EAllusion wrote:The caveat was added later, and most recently timetables have been taken off the table.
Even if the original promise was to end DADT, as long as he never added the adverb "immediately", he hasn't broken it.
I hadn't heard that timetables are out the window. If true, that is indeed disconcerting, although it doesn't necessarily indicate that the administration doesn't have a plan to end the policy.
He's got political capital to do it if he wanted right now.
This is the conventional wisdom, and there's interesting figures to support it, but I ultimately don't think this is true. I don't think that the 75% support in the general populace for ending DADT is the limiting factor here; I think that the likely reaction of conservative military brass being told what to do by a President who never served is what's holding Obama back. If Obama were smart, he'd wait to gain rapport with military leaders (perhaps by displaying foreign policy shrewdness, as is likely to manifest itself within the next year or two) before springing an executive order against DADT on them.
Avoiding doing it is more a calculated attempt to avoid awakening the social conservatives which might hurt other agenda he has.
This would be a pretty silly calculation on Obama's part, because the 25% of voters who support DADT are the people who would never vote for him anyway, and who are unlikely to even consider voting for Congressional Democrats.
But by contrast, Truman getting the ball rolling on integrating the military was more politically reckless. It probably will be done, but it's clearly not a significant priority.
This may sound heartless, but it sounds to me like Obama has his priorities straight. Entitlement reform and foreign policy are too important to jeopardize at this juncture. Equality for gays is very, very important, but the first two areas I mentioned are much more determinative even of the average gay American's future.
He's also signed in some token increase in benefits for gay federal employees while intentionally withholding the important benefits. He's spoke out against DOMA at gay political events while his justice department has released legal arguments defending its necessity (to prevent incest, apparently).
Well, the DoJ is legally obligated to do that sort of thing. The fact that the Department's brief in favor of DOMA was so poorly argued is actually evidence that it is indeed on the chopping block.
It's really an open question at this point whether his administration's stances towards gays is going to turn out any different in the big picture.
I agree, and this is actually the point that I was hoping to get you to agree with. Time will tell.