Crossposted at Blogging For Michigan.

Last week the House Armed Services Committee had a hearing on the military's policy of don't ask, don't tell.  As you know, it's the policy that says that if the military finds out that you're gay, you will be dishonorably discharged.

I'm going to let the homophobes that still support this outdated policy in on a little secret, a secret so shocking that when revealed, America is going to have to remove the policy because they'll see how incredibly stupid it is.

You guys ready?  You want to know the secret?  Go below the fold to find out.

Look, okay, I am fully up front about the fact that I am wholly biased when it comes to freshman Rep. Patrick Murphy (PA-8). I'm proud to call him a friend, but if possible, even prouder today.

For the first time since the policy was implemented in 1993, the House Armed Services Military Personnel Subcommittee held a hearing today to review the disgraceful "Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell" policy which prevents GLBT Americans from serving openly in our armed forces.  One of the witnesses was Elaine Donnelly, President of the "Center for Military Readiness," who Pam Spaulding has properly identified as someone who "has never served in the military, and admits she has no qualifications or expertise on sexuality."

And after her inane testimony, Congress' only Iraq veteran was ready:

Let's remember the facts:

• Nearly 800 specialists with critical skills have been fired from the military under DADT, including several linguists who speak Arabic.
• U.S. taxpayers have paid $250 million to investigate and root out patriotic servicemen and women under DADT and as much as $1.2 billion in lost recruiting and training costs.
• More than two-thirds of civilians support allowing gays to serve openly in the military. And despite the fear-mongering about unit morale, nearly 3 in 4 troops say they are personally comfortable serving side-by-side with gays and lesbians.

More on today's hearing here.  DADT must end. Period.  Full stop.

USAToday reports:

Democrats in Congress hope to ignite a drive to reverse the military's "don't ask, don't tell" policy Wednesday with the first hearing on the subject since 1993, when President Clinton said gays could serve in uniform if they kept quiet about their sexual orientation.

Without this hearing, said former Joint Chiefs of Staff chairman John Shalikashvili, "you will never repeal the law. It's a great idea." He is among more than 50 retired generals and admirals who have said it is time to rethink the policy.

Solid thinking by General Shalikashvili. That seems to me to be exactly right. That is, that Democratic Members of Congress need to be thinking ahead now about exactly how they propose to manage drinking from the firehose of needed reforms and repairs coming after Liberation Day in January of next year.

But it's not just the Bush-bots who are to blame for the fact that there hasn't even been a hearing on the subject for 15 years:

Democrats on the House Armed Services Committee tried to have a hearing on the policy in April 2007, but opposition from conservatives in their party sank the idea.

More and better, people. More and better.

The conditions are right for revisiting this issue:

[T]he volunteer armed forces struggle to retain troops to fight two wars. Changing attitudes are seen in polls such as one by The Washington Post, published Saturday, showing that 75% favor allowing gays to serve openly, up from 44% in 1993.

The presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, Barack Obama, has said that if elected, he would work to repeal the bar on open service — and the "don't ask" compromise designed to work around it. His Republican rival, John McCain, wants no change.

"At a time when the military is relaxing every possible standard to attract new recruits, and at the same time is losing mission-critical specialists such as Arabic linguists, medical professionals and others, one would hope and expect that Defense Department leaders would be first in line to call on Congress to repeal the law," says Steve Ralls of Parents, Families and Friends of Lesbians and Gays.

They're not, of course. Because active duty military personnel generally feel restrained from challenging policy.

But the numbers tell the hidden part of the story:

The military has booted 12,500 servicemembers under "don't ask, don't tell." Annual discharges peaked at 1,273 in 2001. Discharges have declined sharply since the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. The Pentagon discharged 627 servicemembers last year.

"Don't ask, don't tell" is just one of many legislative fixes needed, of course. Kudos to Military Personnel Subcommittee chair Susan Davis (D-CA) for holding the hearing, and to Ellen Tauscher (D-CA), who's been beaten up plenty around these parts before, for sponsoring the bill designed to enact the repeal.

Hopefully an early success -- meaning that it comes shortly after the current maniac is finally purged from the White House -- will embolden Democrats in the 111th Congress to move quickly on repeals promised more recently, such as that of the Military Commissions Act and the recent FISA disaster.

