RachelWatch: Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell, Don’t Make Stuff Up

Well, it’s official: 43 members of the Senate don’t seem to have a problem with sending our troops into battle with substandard body armor, but would rather bring the entire military-industrial complex to a screeching halt than contemplate the idea of straights and gays stepping into the same foxhole.

We all know that straights, bis, and gays have been serving together since, oh, war was invented, so really the debate is not about whether it’s OK for lesbian, gay, and bisexual troops to put their lives on the line for their country.

It’s about whether it’s OK to fire someone who has put her life on the line for taking her girlfriend to Wal-Mart.

When an argument can be boiled down to that big a nugget of pure stupid, you need an awful lot of bluster and misdirection to keep the debate going. And wow, has the bullpuckey been flying.

Rachel Maddow devoted the first segment of her Tuesday night show to demolishing the fake reasons for the filibuster. And she’s right: Senators, if you’re going to force dedicated servicemen and women to lie about who they are, at least have the nards to tell the truth about why you’re doing it.

Forty-three Senators froze our entire military budget in order to suck up to angry, frightened bigots. Way to go down in the history books. What’s the opposite of a principled stand, anyway? A chicken sit?

Rachel devoted one or two other segments to DADT and the filibuster.

Lawrence O’Donnell dropped in to talk about how filibustering has changed in recent years, building on Rachel’s MSNBC appearance from earlier in the day. Both clips offer a fascinating insight into the way government works.

Less can’t-put-that-article-on-stick-bugs-down fascinating than can’t-stop-throwing-random-breakable-objects-while-watching-this fascinating, but still.

An intriguing* sideshow to the DADT mess has been the latest phase of Senator John McCain’s elaborate, years-long Druid ritual to stay in power by sacrificing each and every one of his once-cherished principles by carefully wrapping them in white linen sheets and mistletoe before tossing them into a bonfire and then staggering around while making humiliating, self-contradictory speeches.

I know this clip looks bad, but brace yourselves: Next month as part of his election buildup he’ll be renouncing his belief in gravity.

By the way, Chris Geidner, who was one of the reporters speaking to McCain in the clip, wrote an informative** column on what went down and the resulting blamesplatter that’s well worth reading.

The whole thing is disheartening, yes, but disheartening isn't the same thing as over. Rachel spoke to author Nathaniel Frank about what might come next.

And, in the end, we all know who's going to win this in the long run. Senator McCain is 74; Lady Gaga is 24.

And she has much better Druid outfits.

*can’t-stop-putting-my-fist-through-the-drywall intriguing

**can’t-stop-shredding-pillows-with-my-teeth informative