothing whatsoever to do with our national security. It's hard to see how a bill designed to improve our military recruitment has nothing to do with our national security, but that's what McCain is claiming.

As you probably know, the Defense Appropriations Bill is the most must-pass bill in existence. If it doesn't pass our troops are left in the field with nothing but their genitalia in their hands. If you want to pass something that cannot otherwise pass, you attach it to the Defense spending bill. That's also why Harry Reid is including language in this year's bill that will end the Don't Ask, Don't Tell policy. He's letting the Republicans offer and amendment to strip that language out, but they'd need 60 votes to accomplish that, and there's not a chance in hell that they can pick up 19 Democrats to maintain a homophobic law.

McCain is probably more pissed off about the Democrats giving something important to both the Latino and the LGBT communities on the eve of the midterms than he is about the procedure being used.

Maybe the procedure isn't pretty, but it's payback for the Republicans' unprecedented obstruction. The Democrats will put the DREAM Act in the Defense Appropriations bill and defeat any effort to keep Don't Ask, Don't Tell before they recess for the elections. They will also force the Republicans to vote for or against keeping tax cuts for 97% of Americans, and then for or against keeping tax cuts for our richest three percent. It helps to be able to set the agenda.

Meanwhile, the Republicans will spend much of their time trying to explain their fondness for rape babies and hatred of Social Security, Medicare, and masturbation.

[Sinistrous]

1. kandr

:kick:

[angee_is_mad]

2. K&R

dayum, those dems are really something, lol.

[Parker CA]

3. BAM! BAM! BAM! These, if they go through as planned, will be an incredible set of successes.

[Cha]

4. Thanks for this piece of booman's,

babylonsister~ It's so ridiculous having idiots as adversaries..but, here we are.

[jillan]

5. There's a recent video of McCain meeting with the illegal college students who are trying to tell

him why he should support the Dream Act. Of course McCain said whatever to appease them. McCain really put himself in a quandary...what a foolish man.

[Hawkowl]

6. You mean they're using their dry powder?

It is about time! It would be stunning if the dems manage to snatch victory from the jaws of defeat just once in my lifetime.

[impik]

7. As Obama said: "They forgot i know how to politik"

[ClarkUSA]

8. So DADT is going the way of the dodo and we have President Obama to thank for it.

Of course, after all the vitriol aimed at this President over this issue by some people, I expect that this OP will garner hundreds of recs from the same folks while President Obama will get the praise he richly deserves for keeping his campaign promise to repeal DADT.

No president has ever done more to advance LGBT rights than President Obama:

... he invited Rachael Maddow to the White House and hosted a reception for 300 LGBT activists at the White House to honor LGBT Pride, the first such event ever held at the WH ... appointed more openly gay people to his administration than the last two combined, including the first ever transgender appointees ... awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom to Harvey Milk and Billie Jean King ... signed the Matthew Shepard and James Byrd, Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act ... spoke out against LGBT discrimination at the National Prayer Breakfast ... spoke out about repealing Don’t Ask/Don’t Tell in his first State of the Union Address ... released the first Presidential PRIDE proclamations since 2000 ... invited gay families to the Easter Egg Roll as part of the Obama administration's outreach to diverse communities ... welcomed four gay couples to its first State Dinner ... publicly invited shunned gay Mississippi high school prom student to the White House ... convened the first-ever anti-bullying summit to craft a national strategy to reduce bullying in schools ... reversed the US's position by signing the UN Declaration on Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity ... successfully fought for UN accreditation of IGLHRC (the International Gay & Lesbian Human Rights Commission, against Republican attempts to block it ... extended benefits to same-sex partners of federal employees in 2009 and 2010 ... issued diplomatic passports, and provided other benefits, to the partners of same-sex foreign service employees ... banned job discrimination based on gender identity throughout the Federal government (the nation's largest employer) ... instructed HHS to require any hospital receiving Medicare or Medicaid funds (virtually all hospitals) to allow LGBT visitation rights ... extended the Ryan White HIV/AIDS program ... issued a National HIV/AIDS Strategy praised as "long-overdue" by the Task Force, Lambda and others ... eliminated the discriminatory Census Bureau policy that kept gay relationships from being counted, encouraging couples who consider themselves married to file that way, even if their state of residence does not yet permit legal marriage ... produced U.S. Census Bureau PSAs featuring gay, lesbian, and transgender spokespersons ... extended domestic violence protections to LGBT victims ... extended the Family and Medical Leave Act to cover employees taking unpaid leave to care for the children of same-sex partners ... required all grant applicants seeking HUD funding to comply with state and local anti-discrimination laws that protect LGBT individuals ... issued guidance specifically to assist LGBT tenants denied housing on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity..."

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=433&topic_id=439520&mesg_id=441289

Clinton's DADT is on the brink of being erased by a stroke of President Obama's signing pen, to be consigned to the dustbin of history.

It's about time President Obama gets the credit he deserves.

[liberalla]

9. This will be fun to watch.

:woohoo:

[Whisp]

10. thank you, babylonsister!

please let it happen this way.

:woohoo:

[Phx_Dem]

11. YEA!!! And fuck you, McCain.

You hateful old fart.

[Scurrilous]

12. Kick

:kick: