Repeal DADT: Blog Post #2

Chaka Fattah  is currently the representative for Pennsylvania’s second district, which includes sections of the city of Philadelphia.
Congressman Fattah has a long history of voting in favor of issues regarding gay rights.

• He voted yes for the Employment Non-Discrimination Act.

This act was designed with the intent to make it an unlawful employment practice to discriminate against an individual on the basis of actual or perceived sexual orientation,

• He voted no for on constitutionally defining marriage as one-man-one-woman.

The proposed amendment to the constitution stated that "Marriage in the US shall consist only of the union of a man and a woman. Neither this Constitution, nor the constitution of any State, shall be construed to require that marriage or the legal incidents thereof be conferred upon any union other than the union of a man and a woman."
Therefore, it was no surprise when he voted in favor of abolishing the Don’t Ask Don’t Tell policy. His response to the issue was: “the worldwide injunction issued today by Judge Virginia Phillips to stop enforcement of the ‘Don’t Ask Don’t Tell’ policy concerning gay and lesbian members of our military is welcome and long overdue.”

The greater opposition of this blatantly homophobic bill is John McCain.
In 2006 he spoke to a group of Iowa state university students and said "The day that the leadership of the military comes to me and says, 'Senator, we ought to change the policy,' then I think we ought to consider seriously changing it."
However, since losing the election to Barack Obama, McCain has been the president’s biggest critic, so it was no surprise when his stance on the issue changed when Obama announced his current push to repeal the bill.

"At this moment of immense hardship for our armed services, we should not be seeking to overturn the 'don't ask, don't tell' policy," he said bluntly, before describing it as "imperfect but effective."