[Vision2020] Gays Should Serve Openly, Admiral says

Wed Feb 3 09:28:56 PST 2010

I remember debating this with another Christian woman some 15 years ago, just a couple of years after Clinton's "don't ask, don't tell" policy.  She was married to a former Marine and was convinced that allowing gays to serve openly would sound the death knell of the military as we know it.  She was less than pleased when I suggested that if "the military as we know it" now included the insanity of denying gay people the right to serve -- and die -- honorably with their fellow citizens, that and certain other parts of the military culture needed a death knell struck to them.  

The military is too important an institution, and the soldiers therein too honorable, to be marked by the kind of mindless homophobia the current policy (and culture) promotes.  After Abu Ghraib and reports of soldiers committing acts of rape and other violence against other soldiers as well as women in the countries in which they serve, it's clear that too much of "the military as we know it" suffers from the sins of heterosexual men.  Let's focus on bad conduct where it exists, and not presume bad conduct or morals or character on those soldiers who identify as homosexual.

Keely
www.keely-prevailingwinds.com

> Date: Wed, 3 Feb 2010 06:19:02 -0800
> From: thansen at moscow.com
> To: vision2020 at moscow.com
> Subject: [Vision2020] Gays Should Serve Openly, Admiral says
> 
> It's a simple matter of equality, V-peeps.
> 
> Courtesy of today's (February 3, 2010) Spokesman-Review.
> 
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> 
> Gays should serve openly, admiral says
> Mullen’s testimony draws fire from GOP senators
> 
> WASHINGTON – The nation’s top military officer told Congress on Tuesday
> that gay men and lesbians should be allowed to serve openly in the
> military, the strongest endorsement ever by the nation’s military
> leadership for overturning the law that excludes them from the U.S. Army,
> Air Force, Navy and Marine Corps.
> 
> Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Adm. Mike Mullen called repeal of
> the ban “the right thing to do.”
> 
> “No matter how I look at the issue, I cannot escape being troubled by the
> fact that we have in place a policy which forces young men and women to
> lie about who they are in order to defend their fellow citizens,” Mullen
> told the Senate Armed Services Committee.
> 
> Mullen’s testimony drew angry responses from most of the committee’s
> Republicans, in contrast to the deference they’d shown Mullen and Defense
> Secretary Robert Gates in a morning session on the Pentagon’s budget,
> where the Republicans declared the men two of the nation’s finest public
> servants.
> 
> Sen. John McCain of Arizona spelled out his objections to repealing the
> law, calling the current policy imperfect but effective, despite having
> said four years ago that he’d defer to the wishes of military leaders on
> the matter.
> 
> Sen. Jeff Sessions of Alabama pointedly reminded Mullen that Congress, not
> the chairman, will decide if the law should be changed.
> 
> “I don’t think they are required to lie about who they are. I think that
> is an overstatement,” Sessions told Mullen. “You shouldn’t use your power
> to influence a discussion.”
> 
> “This is about leadership, and I take that very, very seriously,” Mullen
> responded.
> 
> Defense Secretary Robert Gates told the hearing that he thinks it’s a
> matter of when, not if, the law will be repealed. Gates said he’d ordered
> a 45-day review of the regulations used to implement the current law in an
> effort to find a “fairer way to enforce it.”
> 
> He also said he had asked the Pentagon’s chief legal adviser, Jeh Johnson,
> and the head of the U.S. Army in Europe, Gen. Carter Ham, to head a panel
> to study what steps would be necessary were the ban to be lifted. The
> study will take at least a year to complete.
> 
> “The mandate of this working group is to thoroughly, objectively and
> methodically examine all aspects of this question and produce its finding
> and recommendations in the form of an implementation plan by the end of
> this calendar year,” Gates said. “A guiding principle of our efforts will
> be to minimize disruption and polarization within the ranks, with special
> attention paid to those serving on the front lines.”
> 
> Mullen, who as chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff is the nation’s
> highest-ranking officer, said that he’d served with gay sailors and
> soldiers since 1968.
> 
> Mullen’s and Gates’ testimonies marked a watershed moment in the long
> debate over what the U.S. should do about the prohibition on openly gay
> service members, which has been part of U.S. military policy since 1950.
> 
> President Bill Clinton sought to eliminate the ban in 1993, but faced with
> opposition from both top military officers and Congress, instead issued
> the so-called “don’t ask, don’t tell” executive order that guides current
> enforcement.
> 
> Under that order, military officers aren’t supposed to inquire about
> service members’ sexual orientation or seek to know it, while service
> members themselves are to keep quiet about it.
> 
> The rule also requires officers to act if they learn that a subordinate is
> gay.
> 
> Since “don’t ask, don’t tell” went into effect, roughly 13,000 service
> members have left the military because of the rule.
> 
> Tuesday’s hearing was scheduled in response to President Barack Obama’s
> call during his State of the Union address last week for ending the ban.
> It was easily one of the most contentious hearings either Gates or Mullen
> have appeared at since they were appointed to their posts by Republican
> President George W. Bush.
> 
> As the hearing progressed, Gates’ face grew visibly taut as he listened to
> senator after senator admonish him and Mullen for contemplating a change
> in policy.
> 
> Saying he was “deeply disappointed” in the two men, McCain urged Mullen
> and Gates to “keep the impact it will have on our forces firmly in mind.”
> 
> Among the Republicans, only Sen. Susan Collins of Maine didn’t attack
> Mullen and Gates. Democrats were supportive of the repeal and stepped in
> to defend Mullen from the Republican assault.
> 
> “You don’t have to be straight to shoot straight,” Sen. Mark Udall,
> D-Colo., said after McCain spoke, quoting McCain’s predecessor, Republican
> Sen. Barry Goldwater, the Arizona conservative who famously reversed his
> opposition to gays in the military in the 1990s.
> 
> Despite Mullen’s support, it remains unclear how much of the military’s
> top brass favors repealing the ban.
> 
> Marine Corps Commandant Gen. James Conway has said he opposes ending
> “don’t ask, don’t tell."
> 
> -------------
> 
> Joint Chiefs Chairman Adm. Michael Mullen, right, accompanied by Defense
> Secretary Robert Gates, testifies Tuesday during a Senate Armed Services
> Committee hearing.
> 
> http://tinyurl.com/Admiral-Michael-Mullen
> 
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> 
> Seeya round town, Moscow.
> 
> Tom Hansen
> Moscow, Idaho
> 
> "Lesbian and gay people are a permanent part of the American workforce,
> who currently have no protection from the arbitrary abuse of their rights
> on the job. For too long, our nation has tolerated the insidious form of
> discrimination against this group of Americans, who have worked as hard as
> any group, paid their taxes like everyone else, and yet have been denied
> equal protection under the law."
> 
> - Coretta Scott King
> 
> 
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