This guest diary came to us at The Bilerico Project from Minnesota Congressional candidate Ashwin Madia. He wanted to share with us his experiences fighting against discrimination in the military and ask for the blogosphere's help in his competitive race to take a Republican's seat. More info below the fold.

I am a Marine Corps veteran, an Iraq war veteran and the Democratic candidate for Congress in Minnesota's Third District, so I hear a lot about patriotism these days. But real patriotism sometimes means taking on the system if you know what you're doing is the right thing. As a Marine Corps lawyer, I was one of the first attorneys to successfully defend a gay Marine from discrimination by the military.  

Who knew?

Congress should repeal the "don't ask, don't tell" law because the presence of gays in the military is unlikely to undermine the ability to fight and win, according to a new study released by a California-based research center.

Of course since the study was based in California (where San Francisco is located), and given that certain panel members did endorse two Democrats in the past 12 years, the results must be taken with a grain of salt. Because after all, retired Lt. Col. Robert McGinnis, who by the way was one of the Pentagon analysts who helped sell the war in Iraq, does say that having gay people "in a close combat environment...results in a lack of trust." And when it comes to a complete lack of trust, what better source is there than Lt. Col. McGinnis?

One final note: to those who think that this study is some sort of vindication for the disgust you've felt over the military's "don't ask, don't tell" policy, please, take a step back and realize that our first concern must be our nation's security

Gay Rights: The Time is Now

... A Message From the Self-Appointed Straight Ambassador to Gaytown =)

On February 12th Lawrence King, 15, was fatally shot by fellow student Brandon McInerney at school.  Why?  Lawrence asked to Brandon to be his valentine.  The incident went virtually unacknowledged by the MSM.  Even the supposedly liberal-biased New York Times gave the incident a one line mention the day he died—Valentine’s Day—and didn’t specify that it was a hate crime.  

The horrible underlying message here is that hate crimes are not a big deal because the gay people are inferior.  If a kid was killed in America for being straight there would be an absolute uproar and Rush Limbaugh would be on the radio screaming ‘straight crime’ before he could put down his bottle of OxyContin.  

Whether motivated by a desire to be considered for the Vice Presidency or not, this is quite significant:

Chief Congressional Architect of Military's Gay Ban Ends Opposition to Openly Gay Service

Former Senator Sam Nunn told reporters today that "times change" and it is now time to reconsider the ban on openly gay service that he spearheaded as Chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee in 1993. When "fifteen years go by on any personnel policy," he said, "it's appropriate to take another look at it - see how it's working, ask the hard questions, hear from the military." Nunn said the starting point for review should be a "Pentagon study."

Nunn's comments come as his name is circulated as a possible vice presidential pick for Senator Barack Obama, the likely Democratic candidate for the White House. They also come three days after the death of Nunn's friend, Charles Moskos, the renowned military sociologist who was the chief intellectual powerhouse behind "don't ask, don't tell."

Via the Chicago Tribune

The military cannot automatically discharge people because they're gay, a federal appeals court ruled Wednesday in the case of a decorated flight nurse who sued the Air Force over her dismissal.

The three judges from the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals did not strike down the military's "don't ask, don't tell" policy. But they reinstated Maj. Margaret Witt's lawsuit, saying the Air Force must prove that her dismissal furthered the military's goals of troop readiness and unit cohesion.

It's not over for the ban on gays in the military, but its days are, as the article says, probably numbered. More on why below the cut.

As many parents of HS students find out, their children begin receiving mail from various colleges after they take PSAT's and SAT's in Junior year.

Those that do relatively well are deluged with material from various colleges looking to improve the quality of their incoming freshmen.

My oldest is a junior this year.  Pretty smart kid.  Exceptional language skills. No shortcomings academically, an involved and accomplished student, a 'leader' in many ways.

He received a letter from the Department of the Navy today - the Office of Admissions, United States Naval Academy.  It was an invitation to attend an Admissions information forum.  The accompanying flyer touted a $350,000 college 'scholarship'.

more below

I have fought hard all my life for equal rights for gay Americans. So before I support a candidate, I always do a thorough investigation of their views, positions and actions on GLBT rights.  If a candidate doesn't pass my vetting on gay issues, he or she will never get my support. In doing research on Barack Obama, I learned that he has a long, strong and clear record of supporting GLBT rights, which I recently documented in some detail here.  Hillary Clinton's legacy on gay rights, however, is much murkier.

