Bloodcinder
05-20-2009, 18:08
This is an article written by my liberal gay friend for our school newspaper.
Obama must end don't ask/don't tell now (source (http://www.da.wvu.edu/show_article.php?story_id=42957))
According to statistics released this week by the Pentagon, 619 soldiers were discharged from the armed forces of the United States in fiscal year 2008 because of their sexual orientation.
This number is more or less consistent with the amount of annual discharges over each of the last five years under the law that prohibits homosexuals from serving in the military.
Annual discharges in that time have averaged 654. In sum, since the policy began in 1993, more than 13,000 troops have been discharged.
The shorthand title commonly given to this policy is “don’t ask, don’t tell” – a memorable but entirely inaccurate description of the law.
The “don’t tell” part is a mandate, but “don’t ask” is just a suggestion. Any soldier of any rank may be discharged for admitting to either being gay, thinking about being gay, engaging in same-sex activity or having a same-sex relationship. Any commander, meanwhile, may initiate a formal investigation on as much as a suspicion of homosexual inclination.
We must disabuse ourselves of the notion that gays have the ability to serve in the military as long as they don’t announce it.
A soldier who has never spoken a word to anyone in the military hierarchy can be investigated and discharged all the same.
There are no privacy protections from anti-gay crusaders. It is simply not the case that only soldiers who choose to make public proclamations of their sexuality are discharged under the policy, though some certainly do this as a means of making a political statement.
Lt. Dan Choi, the Arabic-speaking National Guardsman dismissed earlier this month, is a recent well-publicized example, but he stands on the shoulders of many who have come before.
During his time as a presidential candidate, Barack Obama promised to do something about this.
He claimed confidence that he could end the policy “reasonably.” The policy, Obama said, “doesn’t make us more safe.”
“You don’t hear a politician give a one-word answer much. But it’s, ‘Yes,’” said soon-to-be White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs Jan. 14 when asked if the incoming administration planned to end the policy.
Those words were unequivocal, but the administration since then has done nothing but equivocate.
The administration announced it would not take action on behalf of Lt. Choi or anyone else currently facing expulsion under the policy.
A Pentagon spokesman said this week that no plans to change the policy are currently in the works and that no surveys or studies on the subject have been initiated within the service branches.
Earlier this year, National Security Advisor Gen. James Jones said he didn’t know if the administration would ever change the policy.
The Servicemembers’ Legal Defense Network, which specializes in defending soldiers facing discharge hearings under don’t ask/don’t tell, estimates that around 200 soldiers have been expunged for being gay since Obama took office in January.
Most distressingly, the administration actually picked up and carried on a Bush-era fight against a federal court ruling against blanket application of don’t ask/don’t tell.
The Ninth Circuit ruled last year that the Air Force could not discharge a decorated major who admitted to being a lesbian without specifically demonstrating how the major’s sexuality could “create an unacceptable risk” to “morale and unit cohesion” – the rationale given for banning gays under the 1993 law.
The Bush Administration appealed, of course, but its time ended before the appeal began.
Then the Obama Administration actually filed two extensions with the Supreme Court in an attempt to continue the Bush appeal before giving up last week.
“Until Congress passes legislation repealing the law, the administration will continue to defend the statute when it is challenged in the justice system,” said White House Spokesman Ben LaBolt.
The implication is clear. This potato is too hot for the president, and he has thrown it back to Congress.
Yes, don’t ask/don’t tell is a policy based on a federal law passed by Congress, and the president cannot simply overturn it.
But Obama enjoys wide popularity and powerful influence in a Congress controlled almost entirely by his own party. He has muscled through more than one controversial initiative already.
It is difficult for everyone who opposes don’t ask/don’t tell to view Obama’s decision to punt on this issue as anything but weakness and impossible for the gay and lesbian community in the United States to view it as anything but a betrayal.
Obama has been right on many things, but he is wrong on this.
The president should not wait for Congress to act or for the views of the entrenched leadership at the Pentagon to evolve.
Don’t ask/don’t tell is the only law on the books permitting the government to engage in blanket discrimination.
Now is the time to begin dismantling it.I told the gays before the election that Obama wasn't going to live up to his word on this issue. They were too busy basking in his radiant corona to care. Now we've got him in office. Where's the action?
I don't think "he can't get it through Congress" is a good excuse, and it's definitely the only one he can attempt to make. He said he was going to get rid of the policy. He said this explicitly. It's been over four months. Why is he waiting?
