Hillary Clinton just made an appearance at the Yearly Kos convention. She gave a short speech and then said she wanted to take questions. Peter Daou asked everyone to identify themselves and where they blogged. The first question, from a member of the National Teacher’s Association, was about No Child Left Behind. Education is clearly one of Hillary’s animating passions because she spoke for almost fifteen minutes. This left very little time for any other questions. She promised to repeal the Military Commissions Act and shut down the Guantanamo prison. She said that she voted against the FISA law last night but noted it had a sunset provision and said she would revisit it as President.
Then she received a great question. A gay man stood up and thanked her for committing to do away with the Don’t Ask Don’t Tell policy. The he said, “but I want to know if you will commit to doing away with four other pieces of legislation that your husband passed?”
After a lot of laughter, he listed them: The Defense of Marriage Act, the 1996 telecommunication bill, NAFTA, and the welfare reform bill.
It was a great question. Hillary defended DOMA as a necessary way of preventing a Hate Amendment to the constitution. She did commit to repealing that third section of the law, which she said denies full rights under federal law. She told the audience to ask Al Gore about the telecommunications act because she was no expert. Her comments on NAFTA were predictable and standard.
[aside: ooh, Obama just got a HUGE cheer while being introduced at the candidate’s forum.]
I’ll have more after the conference.
