Posted on Advocate.com October 01, 2010
View From Washington
As Congress adjourned for the midterms, President Obama took his fight to the campaign trail, but where was he when the LGBT community needed him?
By Kerry Eleveld
http://www.advocate.com/Politics/Washington_D_C_/View_From_Washington_The_Fight/In case you missed it, Congress is gone. It recessed for the midterms Wednesday evening.
It was missable ... it sort of went out with a whimper. Rather than scratch and claw for one more accomplishment, one more campaign issue, Democrats just couldn't wait to pack up and go home after passing a small-business tax cut that President Barack Obama signed into law Monday. Eh, why stay in the fight till October 8 — the originally scheduled time to adjourn — when you can just go on home?
So most likely, when the 111th Congress is a wrap in December, the Obama administration's major legislative accomplishment for the LGBT community will have been passing the hate-crimes bill. Though there may be one last attempt at moving the National Defense Authorization Act with DADT repeal attached, I can't find a single student of the legislative process in Washington who thinks there's any better than a slim-to-none chance the defense funding bill will pass during lame-duck.