It sure just looks like his administration has decided not to care.
Obama must end don't ask/don't tell now (source (http://www.da.wvu.edu/show_article.php?story_id=42957))
According to statistics released this week by the Pentagon, 619 soldiers were discharged from the armed forces of the United States in fiscal year 2008 because of their sexual orientation.
This number is more or less consistent with the amount of annual discharges over each of the last five years under the law that prohibits homosexuals from serving in the military.
Annual discharges in that time have averaged 654. In sum, since the policy began in 1993, more than 13,000 troops have been discharged.
The shorthand title commonly given to this policy is “don’t ask, don’t tell” – a memorable but entirely inaccurate description of the law.
The “don’t tell” part is a mandate, but “don’t ask” is just a suggestion. Any soldier of any rank may be discharged for admitting to either being gay, thinking about being gay, engaging in same-sex activity or having a same-sex relationship. Any commander, meanwhile, may initiate a formal investigation on as much as a suspicion of homosexual inclination.
We must disabuse ourselves of the notion that gays have the ability to serve in the military as long as they don’t announce it.
A soldier who has never spoken a word to anyone in the military hierarchy can be investigated and discharged all the same.
There are no privacy protections from anti-gay crusaders. It is simply not the case that only soldiers who choose to make public proclamations of their sexuality are discharged under the policy, though some certainly do this as a means of making a political statement.
Lt. Dan Choi, the Arabic-speaking National Guardsman dismissed earlier this month, is a recent well-publicized example, but he stands on the shoulders of many who have come before.
During his time as a presidential candidate, Barack Obama promised to do something about this.
He claimed confidence that he could end the policy “reasonably.” The policy, Obama said, “doesn’t make us more safe.”
“You don’t hear a politician give a one-word answer much. But it’s, ‘Yes,’” said soon-to-be White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs Jan. 14 when asked if the incoming administration planned to end the policy.
Those words were unequivocal, but the administration since then has done nothing but equivocate.
The administration announced it would not take action on behalf of Lt. Choi or anyone else currently facing expulsion under the policy.
A Pentagon spokesman said this week that no plans to change the policy are currently in the works and that no surveys or studies on the subject have been initiated within the service branches.
Earlier this year, National Security Advisor Gen. James Jones said he didn’t know if the administration would ever change the policy.
The Servicemembers’ Legal Defense Network, which specializes in defending soldiers facing discharge hearings under don’t ask/don’t tell, estimates that around 200 soldiers have been expunged for being gay since Obama took office in January.
Most distressingly, the administration actually picked up and carried on a Bush-era fight against a federal court ruling against blanket application of don’t ask/don’t tell.
The Ninth Circuit ruled last year that the Air Force could not discharge a decorated major who admitted to being a lesbian without specifically demonstrating how the major’s sexuality could “create an unacceptable risk” to “morale and unit cohesion” – the rationale given for banning gays under the 1993 law.
The Bush Administration appealed, of course, but its time ended before the appeal began.
Then the Obama Administration actually filed two extensions with the Supreme Court in an attempt to continue the Bush appeal before giving up last week.
“Until Congress passes legislation repealing the law, the administration will continue to defend the statute when it is challenged in the justice system,” said White House Spokesman Ben LaBolt.
The implication is clear. This potato is too hot for the president, and he has thrown it back to Congress.
Yes, don’t ask/don’t tell is a policy based on a federal law passed by Congress, and the president cannot simply overturn it.
But Obama enjoys wide popularity and powerful influence in a Congress controlled almost entirely by his own party. He has muscled through more than one controversial initiative already.
It is difficult for everyone who opposes don’t ask/don’t tell to view Obama’s decision to punt on this issue as anything but weakness and impossible for the gay and lesbian community in the United States to view it as anything but a betrayal.
Obama has been right on many things, but he is wrong on this.
The president should not wait for Congress to act or for the views of the entrenched leadership at the Pentagon to evolve.
Don’t ask/don’t tell is the only law on the books permitting the government to engage in blanket discrimination.
Now is the time to begin dismantling it.I told the gays before the election that Obama wasn't going to live up to his word on this issue. They were too busy basking in his radiant corona to care. Now we've got him in office. Where's the action?
I don't think "he can't get it through Congress" is a good excuse, and it's definitely the only one he can attempt to make. He said he was going to get rid of the policy. He said this explicitly. It's been over four months. Why is he waiting?
It sure just looks like his administration has decided not to care.