President Obama will push for homosexuals to have the right to openly serve in the military. So went the headline only hours before the State of the Union address.

The announcement coincides with this White House's effort to pivot more toward the center and focus on the economy. There is a question already being posed across the broadcast airwaves: will pushing now for overturning "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" undermine this president's effort to win back independents?

Likely not. The Gallup Poll found that even in November 2004, amid a presidential election consumed with the politics of gay marriage, 63 percent of independents supported allowing gays the right to openly serve in the armed forces. By the spring of 2009, that number had hardened to 67 percent. And today three-quarters of moderates support repealing the policy as well. Generally, the majority of Americans support gay rights issues that concern equal protection under the law (i.e.– majority backs civil unions and protection from hate crimes). It's cultural issues, like applying the term "marriage," that split the nation. And to most Americans, "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" fell under the former category.

In fact, the big news last year on this issue was the political right's shift. About six-in-10 conservatives, weekly churchgoers and Republicans now believe that "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" should be abolished. That marked a roughly 10-point rise in less than five years, among all three groups.

It's true that this is the precise issue that, with healthcare, helped sidetrack Bill Clinton's first term. But this issue is not as controversial as it was in the early 1990s. A Gallup poll in the summer of 1993 found that the country was split on the policy: 48 percent supporting “Don't Ask, Don't Tell” and 49 percent opposing it. By 2004, 63 percent opposed it. By May 2009, 69 percent of all adults opposed it.

The economy is also a factor. Americans tend to be less interested in cultural issues when economic conditions are dire. This is one reason Obama could have made this push last year as well, as gay activists wanted.

This writer asked in a column last year: “Will Obama be Truman on Gay Rights?” He's not in Truman's league on the subject of civil rights (at least, not yet). But to dispirited liberal activists, the news on "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" is a significant first step.

And in the big picture on the big middle, independents generally tend to be more liberal on social issues and more conservative on fiscal issues. Obama's move signifies outreach to the political left without further stressing what remains of his fragile bond with the center. It's not action on the issue of our time (the economy and joblessness). But it's smart politics all the same.

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