DADT

The Keen News Service and Servicemembers Legal Defense Network have coverage of today's Congressional hearing on the implementation of the "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" repeal that's really worth checking out. In short, "the military's repeal of its longstanding 'don’t ask, don’t tell' policy is not facing resistance from troops and is on track to take full effect this fall as planned."

But Vicky Hartzler, who sits on the Military Personnel Subcommittee of the House Armed Services Committee, wasn't all that interested in facts, the insight from experts who testified before the subcommittee and the clear opinion of actual service members.  She just finds the whole idea of repealing DADT icky. 

According to tweets from the Servicemembers Legal Defense Network, Hartzler was "obsessed" with talking about why shower facilities are segregated by gender, but not by sexual orientation.  And Hartzler told the committee she believes 10% of the military will leave because of the decision to repeal DADT.

UPDATE: Here's video from ThinkProgress: 

Feel the hate

Rep. Vicky Hartlzer isn't sure that reinstating a discriminatory, unnecessary and unpopular "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy is enough to fully capture her disgust with gay, lesbian, or bisexual service members.  Beyond just reinstating the military's "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" rules, she'd also like the Pentagon to think about an "Ask, Separate Housing" plan.

After a 10-month Pentagon study found more than two-thirds of service members do not object to serving alongside openly gay soldiers, President Obama signed a defense bill that included ending the practice of expelling gay service members.

Hartzler - whose 4th Congressional District includes Whiteman Air Force Base and the Army's Fort Leonard Wood - told Fitzpatrick she and other Republicans oppose the change.

"I can tell you people on the committee, who are my side of the aisle, think it's very ill-advised and do not support that," Hartzler said, and are "pushing back."

Hartzler said that during a hearing with military brass she asked why, because separate housing exists for male and female troops, gays are not housed separately, too. She said a general, she did not know which, responded first with a gurgling-type noise before answering, "We're recruiting professionals."'

Hartzler's description led some in the crowd to laugh.

"So we have some work to do there," she said. "We're going to keep advancing the cause."

Laughter may not be the appropriate response here.  Unless it's one of those awkward, nervous laughs that comes when someone asks you if you're embarrassed by the person who represents you and your community in Washington.

Rep. Todd Akin continues to impress. Yesterday of Fox News, Akin shared his rather fascinating understanding of the existing DADT policy.

If people are gay, they can serve in the military now. It's just that they can't allow their gayness to get in the way of getting the mission done.

Um, no.  But watch the whole interview and judge for yourself.

Note that Akin completely misrepresents the results of the Pentagon's study, and makes the serious charge that the Defense Department "doctored around" with their data that jeopardizes human lives in the service of a "social statement." 

Crazy Ed Martin emailed supporters this morning to complain about a number of federal issues, including this weekend's bipartisan Senate vote to end the discriminatory "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy.  Martin, as you might have guessed, opposes the move. What you may not have known is that Martin has his pulse on the LGBT community.  Here is his brilliant defense of continued discrimination:

Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell was a reasonable compromise policy in which the military has been directed to not “hunt” homosexuals and those who were gay have been asked to keep their private lives private. I believe the overwhelming majority of servicemen and women who are gay accept that the mission is more important than their personal life and are satisfied by the bargain. Over 80% of honorable discharges under DADT have been initiated by a service member breaking their part of the agreement by making their sexual orientation a matter of unit discipline.

Senator McCaskill and Congressman Carnahan may have secured for themselves the accolades of the left by ignoring the concerns of our combat troops but they have introduced a potentially disruptive variable into the volatile mix of a military in a protracted war.  I hope my grave concerns are never realized, but I fear the self-righteous indulgence of these thoughtelss [sic] leftists will have awful consequences.

Yowsa.

Tweeted this morning by Congresswoman-elect Vicky Hartzler:

Never mind that 77% of Americans think members of the military should be able to serve open and honestly, that more than 70% of respondents in the Pentagon's study on DADT said that repealing the discriminatory policy would have "positive, mixed or nonexistent" effects, or that the Pentagon says that ending the policy will "not harm long-term military effectiveness."

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Also check out St. Louis Activist Hub's coverage of Ed Martin's spasm of homophobia this weekend. 

