Hillary Clinton

This, reported by Towleroad, from the new Advocate interview with Hillary Clinton:

As any good therapist would say, no partner is perfect. At least Clinton’s willing to try. "I cannot promise results," she says to me. "I can only promise my best effort. I can only promise to do everything that I can do to make the case, to put together the political majority, to take the message to the country, and I will do that. But there are no guarantees in life or politics."

So, I say to her, even if the negative feedback is deafening, would you still push forward on repealing "don’t ask, don’t tell"? "I’m certainly going to continue to push forward," she says. "But again, I can’t guarantee that the negative feedback will go away. The president is not a king, despite George Bush’s efforts to be one…and don’t forget, there’s another set of agenda items too. We’ve got ENDA and hate crimes."

"If they reached your desk,' I press, 'you’d promise to sign them?"

"Absolutely, because as president I would be trying to get them to my desk," she says with an exasperated laugh. "That’s the whole point!"

What negative feedback? Who are these people listening to? Here is an article from Military Education Initiative surveying poll results on DADT over the past several years. The trend is obvious -- a clear majority of Americans, including servicemembers, favors repeal. I would venture to guess, from my latest recollection, that the trend holds true for ENDA and hate crimes legislation.

How very brave of Hillary, to be willing to stand up to the Beltway elite on gay issues. Well, mostly.

I'm being a little snarky, because frankly, out of the whole field, right and left, she's one of the two candidates I can possibly support. Obama is not the other. Don't ask me why -- it's a very visceral thing, but I just don't trust him. But I'm really tired of the Democrats dodging this issue, because yes, boys and girls, it is the litmus test this time around. Someone needs to have the balls to reframe the whole discussion, and I don't see it happening.

I read too much about Hillary being "calculating." Well, yeah. What's your damage? I'd rather have her calculating on how to get decent policies in effect than how to make the entire government an arm of any particular political party. Frankly, the whole triangulation argument leaves me cold, because, after all, it works. Maybe it doesn't make everyone happy, but that's politics for you. Yes, she's a politician, and a very successful one -- they adore her in New York, by all reports, even though she started out being called things like "carpetbagger." I do object to her making any attempt to pander to the Republican base -- there are enough politicians doing that already, and I, for one, would find it refreshing if one of them would simply point out that these people at their very strongest comprise about 25% of the electorate, and it's about time the other 75% of us received some attention. After all, I'll be voting for a leader, not a follower.

Read the interview. Kennedy makes no bones about his feelings toward Clinton and her candidacy, but they're not the same feelings and he seems willing to take a cold look at her positions.