All you need to know is that on Leno last night Bill O'Reilly called on President Obama to immediately stop the enforcement of DADT—something the president has had the power to do since the day he was sworn in. Nearly a hundred members of Congress have asked the president to stop enforcing DADT, Dan Choi has asked the president to stop enforcing DADT, John Aravosis at Americablog has demanded that the president stop enforcing DADT (and stop lying about having no choice but to enforce it), and I've pointed out that the president can order the military to stop enforcing DADT just every time I've been on cable news program yakking about Obama and gay rights. Here's what Bill said:
Bill O'Reilly wrote:"President Obama has the power to stop this 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell' business. Just sign an executive order. I don't know why it's taking so long—it's not fair. We should stop this nonsense."
So for the record: Bill O'Reilly is now to the left of President Obama on DADT. And President Obama is to the right of Dan Choi and Bill O'Reilly and John Aravosis and me.
Just typing that made my head explode. I'm going to go get a restorative cupcake now.
It's cute that he's surprised that Obama is right-wing on an important issue. He's like an innocent child.
Bill O'Reilly is now to the left of President Obama on DADT
At best they're tied - they're both in favoring of ending DADT - except O'Reilly wants Obama to end it today via executive order. O'Reilly says Obama shouldn't have kicked Dan Choi out of the military (and spare me the "it was the Pentagon, not the President" BS - who runs this country, Barack Obama or Robert Gates?). Not sure an executive order would work in this case, as DADT is a law - but as we've seen before, the Obama administration has already ignored lots of laws that it doesn't like. And in the case of "Don't Ask, Don't Tell," there is the option of a stop-loss order. If the President wanted the discharges to end, he could end them today. And even FOX News' Bill O'Reilly now says the discharges should end now.
Approximately nothing. The problem with issuing an executive order to stop enforcing DADT is that it stays on the books, just that it's not being enforced; and if, sol forbid, we get Palin 2012, she could simply order the military to begin enforcing it with extreme prejudice. If he wants to stop it for reals, he has to get the rules against sodomy and homosexuality and all that jazz stripped out of the UCMJ, and that requires an act of Congress.
To play devil's advocate on the side of not issuing an EO to have enforcement of DADT ceased, it might be a long-view play. Issuing the EO is guaranteed to solve the issue - only for so long as he remains President. If the next guy is some ridiculously almighty anti-gay crusader, it could well be the very first thing he writes up the moment gets into the oval office. But, if he solves it with the band-aid (the EO,) people might well forget that, consider it solved, then come back to vilify him as not having solved the issue.
He might be holding out for Congress to get off it's ass and do something about it... Unfortunately, we can well imagine that Congress moves at a speed which slips behind glacier movement and barely exceeds continental drift; on the issues it wants to move on. On issues this contentious, well... At this point I might make some crack about finding the Northwest Passage before Congress finding some motivation, but nowadays I think I'll hedge my bets and say we'll have a man back on the Moon before Congress finds some motivation.
CaptainChewbacca wrote:Dude...
Way to overwork a metaphor Shadow. I feel really creeped out now.
I am an artist, metaphorical mind-fucks are my medium.
"You have to believe in God before you can say there are things that man was not meant to know.
I don't think there's anything man wasn't meant to know. There are just some stupid things that people shouldn't do." - David Cronenberg
"Doesn't Rush Limbaugh remind you of one of those gay guys that like to lie in a tub while other guys pee on him?" - Bill Hicks
Oops I posted that in the wrong topic could a mod fix that please.
"You have to believe in God before you can say there are things that man was not meant to know.
I don't think there's anything man wasn't meant to know. There are just some stupid things that people shouldn't do." - David Cronenberg
"Doesn't Rush Limbaugh remind you of one of those gay guys that like to lie in a tub while other guys pee on him?" - Bill Hicks
Maybe he should research his candidates more...or at least admit it was the 'least bad' option.
