Gen. Pace, you can take a big step to begin to make up for your insensitive remarks about gays by doing the practical thing: Resupply our armed forces with the Arabic/Farsi linguists it desperately needs -- including decorated sergeant Bleu Copas, who volunteered out of patriotism after 9/11 and who was fired despite having the indispensible task of "helping translate intercepted messages from possible terrorists." First, from Keith Olbermann's Countdown newsletter today:
Senior aides to the chairman of the military Joint Chiefs of Staff said Tuesday that Marine Gen. Peter Pace won't apologize for calling homosexuality immoral - an opinion that gay advocacy groups deplored. "General Pace's comments are outrageous, insensitive and disrespectful to the 65,000 lesbian and gay troops now serving in our armed forces," the advocacy group Servicemembers Legal Defense Network said in a statement on its Web site. (MSNBC)
The U.S. Embassy in Baghdad has only six (6) fluent Arabic speakers out of 33 who speak Arabic.
Yet, despite the Bush administration's lip-service to a need for more Arabic speakers, the U.S. military has fired over two dozen linguists for being gay: 20 were Arabic linguists, 6 were Farsi linquists.
From The Carpetbagger Report's "Actually, Bush can ’snap his fingers’ and get Arabic speakers":
... Bleu Copas, a decorated sergeant and Arabic language specialist was thrown out of the military under the “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy. Copas, who joined the Army after the 9/11 attacks out of a sense of duty, was responsible for helping translate intercepted messages from possible terrorists, but he was thrown out anyway.
The Daily Show’s Jason Jones sat down with Paul Cameron, one of the nation’s leading anti-gay activists, said, “I think the country, on the aggregate, is safer without Bleu in the military.” Asked why, Cameron explained, “Guys don’t want to think about other guys, other fellas, ogling them in the shower or whatever.”
Jones responded, “I know I’d rather die in a terrorist attack than suffer through an uncomfortable shower with a gay.” Cameron grudgingly responded, “Yes.”
Condi got put in the "hot seat" by Congressman Gary Ackerman in February, reports CactusPat's blog at Democrats.com. From "Will Condi Rice Hire A Platoon of Lesbians?":
... Last week Rep. Gary Ackerman (D-NY) sliced and diced the Pentagon's "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy by suggesting Condoliar Rice hire the gay linguists dismissed by the Pentagon during a congressional hearing on the '08 State Dept. budget. Ackerman said. "...For some reason, the military seems more afraid of gay people than they are against terrorists, but they're very brave with the terrorists.... If the terrorists ever got a hold of this information, they'd get a platoon of lesbians to chase us out of Baghdad...."
[...]
Rice Pressed On Fired Gay Linguists
by 365Gay.com Newscenter Staff
Posted: February 7, 2007 - 5:00 pm ET
(Washington) Condoleezza Rice got a grilling Wednesday when she bemoaned "the foreign language deficit that we have" and how much the government needs Farsi and Arabic speakers during an appearance on Capitol Hill.
Rice was appearing before the House Foreign Affairs Committee justifying the State Department's proposed budget increases.
After she complained several times that the department was facing a problem finding translators an exasperated Rep. Gary Ackerman (D-NY) asked why the department had not hired any of the translators fired by the Pentagon because they are gay and lesbian. ...
Last December, I wrote about the lack of Arab speakers in the F.B.I.:
You may have seen NBC correspondent Lisa Myer's special report on the lack of knowledge within the FBI about terrorism and terrorists -- essentially, "ignorance of the enemy." For example, John Lewis, until recently the FBI’s deputy assistant director of counterterrorism, didn't know the difference between Shiites and Sunnis, or that there was "any relationship between the first World Trade Center bombing and the 9/11 attacks." Myers' report also reveals that "only 33 of the FBI’s 12,000 agents have even a limited proficiency in Arabic."
The only conclusion? The Bush administration simply isn't serious about catching terrorists.
The only thing they're serious about is appeasing their fundy 'winger cronies.