Once Again, the White House Does the Right Thing, When Forced To……

And then they weaken it significantly.

In this case, the White House is now behind repealing Don't Ask, Don't Tell this year, because it's clear that it's going to hit the floor of the House, and probably the Senate, and while they have been fighting against this behind the scenes, Obama and His Minions^™ don't want to fight against this in public.

The thing is, in order to get Obama's tepid support, they have created a repeal of DADT that does not repeal DADT:

Discussions around what that repeal measure would include were ongoing as Levin continued to lobby his colleagues. But a couple concessions designed to pacify Gates were being considered: allowing the Pentagon to complete its study before implementation proceeded and potentially requiring a stamp of approval (e.g. a certification letter) from military leadership and/or the president.

But by the time repeal advocates were invited to the White House on Monday morning to be briefed on a new compromise, a third concession had been added. There would be no nondiscrimination mandate. In other words, even after the law is repealed, it will not be replaced at any point with a policy that explicitly states gays and lesbians are allowed to serve openly in the military.

So, the repeal of DADT is just putting the policy back in the hands of Barack Obama, who will doubtless delegate to Robert Gates, who appears to be the most hostile person to gays serving currently working in the Pentagon.

Not feeling hopey changey.