DADT repeal wins!

By Greg Sargent

In a historic victory for the military, the Senate Dem leadership, the White House, and the civil rights of embattled gay and lesbian service-members -- and in a massive rebuke to John McCain, Mitch McConnell and the GOP Senate minority's efforts to maintain legalized discrimination in defiance of common sense and decency -- the Senate just cast a key vote in favor of the stand-alone bill to repeal don't ask don't tell.

Seventeen years after DADT passed into law, the vote all but ensures that its repeal will become a reality before the end of the year. The vote passed by 63-33, with moderate GOPers like Scott Brown, Lisa Murkowski, Susan Collins, and Olympia Snowe voting Yes.

First of all, major props are due to Joe Lieberman, Harry Reid, President Obama, gay rights groups, and pro-repeal bloggers and commentators, all of whom played different but interlocking roles to make this happen. A rundown:

Joe Lieberman:

Lieberman was tireless in his efforts to cajole the handful of GOP moderates to come on board, despite extraordinary pressure on them to maintain GOP unity and block the measure. Lieberman prodded the process along with well-timed public statements, laying down a road-map for the Dem leadership to follow that led to success.

Lieberman also played an important role as a public counterbalance to John McCain, whose quixotic, erratic and desperate efforts to stall and defeat repeal might have commanded more public respect, were it not for Lieberman's high-profile campaign. Lieberman's independent status and Beltway reputation as a hawk made him perfect for the lead role in undercutting McCain's arguments. He succeeded in doing this in scores of TV interviews and at the Senate hearings, where he cross-examined military leaders inclined against repeal and got them to acknowledge that they could live with repeal if it were implemented by Defense Secretary Robert Gates. In a sense, this has been an old-school epic battle between two senators. Lieberman won.

Harry Reid:

Reid, too, deserves enormous credit for helping shepherd DADT repeal through the Senate. Though watching his efforts was one heck of a roller-coaster ride, in retrospect it's clear that he handled this in very shrewd fashion. Before the vote on the defense authorization bill containing DADT repeal, which the GOP successfully blocked, Reid made a whole range of concessions to GOP moderates, bringing them to the brink of casting a Yes vote.

When it became clear that Susan Collins's procedural demands risked throwing the lame-duck session into chaos, Reid's decision to fast-track the vote at that time was roundly criticized. In retrospect, it turns out this move allowed moderates the room to register their procedural objections with a first-round No vote. As Reid knew, he could then schedule a second, stand-alone vote, giving the moderates a bit more time and maneuvering room -- and another series of private meetings with military leaders -- to come around to the Yes camp. It's hard to know whether Reid originally intended to do this -- or whether he only did it under pressure -- but he did it.

And Reid was right to schedule the DADT vote before getting New START resolved -- again under heavy pressure, but again, he did it -- forging forward despite GOP threats that so doing could scuttle the START treaty.

The White House:

Finally, the White House. Obama had been criticized for months on don't ask don't tell, with advocates complaining that his administration aggressively defended DADT in court and that he wasn't doing enough to rally the Senate to pass repeal. But the botton line is that the White House did everything possible to create the political climate necessary to make this happen. The Pentagon report and the testimony by Robert Gates -- and his public round of interviews calling on Congress to pass repeal for the good of the military -- were major game-changers.

Also: For all the criticism of the Obama tax deal, today's victory stands as partial vindication of his strategy. Getting the tax deal wrapped up early made the time for repeal, with only days left in the lame-duck session.

This is an important victory for the White House in another way. It will quiet all the talk about Obama's supposed "triangulating," because it demonstrates -- for the time being, anyway -- that even as the White House sees a need to trade away some core liberal priorities to compromise with Repubilcans, Obama seems to want to bring the left along with him, to whatever degree he can. This will make it tougher to argue that Obama's strategy is to deliberately alienate the left in order to win back the middle of the country.

This moment in the Senate will take its place in the history books alongside other ground-breaking civil rights votes, and stands as an important reminder that as broken as our system seems at times, progress towards a more just and inclusive society is still possible.

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UPDATE, 12:38 p.m.: President Obama's statement:

Today, the Senate has taken an historic step toward ending a policy that undermines our national security while violating the very ideals that our brave men and women in uniform risk their lives to defend. By ending "Don't Ask, Don't Tell," no longer will our nation be denied the service of thousands of patriotic Americans forced to leave the military, despite years of exemplary performance, because they happen to be gay. And no longer will many thousands more be asked to live a lie in order to serve the country they love. As Commander-in-Chief, I am also absolutely convinced that making this change will only underscore the professionalism of our troops as the best led and best trained fighting force the world has ever known. And I join the Secretary of Defense and the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, as well as the overwhelming majority of service members asked by the Pentagon, in knowing that we can responsibly transition to a new policy while ensuring our military strength and readiness. I want to thank Majority Leader Reid, Senators Lieberman and Collins and the countless others who have worked so hard to get this done. It is time to close this chapter in our history. It is time to recognize that sacrifice, valor and integrity are no more defined by sexual orientation than they are by race or gender, religion or creed. It is time to allow gay and lesbian Americans to serve their country openly. I urge the Senate to send this bill to my desk so that I can sign it into law.

The final Senate vote is set for 3 p.m. today.