Every night from here on out to the General Election, I will write an Obama Evening News & Roundup. Throughout this election cycle, the media is doing what it does best -- sensationalizing stories that have nothing to do with how they will govern. And the media reports a whole pack of lies about Obama:

Obama's gonna be the nominee.

There is a sweetness in that beyond words. There is the solidifcation of the "vague nimbus of hope."

I hope he does not throw LGBT Americans under the bus.

When I decided to run for Congress as an openly gay man, I realized that what I was doing was groundbreaking. No non-incumbent, gay man has ever been elected to an open seat in Congress. Rep. Tammy Baldwin is the only openly lesbian woman to be elected to US Congress!

Unfortunately, the first homophobic attack occurred yesterday from a group closely- associated with my opponent Joan Fitz-Gerald’s campaign. Fitz-Gerald supporter Jim Hudson, quoted in a Fitz-Gerald campaign press release and identified on Joan Fitz-Gerald’s website as Vice-President of Colorado Veterans for America. His statement in today’s issue of the Denver Post questioned why I never served in the US military:

"He says, that he has to ‘tell’ that he’s gay," Hudson said.
"I can tell you, when I served in Vietnam, I served with many
gays, and was honored to do so. And they didn’t feel compelled
to make an issue of their orientation, because, I presume, that
they thought it was more important that they serve their country."

There have been a number of diaries here recently on the issue of gay rights and the top three Democratic candidates' respective stances on that issue. (Obama has probably gotten more of the attention in the diaries, though both of the other two get plenty in the comments.)

One of the refrains I've seen over and over in these diaries is that Obama is allegedly head and shoulders above the rest. I've been told that, as a gay man, I should vote for Obama because he's done more than any other Democrat in the field for gays and lesbians, he's the most liberal/progressive on the issue, and because he'll do far more than either Clinton or Edwards will.

Sadly, those assertions are not borne out by the facts of the matter. Follow me below the fold for an explanation of why all three of the frontrunners are more or less equally bad when it comes to gay rights.

Well, fuck this fucking shit.

They had a Democratic debate in Las Vegas tonight (but Brian Williams thought he was in Los Angeles--for this he gets millions and millions of dollars).

So not only did the three candidates NEVER utter the words gay or lesbian at any time (much less bisexual or transgender), they discussed the law forcing colleges and universities to permit military recruiters and ROTC without EVER mentioning Don't Ask Don't Tell.

What a fucking crock of shit.

More shit after the break....

(Originally published in Bay Windows, January 10, 2008, and crossposted at Mombian.)

Impact of 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell' hits children of LGBT servicemembers
Iraq War vet tells of struggles to raise two sons while closeted

Five-year-old William and three-year-old Ryan are the children of decorated U.S. Army officer Cheryl Parker. Like other children of service members, they have dealt with cross-country moves and months without their mother while she was deployed in Iraq. Unlike the others, however, they must forgo many benefits, conveniences and support services offered to military families, or risk revealing that they have another mother, Donna Lewis. This could lead to Parker's dismissal under the military's "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy, even in LGBT-friendly Massachusetts. (Note: Names and identifying details have been changed to protect the family.)

A few days ago, 60 Minutes' Lesley Stahl interviewed Army Sgt. Darren Manzella, an openly gay soldier who should have been discharged under the military's "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy, but wasn't.

Sheesh, what a moron!  I knew eleven years ago that the official policy on gays in the military was several brain cells short of a good idea.  I should have written something back then, as perhaps it might have had some effect!  Now I'm hoping there's nothing like heaping scorn and ridicule, laced with good humor, to help end that knuckle-headed policy.  

Oh, well.  Better late than never.

My 10-minute stage comedy, "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" was just selected (among 200+ submissions) for one of seven productions at the internationally recognized ShowOff! playwriting festival in San Juan Capistrano, CA, at The El Camino Playhouse.  There will be seven performances on weekends in January.

I find it no mere coincidence that the final play selections were made on or about the widely reported 11th anniversary of our D.A.D.T. policy.  Right place at the right time, I guess.

Those of my fellow Kossacks, straight or gay, who live in the area should check it out HERE.

Hmmm ... I wonder if they ever stage any plays in the White House....?

Let the scorn and ridicule continue.