President Obama has endorsed a compromise to pave the way for the repeal of Don't Ask, Don't Tell.

Under the deal, lawmakers could vote soon to repeal the contentious 17-year-old policy, which bars gay men and lesbians from serving openly in the armed services; the House Democratic leaders are considering taking up the measure as soon as this week. But the policy would not change until sometime after Dec. 1, when the Pentagon completes a review of its readiness to deal with the new policy. President Obama would also be required to certify that repeal would not harm military readiness.

If it passed, the measure could clear the way for gay men and lesbians to serve openly in the military as early next year, ending a policy that Mr. Obama, Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates and Adm. Mike Mullen, the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, all say they oppose.

Here is the Committee Amendment that Sen Joe Lieberman is expected to introduce.

This is Monday Morning quarterbacking (not in a bad sense), and we are past this stage of the Kagan Debate now, but Scott Lemieux provides a progressive critique of President Obama's decision to nominate Elena Kagan:

One of the mistakes, in my view, of critics of President Obama's choice of Elena Kagan for the Supreme Court is their view that Obama is afraid to fight for his values. This gets it wrong imo. Obama has supple values, he is a pol after all. My surmise is that Obama hopes Kagan is like Cass Sunstein (and maybe Kagan has let him think so.) I hope she is not. For once, HOPE is the appropriate word. Glenn Greenwald writes:

The New York Times this morning reports that "Mr. Obama effectively framed the choice so that he could seemingly take the middle road by picking Ms. Kagan, who correctly or not was viewed as ideologically between Judge Wood on the left and Judge Garland in the center." That's consummate Barack Obama. The Right appoints people like John Roberts and Sam Alito, with long and clear records of what they believe because they're eager to publicly defend their judicial philosophy and have the Court reflect their values. Beltway Democrats do the opposite: the last thing they want is to defend what progressives have always claimed is their worldview, either because they fear the debate or because they don't really believe those things [. . .]

(Emphasis supplied.) I vote for B. But what does this tell us about Elena Kagan? Not much in my view. Indeed, here is the perfect opportunity for the Senate to reseize its constitutional responsibilities of advise and consent, not rubber stamping of a President's choice for the SCOTUS. More so than any recent nominee, no one really knows what Kagan thinks about much of anything. As Glenn notes, the issue of the exercise of the advice and consent Constitutional responsibility of the Senate is one of longstanding for me:

Not surprising:

In a personally-narrated radio spot, Obama paints Lincoln as a populist crusader who is "leading the fight to hold Wall Street accountable and make sure that Arkansas taxpayers are never again asked to bail out Wall Street bankers."

"On health care," Obama adds, "Blanche took on big insurance companies by voting to end discrimination against Arkansans with preexisting conditions and fought for tax credits that will help thousands of local small businesses provide insurance to their employees."

Heh. Anyway, this goes to my argument that fealty to President Obama from progressives is a bad bargain. Obama is not the progressive champion we have been waiting for. He is a pol. And they do what they do.

Speaking for me only

Via atrios, the strong Executive in action:

The Obama administration plans to change the so-called Title IX policy which governs gender equality in sports, eliminating what some women's rights supporters claim is a Bush-administration loophole in compliance, according to a senior White House official.

[. . .] Universities initially faced three requirements to prove they were complying with the law: that the proportion of male and female students participating in sports at the university was proportional to the number of male and female students enrolled in the university; that the university was expanding opportunities for women students in athletics; and that the university was meeting the athletic abilities and interests of women students.

In 2005, the administration of former President George W. Bush changed the third requirement, allowing the university to prove it was meeting the athletic interests of women by carrying out surveys of students' interest in sports. [. . .] Under the new policy, universities will no longer be able to claim that a low response to surveys means a low interest in sports, the official said. [. . .] The official told CNN the new rules "restore the system to what it was before" the 2005 change. That rule "made it easier for universities to avoid complying with Title IX," the official said.

Well done, Obama Administration!

An eternal optimist, this announcement gives me hope:

President Obama [will] be at Cooper Union on Thursday to "remind Americans what is at stake if we do not move forward with changing the rules of the road as part of a strong Wall Street reform package,"

The most famous speech ever delivered at Cooper Union was Abraham Lincoln's speech in 1860. I have written about that speech often, including my first post at TalkLeft. Could it be that Obama is learning from Lincoln. Will he say to Republicans "[y]ou will rule or ruin in all events." Will he say to Democrats:

Neither let us be slandered from our duty by false accusations against us, nor frightened from it by menaces of destruction to the Government nor of dungeons to ourselves. LET US HAVE FAITH THAT RIGHT MAKES MIGHT, AND IN THAT FAITH, LET US, TO THE END, DARE TO DO OUR DUTY AS WE UNDERSTAND IT.

Hope springs eternal.

