Sssshhhhhhhhh.....the details of the DADT chess game are still kinda secret, but at least now we now know the basic framework: we're on our own.
Now let's get it done! All we have to do is persuade Senate Republicans to vote for us. It's so brilliant, I can't believe we didn't think of it ourselves!
On our own, you say? Try this on for size:
Asked by the Washington Blade whether the president has made any outreach attempts to encourage senators who voted "no" on moving forward with repeal to vote "yes" a second time around, Gibbs replied that no such outreach has taken place to his knowledge.
Still, Gibbs acknowledged that the only way the Senate could move forward with the fiscal year 2011 defense authorization bill — to which repeal language is attached — is to change some of those votes.
"To my knowledge, it hasn’t taken place yet, but, look, the only way we’re going to get something through the Senate is to change the vote count," Gibbs said.
The Super-Secret Plan is to get the Log Cabin Republicans, who in the past can't even get Republicans to take their campaign contributions (see Dole, Bob) to do this crucial outreach to Republican Senators. I had no idea they had such power to influence the Republican caucus on LGBT issues, because they never in the past have been able to make even the slightest difference in how Republicans vote.
Finally, Joe asked the President if he has a strategy for passing the DADT compromise legislation during the lame duck session in Congress. The President did make some news here, by telling Joe that he asked the Log Cabin Republicans in a meeting at the White House yesterday to get him 2 to 5 votes. The President seemed to think that Joe could help persuade Log Cabin to help. Joe told the President that he didn't have sway with those people.
Who knew you could just order up 2-5* Republican votes? Just think of how much better the health care bill could have been if the Log Cabin Republicans were on the job! Obviously the Super Secret Plan met with some resistance from the "those people" (my feelings exactly), because President Obama needs all of us to persuade the Log Cabin Republicans to pull our DADT chestnuts out of the fire.
So, everybody get busy and lobby the LCR to get those GOP votes. If you don't, we'll only have ourselves to blame for this screwed up MESS. Which maybe is the REAL Super Secret plan.
*kind of telling that we might need 5 Republican votes - no?
UPDATE: vacantlook was kind enough to link to the transcript of today's meeting between President Obama and liberal bloggers. Makes for infuriating reading, to say the least...