It's an outcome likely to push the gay rights movement toward the courts and toward more civil disobedience, and away from any particular allegiance to Democrats.
The provisions in the bill would allow the military to certify when it's OK to repeal, not an outright repeal. Senator McCain, who said he'd defer to military leaders telling him when it is OK to repeal, now says Congress should be deferred to- after military leaders told him it's OK to repeal. An angry little man who has virtually nothing left of his reputation but his war record wraps himself in the flag to claim DADT repeal will insult service members. Never mind the insults to service members so devoted to their nation's service they live day to day risking being outed and discharged, while in the meantime putting their lives on the line alongside coalition forces who aren't so wiggy about The Gays.
Senator Collins wants to repeal, just not today. Sometime else. Some day. Somewhere. On another planet. After her next election. And then after the one after that.
Here in SC, the vote was one without cost or consequence. Senator Jim DeMint is an honest and open hater. Senator Lindsey Graham- called out by some Teabaggers as some sort of gay hostage to the liberal agenda in Congress, hasn't yet alienated the right enough to drop a real dime on him. It doesn't say much about either- who so fetishize military service- that they create categories of "real" service members and The Other. Never mind that the very first casualty in their faux-war in Iraq was a gay Marine. The cost of his blown-off leg? DADT.
And the Democrats? Well, the President brought this one on himself. His chief of staff- no friend to gay people except in a vague, how much can you contribute to me sort of way, has kept the White House on the traditional, kick the can down the road path the party has always followed. We love you to death, Democrats say, just don't ever ask us to actually do anything. The President's stated positions on DADT are incoherent.
The Ds need to get a grip. Some things they're gonna be tagged as being for just because they aren't Republicans. Gay stuff sells across the aisle, so the GOP is going to smear Democrats as being for the most outlandish of gay stuff just because they can. So why not just say, yeah, we're in favor of repealing DADT and marriage equality and employment non-discrimination and immigration reform because they are the right thing to do, and take the game to the fuckwits on the right for being the big bunch of terrified haters they are? There's no downside. They'll call you the same names no matter what.
Well, except for Heath Shuler, who relies on the North Carolina tradition of Voting For Jocks No Matter What. Which, in the context of gay rights, is kind of funny.
Senator Imhofe, widely thought to be illiterate, makes arguments that underscore the point
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