Reports the Huffington Post:
House Democrats have reversed a decision by President Obama and removed a ban on federal funding for needle-exchange programs that he included in the 2010 budget. Including the ban broke a campaign pledge and the flip-flop set off outrage in the gay community and among HIV/AIDS activists. Twenty-six activists were arrested Thursday in the Capitol protesting the policy.
“For us this is a major positive development,” said Allan Clear of the Harm Reduction Coalition. “We’re optimistic it will stay out. We don’t think Democrats would do this unless they thought they could keep it out.” …
The needle-exchange question goes to the heart of a seemingly never-ending debate in Washington: Should policy be made based on sound science or used to drive a wedge between the electorate? Obama has placed himself squarely in the sound science camp, which is why his decision touched off such anger.
It is also, quite literally, a life or death question. “Thirty-thousand people a year get HIV or Hepatitis C directly or indirectly from intravenous drug use,” said [director of national affairs for the Drug Policy Alliance Bill] Piper. “That’s 300,000 people that could be saved over the next decade.”
This is good news—assuming the language sticks—but it’s just pathetic. Congressional Democrats had to strong-arm legislation to carry out Obama’s promise to restore funding for needle exchange. Obama, of course, said he would do this but didn’t… yet will probably take credit for shepherding change.
Slog tip from Gnossos
He defers to congress to take the heat off him. Congress should continue to go along with this and do away with DADT and DOMA.
@1 for the win.
Yeah, that fast.
Deal with it, politics is brutal, folks.
Um, isn’t this the way our government is supposed to work?
“Congressional Democrats had to strong-arm legislation to carry out Obama’s promise”
Legislation is the domain of the legislative branch, no?
If anybody would bother to read the Constitution, you’d know it wasn’t a presidential candidate’s promise to make unless it was preceded by “…will work with Congress to…”
Which he did.
Vince has this exactly right.
@4 – “Legislation is the domain of the legislative branch, no” is true, of course, but the budget is a little more complicated.
Here’s the chain of events as I understand it. Obama promises to overturn the ban on funding needle-exchange programs. However, the budget that he submits to Congress still has the ban in it. The President submits the budget request to Congress, so, Obama has the authority to remove the ban before he submits. He didn’t do so. Congress, of course, has the authority to remove it (or add it back in, if he had removed it).
So, anyways, yeah, it’s kind of bullshit that he promised to stop doing one thing, had the authority to recommend that it not be done, and yet didn’t recommend it. He absolutely did not “work with Congress” in this case. “Working with Congress” would have meant removing the ban in his budget request.
@6: The language was almost the same language used for other promises “This is a legislative issue, and I will leave it to Congress.” If he’s not going to use his power to exert influence, well, why did he promise anything at all?
It feels like a dodge.
@4 I hear you and I agree with you.
And I’m sure Obama knew this, too, as a Constitutional scholar. I think he was lighting a match under a complacent Congress’ ass.
But, for all the talk about executive orders and the swipe of a pen, this president needs to get Congress moving WITH him. This was a good start.
Next I want to see him place pressure on Congress for DOMA and DADT, as @1 pointed out.
What I DONT want to see is the president have to do these things on his own. Mainly, because it would make him a lightning rod of right-wing anger and get him booted from office in 3 years.
I know people are impatient but if we could all live through 8 years of Bush, we can at least give a few items of “change” a little prudent time to get done right.
@6, I meant… Sorry, Julie. Not talking to myself.
@6 and 7: Obama played it this way because he is a very astute politician who is a lot more interested in winning than scoring empty points.
He knows quite well how badly Clinton got burned on this issue and was smart enough to let Serrano, Waxman, Obey and others steer this through the legislative process. So far this strategy is paying off quite well.
Sorry, but those that are criticizing him on this (at least so far) really don’t know what is going on behind the scenes.
Believe me, if he backtracks later I’ll jump on him louder than anyone here.
@7 It especially feels like a dodge because the President can recommend whatever the hell he wants in his budget request to Congress. Well, that’s an exaggeration, but it is certainly 100% within his power to recommend that the ban be lifted. That’s how the whole process was designed. And yet he didn’t do it.
gnossos – While it’s true that I have no idea what is going on behind the scenes here, it’s also true that Obama took a stand against the ban in his campaign, and then (under the most charitable interpretation of events) wasn’t willing to take it out of his request to Congress, but instead let them take any heat for it.
I guess one could interpret that as being astute politics. Though, it seems like just recommending that it be taken out wouldn’t hurt him that much (since it was one of his promises), and not recommending it has caused some drama for the administration. So, not sure how astute it was in the end.
Anyways, the budget request isn’t an executive order (BTW, I do agree with Ackham that it could be argued that executive orders a la Bush are not a good idea). The President is supposed to tell Congress what he wants in the budget, and Congress is supposed to make changes to his recommendations, as appropriate. That’s how it works.
For Obama to lift the restriction on using federal funds for syringe exchange the Secretary of Health needs to issue a public statement certifying that syringe exchange does not contribute to increased drug use and is effective at preventing HIV/AIDS (both abundantly true and well-documented). That’s the language in the original bill (the “compromise” with Jesse Helms). Then Congress gets to agree or disagree with that.
Far easier to just get Congress to undue what IT did in the first place. And that is what is happening.
Something good happens, and people on here want to gripe about assigning credit. Can’t you be happy that something positive happened instead of using it as a cheap means of launching a new attack on someone? Who gives a fuck who spearheaded the legislation? If you want to be angry at Obama, be angry about the pertinent policies.
Obama is a wuss on “controversial” issues, and the Stranger worked it’s ass off to get him elected.
So fuck you, Stranger. FUCK YOU. Please take the next issue of your voter’s guide and shove it up your collective ass.
Obama is totally creeping me out. No wonder they shot JFK.
16: You’re fucking sick.
Dan, if DADT, DOMA and the HIV travel ban all get removed during Obama’s administration, and a few more states legalize gay marriage on their own, all without Obama having the slightest influence on the public debate, will you really consider that all of it happened despite Obama, instead of because of him? Like gnossos said, it seems pretty clear at this point that Obama wants to work behind the scenes to get this stuff done. This takes longer, and doesn’t have the same satisfaction of the President striking every anti-gay law from the books with one strike of his pen, but it gets it done cleaner.
Is it just because he said he was a Fierce Advocate that you can’t handle him politicking instead of dictating?
It’s just Fiercy doin’ his Fiercy thang. He’s so Fierce!
At least somebody’s getting this fixed.