This is an excerpt of an article written by Irin Carmon posted on Jezebel. You can read the full post at Jezebel.com.

Yesterday’s Senate failure on the Don’t Ask Don’t Tell repeal was disappointing, but as White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs put it, “I don’t think this is the end.” Oh yeah?

First comes the finger-pointing. The New York Times opined in its news piece that yesterday’s failure was a symptom of “Congress [being] increasingly paralyzed by the partisan fury of the midterm elections,” and the inability to even open debate on a defense bill that would simply open the door to DADT’s repeal was “more a result of a dispute between Democrats and Republicans over legislative process than a straightforward referendum on whether to allow gay, lesbian and bisexual soldiers to serve openly.”

On her show yesterday, Rachel Maddow called that a red herring, arguing that Republicans had dragged their feet on the procedural stuff merely to mask their own culture warrior opposition to gays in the military, and that none of their protests held water. (Also, we can blame both Arkansas Senators, nominally Democrats, for voting with the Republicans.)

Indeed, the House-ordered Pentagon Study gave Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell’s defenders a false cover for their bigotry and/or political cowardice. John McCain said it would be premature to vote on the bill, before the results were in, but as Lady Gaga sensibly noted yesterday, the bill stipulates that the repeal wouldn’t go into effect until after the study results and Pentagon officials certified it wouldn’t harm military readiness.

Read the rest of Irin Carmon’s piece at Jezebel.com

— Nydia Swaby