Yesterday, 65 senators -- including 8 Republicans -- cast a huge vote to end the nation's discriminatory "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy. Sen. Claire McCaskill voted for equality, and Sen Kit Bond voted against.  President Obama is expected to sign the legislation next week, and then:

the Pentagon, the Joint Chiefs of Staff and Obama must work out an implementation plan and officially certify that the military is ready to allow its gay and lesbian servicemembers to come out of the closet. Sixty days after that, DADT is "officially" repealed. Such is the language of the bill the Senate passed today and the House passed earlier in the week.

But repeal could effectively be in place far earlier than that. Following the cloture vote today, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid called on the Pentagon to suspend all DADT discharges and investigationsimmediately, something gay rights advocates say Defense Secretary Robert Gates can order whenever he wants.

The U.S. House of Representatives voted 270-175 this afternoon to repeal the federal "don't ask, don't tell" policy barring openly gay and lesbian soldiers from the military.  Representatives Russ Carnahan, Lacy Clay and Emanuel Cleaver all voted for repeal.  Representatives Todd Akin, Roy Blunt, Jo Ann Emerson, Sam Graves, Blaine Luetkemeyer, and Ike Skelton voted against repeal.  The full roll call vote is here.

Nearly 80% of Americans support repeal. It's time. 

Tomorrow, the Pentagon is expected to release the results of its service member survey regarding the repeal of the federal "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy.  Early reports from sources familiar with the findings say that "more than 70 percent of respondents" said that repealing DADT would have "positive, mixed or nonexistent" effects.  

And today, a Pew survey finds that 58% of Americans want gays to be able to serve openly in the armed forces, while only 27% oppose. 

In anticipation of tomorrow's report, here's a great cartoon from Nick Anderson via the Center for American Progress.

This ad from the Palm Center calling for the repeal of the federal "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy is apparently too much for Fox News' delicate audience to handle. 

What if the commercial just read from a new CNN poll showing that 72% of Americans think people should be able to serve openly?  Would that also get turned down by the freedom lovers at Fox? 

One more post about Sunday night's debate between Ed Martin, Russ Carnahan and Nick Ivanovich.  The candidates were asked to share their stances on the military's "Don't Ask, Don't Tell Policies."  As you can see in this video from Hotflash at Show Me Progress, Carnahan lays out a clear response to why he supports repealing DADT. 

And then, as you'll see, Martin stands up and reveals his true character:

Picking up at the 0:48 mark in the clip:

MARTIN: I'm here for you.  Translation: Congressman Carnahan supports gay marriage.  He doesn't care what Missourians think, or what their positions are.  That's what he thinks.  So, let me ... [audience grumbles]

MODERATOR: [Inaudible] What's your position on what's [inaudible]?

MARTIN: I'm getting there, I'm getting there. So, I'm sure you're going to stop the time right, so we can answer?  The fact is, this is social engineering by Nancy Pelosi and the far left who wanna do something that hasn't been done in our military. That is, allow the social engineers to go in an decide how people are supposed to function....

Classy stuff!  And not true. Most Americans support allowing gay men and women to serve openly.  Repealing DADT is not "social engineering by Nancy Pelosi and the far left" 

Show Me No Hate posted on Martin's cynical switcheroo on Wednesday. 

Politico: "Senate Democrats fail[ed] to break a Republican filibuster of a defense authorization bill that also would have allowed the repeal of the military’s “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy, which prohibits openly gay men and women from serving in the armed forces. The bill was defeated on a largely party-line vote, 56-43, as Democrats failed to find a single GOP senator to agree to open debate on the bill. The filibuster ends what gay rights advocates had believed was their best hope of nixing the 17-year-old policy. "

Sen. Kit Bond voted to sustain the filibuster.  Sen. Claire McCaskill voted to end the filibuster and move the bill forward.

Via the Pitch, here's some quality video of McCaskill questioning Admiral Mike Mullen about the current policy.

Politico's Ben Smith:

A Federal Judge in California has ruled that the ban on gays in the military violates the Constitutional rights of gay and lesbian soldiers to due process and to freedom of expression.

District Court Judge Virginia Phillips -- a Clinton appointee -- also wrote that the policy has had a "deleterious effect" on the military and issued an injunction restraining the military from enforcing the policy, though the government may appeal.

