With six you get eggroll, and with Republican Senators Brown, Snowe, Collins, and Murkowski you get sixty-one votes to repeal “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.” That doesn’t even count in Blanche Lincoln (D-AK), who said last week her dentist kept her from voting, and she would have voted “yes.”
But then there’s the newly-minted freshman Democratic Senator from West Virginia, its former governor, who sits in the chair most-recently occupied by the longest serving member of Congress, ever: the late Senator Robert Byrd. Yes, Joe Manchin, the only Democrat who voted against repealing “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” last week, and who yesterday was hand-delivered a petition of almost one thousand signatures by a gay “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” discharged veteran, has yet to signal a move toward a yes vote.
This is all coming down to a question of time and, frankly, honesty. Or, as Barney Frank just said, “unless there are some liars,” we have sixty-one votes.
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid says he will bring the standalone “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” repeal bill to a vote next week.
Will he keep his word?
Republican Senators Brown, Snowe, Collins, Murkowski all say they will vote for repeal. Will they? Or will some of them find yet another reason, like they did last week, to vote no?