Is Obama Being Cowed By Clinton Administration Ghosts of Don't Ask Don't Tell and Healthcare?

A BUZZFLASH NEWS ANALYSIS
by Meg White

Though the era of the Clinton Administration seems like ancient history to some, progressives have learned a lot from the missteps of the most recent Democrat to have held the title of President of the United States of America.

Maybe too much.

The overwhelming power of the GOP's culture wars killed President Bill Clinton's grand plans for allowing gays in the military and for providing universal healthcare. The ghosts of those two murdered proposals nearly took with them Clinton's whole first term. Now, the Obama Administration seems willing to allow these two Clinton-era specters to take down the entire progressive agenda.

President Obama knows the country needs universal healthcare. He knows we need to take sexual profiling out of the jurisdiction of military recruiters. But he's also afraid of ghosts.

Clinton entered the White House promising that he would allow openly gay people to serve in the American military. Boy, was he mistaken.

Instead, Clinton got one of the worst legislative compromises in recent memory: Don't Ask, Don't Tell (DADT). The GOP turned a commonsense extension of human rights and civil responsibility into a shameful battle over sex, decency and family values.

This lesson to avoid the DADT issue seems to be one that Obama has learned only since moving into the White House. On the campaign trail, he sent a hand-written note to one service member who was kicked out of the military for being gay which said in part, "It is because of outstanding Americans like you that I committed to changing our current policy. Although it will take some time to complete (partly because it needs Congressional action) I intend to fulfill my commitment."

Sure, Obama intended upon it. But that was before Rahm Emanuel told him a scary bedtime story about the culture war zombies. So, instead Obama is going to give civil union benefits to gay federal employees. I will excuse the GLBT community for not sending a hand-written thank-you note.

The Clinton Administration's battle over healthcare was a similar case, at least in outcome.

Sahil Kapur at Huffington Post reminds us that the fight for universal coverage is not a new battle:

It began in the progressive era, when they disrupted Theodore Roosevelt's public health plan and intimidated FDR into dropping it from the New Deal. They soon grew in power, squashing the efforts of Truman and the 1940s Democrats to guarantee coverage to all Americans. They tried unsuccessfully to kill Medicare and Medicaid in the '60s, and butchered Clinton-care in the '90s. And now they're at it again, in the midst of yet another smear campaign.

But the crushing failure of healthcare reform cast a shadow that hangs over the issue (and its proponents) well over a decade later. In emulating the lesson Hillary Clinton learned to "play well with others" when enacting healthcare reform, Obama and leading congressional Democrats have sold single-payer down the river. Now, smelling liberal fear and disunity as they do so well, the GOP wants to take away the public option entirely.

Learning the lessons of history is an important exercise. But such lessons have no meaning if one does not understand one's unique place in historical context. The thing that Obama doesn't seem to have learned is that his turn in the big guy's chair is different from Clinton's in three very important ways:

First, Obama's approval rating is higher than Clinton's was. In comparing their statuses just after Inauguration Day, Obama's approval rating was 10 percentage points higher than Clinton's.

In fact, Gallup reported today that the public trusts Obama significantly more than Congress, Big Pharma and the insurance industry to do the right thing when it comes to healthcare reform.

Second, the American public's support for universal healthcare and gays in the military is higher today than it was in Clinton's time.

Back in 1993, public support for gays in the military was a paltry 44 percent. Not only are there recent indications that three-fourths of the American public supports the repeal of DADT, but military leaders testified last year that DADT doesn't work. Study after study indicates that the policy should be rescinded at the very least.

As Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) pointed out Tuesday, healthcare reform will be easier to win support for now than it was during the Clinton era because healthcare costs have gone up since then and business owners have warmed significantly to the idea. Recent polls put Americans' support for a public healthcare plan at around 60 percent.

Third, the need for healthcare reform and an unprejudiced military enrollment policy have never been greater.

The problem of multiple deployments manifests itself in many terrible ways, from financial and mental instability to familial dissolution. Nearly 13,000 service members have been dismissed from the American military under DADT, which is way more than we can afford.

Not only are we losing the talent we need most desperately (such as Arabic translators) but we are also making an unfortunate moral statement when we increase the use of enrollment waivers to make up for the loss of these service members. By favoring ex-convicts, former drug users and those without high school diplomas over those with different sexual orientations, what are we saying about our values?

The time is also ripe for healthcare reform. Some may point to the recession as reason for a drop in political will for healthcare reform, but it seems to me the opposite is the case. Sure, deficits are rising due to the high cost of government reinvestment in infrastructure via the stimulus package. But we also have more uninsured people today.

What we really need, to pull ourselves out of this economic rut, is innovation. Unemployed people are much more likely to turn into entrepreneurs if they have health insurance to fall back on. Lack of healthcare is one of the main things that drives laid-off workers -- especially older ones -- into under-paying, unsatisfying corporate jobs, instead of using their talents to develop the technologies that will drive our country's future growth.

But somehow I know these arguments won't resonate with our highly pragmatic president. The ghosts of DADT and Clinton-care must be more convincing, as they haunt the corridors of drafty 1600 Pennsylvania Ave.

Maybe we need an exorcism?

A BUZZFLASH NEWS ANALYSIS

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