The Log Cabin Republicans filed the lawsuit against Defense Secretary Robert Gates, and Phillips cited in her ruling the Obama administration's desultory defense.

"[D]efendants called no witnesses, put on no affirmative case, and only entered into evidence the legislative history of the act," she wrote.

The full decision is here.

In responses provided yesterday to the Southeast Missourian and Beacon, Rep. Jo Ann Emerson refused to apologize for her demonstrably false and insulting claim that Tommy Sowers "never commanded anybody."

Instead, she came back with new accusations that Sowers is somehow trying to "cloud" the debate on the federal "Don't Ask, Don't Tell policy.  Wrong answer.

Look, the facts are pretty simple:

• Emerson made a demonstrably false statement about Sowers' service record
• Confronted about her statement, Emerson refused to apologize. 

The whole point of saying that a person "never commanded anybody, [so] he might have a different perspective" on repealing DADT is to suggest that Sowers doesn't really have any expertise and wisdom on military issues.  He "never commanded anybody," so what does he know? Emerson's reply that "she wasn't disparaging anybody" isn't convincing.

Instead of apologizing, Emerson chose to accuse Sowers of a "cynical attempt to divert attention from a position he has suddenly discovered is out-of-step" with the district. This is just dumb. There is no evidence that Sowers is waffling on his position in any way.

Who knew?  Watch Todd Akin freak out about an upcoming vote on the military's "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy here. 

Repealing DADT would "betray" his children Akin says, embarrass George Washington, and is only being considered to "tickle the fancies of a very vocal but very small minority for political purposes."

The 73% of Iraq and Afghanistan military veterans, 70% of all Americans and 60% of Republicans who support a policy change may be surprised to learn that they consistute a "very small minority" of the American public.

State Sen. Bill Stouffer explains in the News-Leader today that people who think that citizens should be able to serve openly and honestly in the armed forces "do not understand the mission of our military." 

Obviously, Stouffer knows more about the military than you, me, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff or the Secretary of Defense.  I mean, the guy has pictures of airplanes on website and a B-2 bomber lapel pin!  He knows!

As you may know, the Servicemembers Legal Defense Network (SLDN) launched a new “Stories from the Frontlines" project last week to pressure the White House and Congress to end the federal 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell' (DADT) policy.  The campaign is intended to ramp up pressure before President Obama issues his defense budget recommendations this year, and before the Defense Authorization bill is debated in Congress. 

The organization is releasing a personal letter every day challenging the current policy.  Today's story comes from Clifton Truman Daniel, grandson of President Harry Truman. 

Servicemembers Legal Defense Network (SLDN) launched a new “Stories from the Frontlines" project yesterday as part of their larger effort to pressure the White House and Congress to end the federal 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell' (DADT) policy.  The campaign is intended to ramp up pressure before President Obama issues his defense budget recommendations this year, and before the Defense Authorization bill is debated in Congress. 

Every day this week, the organization will release an open letter at www.sldn.org/letters from a person impacted by the existing discriminatory policy. 

Today's letter is from Captain Joan Darrah, USN (Ret.), yesterday's was from Former Air Force Major Mike Almy.  Darrah writes:

Dear Mr. President,

My name is Joan Darrah and I served in silence under “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” (DADT) for almost two decades.  I share my personal story with you as we’re at a critical point in the fight to repeal this discriminatory law.

More brilliant logic from Sen. Gary Nodler (R-Joplin), posted yesterday at The Fuse Joplin:

Responding to the fact that many of our allies, like Great Britain, allow homosexuals to serve openly, Nodler says, "The fact is, in Iraq, and for a period of time in Afghanistan, that happens to be the force that has the highest casualty rate." Continuing, "I can’t say with any certainty that I have any proof that that’s because there’s less comfort from the Iraqis and Afghanis in dealing with those forces, but it might be.

“I believe the highest casualty rate in any of the allied forces has in fact been Great Britain,” Nodler concluded, implying some sort of correlation with casualties and the allowance of homosexuals to serve in the military openly.

New data out today: 

A solid majority of Americans say gays should be allowed to openly serve in the military, and an even higher percentage believe that the "Don't ask, don't tell" policy in effect since 1993 amounts to discrimination, according to a Quinnipiac University poll conducted Feb. 2-8.