WOW! While Barack Obama sits at the White House - I hate to be crude, but it's applicable - with his thumb up his ass rather than lifting a finger to support DADT repeal, our true fierce advocate has sprung into action. Lady Gaga is headed to Portland, Maine today to attend a last minute rally to pressure/embarrass GOP Senators Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe to vote with Democrats to help break a filibuster that is holding up consideration of the Defense Authorization bill that includes the the measure to move repeal of DADT forward. Here's Gaga's tweet:*
Meet me in Portland, Maine 2moro, 9/20 to help repeal #DADT. I'm holding a Rally + speaking live in Deering Oaks Park http://bit.ly/cO4cY9
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The rally, called “For the 14,000”: A Rally for the 14,000+ Discharged" is tomorrow at 4:00 PM Eastern in Deering Oaks Park. And WTF is Obama doing??? NOTHING according to Kerry Eleveld who has a piece in the Advocate that looks at the pathetic circumstances surrounding DADT repeal. The GOP continues to play cynical games to hold up movement. Meanwhile, Barack Obama and Congressional Democrats are basically doing NOTHING to press the matter forward. Personally, I am beyond disgusted with this state of affairs and it makes a part of me think that the Democrats deserve to suffer horrific losses come November 2, 2010.
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The main problem is that politicians on both sides of the aisle are locked in a battle that, even as it has everything to do with the fate of the policy, also has little to do with the policy itself. They are supposedly squabbling over the procedural issue of how many amendments Majority Leader Harry Reid will allow the Republicans to offer on the Senate floor if the National Defense Authorization Act that includes repeal even makes it to the Senate floor.
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Meanwhile, the more cynical among Beltway insiders posit that neither party has a serious interest in seeing the bill move, even if some individual senators would truly like to see it proceed and eventually be signed into law with DADT repeal intact. But from a party perspective, watching it go down in flames is seen as a win for the GOP simply because they would rather not see the Democrats have any legislative victories between now and the November midterms, while the Democrats can throw up their hands and tell two of their key constituencies – gays and Latinos – that they tried to get repeal and immigration provisions through but the GOP blocked the effort.
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But for the most part, Democrats don’t seem to be working very hard at sending an equally strong and unified response to the Republicans. . . . . In some ways, it’s difficult to tell if Dems are being outwitted or simply letting themselves be outwitted. But that message hasn’t been deployed anywhere when we could be seeing similarly worded statements coming out of every Democratic office from that of Reid to Dick Durbin to Carl Levin.
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And then there’s the White House, . . . . after I spoke to three people who lobby on DADT, not a single one said they knew of the White House’s legislative affairs team or the president lifting a finger on the matter. “If you really want something, you deploy your legislative shop to the hill,” said one lobbyist.
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Meanwhile, Lady Gaga has been a more visible force for DADT repeal than almost every politician in Washington combined. Trust me when I say that this reporter – who suffers from severe pop culture deficit – initially discounted her. But after having discharged soldiers escort her to the Video Music Awards, exchanging tweets with Reid’s office about the vote, tweeting an explanation of a filibuster and instructing her “little monsters” to call their senators, Lady Gaga penetrated my Beltway myopia.
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On the Maine event this afternoon, the Advocate also has this:
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Lady Gaga is expected to implore all her fans and especially those attending the event to contact their senators via cell, twitter, or email in order to urge their support for ending the “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy, which prohibits gays and lesbians from serving openly in the military.
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“We know that Lady Gaga can move young people,” Thomas said, noting that she has more followers on twitter than the president (@ladygaga edges out @BarackObama by nearly a million followers).
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Joe Sudbay at America Blog Gay shares my total frustration with the White House. Here's a sample:
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Lady Gaga has been using her extensive bully pulpit to elevate the DADT repeal issue for the past several weeks. It's been very, very impressive. (Meanwhile, despite the impending vote and the GOP filibuster, President Obama has been largely silent on this issue, which, sadly, is not a surprise.)
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