Speaking for me only

clammyc demands a liberal nominee to replace Justice Stevens on the SCOTUS from a centrist President. It is a welcome demand, but fanciful in the extreme. President Obama is not a liberal. As the Dawn Johnsen situation amply proves, President Obama is not, never was and never will be a liberal champion. Paul Rosenberg celebrates the end of the self deception:

The word "myth" has two distinct, but related meanings. One is "a compelling interpretive framework", the other is "a lie." Many myths are both, to varying degrees. The myth of Obama as Rorschach test is one of them. [. . .] In "The death of Dawn Johnsen's nomination," Glenn Greenwald writes:

virtually everything that Dawn Johnsen said about executive power, secrecy, the rule of law and accountability for past crimes made her an excellent fit for what Candidate Obama said he would do, but an awful fit for what President Obama has done.

and thus, finally, one can hope, the myth of Obama as Rorschach test can be set aside. It had a certain credibility once, but by now it simply comes down to the fact that Obama blurs and distorts his image as needed, just like every other politician does.

This is delusion from Rosenberg. The myth of Obama as progressive hero will never end for most Democrats and unfortunately, for too many self proclaimed progressive activists. Rosenberg, who never believed Obama to be a liberal champion, now thinks everyone else will see what he sees. The delusion now comes from him. More . . .

Dawn Johnson has withrawn her nomination for Office of Legal Counsel. She cites the delays in confirming her nomination.

Unfortunately, my nomination has met with lengthy delays and political opposition that threaten that objective and prevent OLC from functioning at full strength. I hope that the withdrawal of my nomination will allow this important office to be filled promptly."

Senators say the votes weren't there. Ben Nelson, a Dem, opposed her, and even though Richard Lugar, a Republican, supported her, there was concern about a filibuster.

Seems to me like Obama could have pushed harder for her. She should have been confirmed.

A wise president works with what he's got and doesn't add more burden than the beast can bear. That's different from triangulation. Triangulation is passing your opponent's agenda on your terms and then taking credit for it. Obama is passing his agenda on the terms the system will bear. - New Progressives

NYTimes:

Obama to Open Offshore Areas to Oil Drilling for First Time

WASHINGTON — The Obama administration is proposing to open vast expanses of water along the Atlantic coastline, the eastern Gulf of Mexico and the north coast of Alaska to oil and natural gas drilling, much of it for the first time, officials said Tuesday. The proposal — a compromise that will please oil companies and domestic drilling advocates but anger some residents of affected states and many environmental organizations — would end a longstanding moratorium on oil exploration along the East Coast from the northern tip of Delaware to the central coast of Florida, covering 167 million acres of ocean.

I personally do not have an opinion on the issue. But I am pretty sure the consensus "progressive" position opposed such a measure. What do they say now about this New "Progressive" "Non-Triangulation?"

Speaking for me only

Unlike many of our readers, it is my view that President Obama has been a nearly flawless foreign policy President. And make no mistake, unlike some Presidents, President Obama appears firmly in control of his Administration's foreign policy. And one of his valuable assets in carrying out his foreign policy is his Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton. Today's New York Times has a long piece on the relationship between the President and the Secretary of State:

Sixteen months after Mr. Obama surprised nearly everyone by picking her as secretary of state, the two have again surprised nearly everyone by forging a credible partnership. Mrs. Clinton has proved to be an eager team player, a tireless defender of the administration, ever deferential to Mr. Obama and careful to ensure that her husband, the former president, does not upstage her boss.

[. . .] Still, there is none of the deep familiarity or the tight bonds — the round-the-clock, back-channel access — of their predecessors, Condoleezza Rice and George W. Bush, or going further back, James A. Baker and the first President Bush or Henry A. Kissinger and Richard M. Nixon. “Hillary Clinton is the secretary of state,” said David Rothkopf, a former Clinton administration official who has written about the shaping of foreign policy. “The question now is whether she becomes a real adviser, and whether he trusts her.”

Rothkopf's comment seems a strange one to me and appears to buy into the idea that the Secretary of State should be the formulator of foreign policy. This accepts the view of Henry Kissinger, who viewed himself as a sort of foreign policy czar:

Sunday's New York Times Magazine has an 8 page profile of Rahm Emanuel.

If Emanuel’s philosophy is to put points on the board, to take what you can get and then cut a deal, to make everything negotiable except success, then the White House is testing the limits of Rahmism.

....Emanuel occupies a unique niche in Obama’s White House. He makes up the rules of the game that others are supposed to follow, and he gets away with what others cannot. Emanuel seems to serve as a virtual prime minister, the most powerful chief of staff since James Baker managed the White House during Ronald Reagan’s first term.

The Times portrays him as a rattlesnake wired into every important decision:

Don't Republicans have anything better to do? Now they are attacking Attorney General Eric Holder because he didn't disclose during his Senate confirmation hearings that he signed onto three Amicus briefs for Jose Padilla, the accused enemy combatant held for 3 1/2 years in a military brig, without access to counsel, before charges were filed.

“The briefs should have been disclosed as part of the confirmation process,” said Matthew Miller, a Justice Department spokesman. “In preparing thousands of pages for submission, it was unfortunately and inadvertently missed. In any event, the attorney general has publicly discussed his positions on detention policy on many occasions, including at his confirmation hearing.”

The briefs challenged then-President Bush's authority to indefinitely detain enemy combatents. They were filed in the Jose Padilla case. Links to them below: [More...]