Sam Harris

stupid!

Lt. Dan Choi of the New York National Guard is an Iraq War veteran and a West Point graduate. He also happens to speak fluent Arabic. Choi received a letter of discharge from the Army for “homosexual conduct.”

Obama is reniging has reniged on his campaign pledge to end “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell”.

The report said that Obama is not moving at lightning speed. Has he actually officially reneged? If he follows through, perhaps people like Lt. Choi can be reinstated with back pay, and receive an official apology from the military. Wouldn’t that be something? Or give reparations if takes too long. Get all those whacky chaplains out, not gays.

goodgraydrab - 09 May 2009 12:19 AM

The report said that Obama is not moving at lightning speed. Has he actually officially reneged? If he follows through, perhaps people like Lt. Choi can be reinstated with back pay, and receive an official apology from the military. Wouldn’t that be something? Or give reparations if takes too long. Get all those whacky chaplains out, not gays.

(Andrew):  So far as I know, since the campaign, Obama’s only paid lip service (via Robert Gibbs) to repeal of DADT.  In fact Sec Gates is now talking “if”, not “when”, DADT is repealed.
The fact is that Obama could stop the discharges right now, with the stroke of his pen, pending a review of the policy.  But he’s chosing instead to put soldier’s lives at risk by reducing the number of badly needed linguists and interpreters. 
All because of which gender turns them on.
That’s stupid, I think.

Funny thing about military chaplains.  When I was in the Army, the chaplain’s office was the “go-to” place for gay servicemen to find out the safe places to hang out in town.  Almost every chaplain’s asst that I knew was gay.
I guess things are different nowadays. 

John Aravosis has some concerns, too:

President Obama wrote a handwritten note to a US service member recently discharged for being gay. In the note, Obama said that he remains “committed to changing our current policy.” Sounds nice. Putting aside the fact that letters are nice, but actions are better, notice that Obama didn’t say he remains committed to “repealing” the Don’t Ask Don’t Tell Policy - a word he always used before. Now he’s for “changing” it.

Has a reason been given for Obama’s change of heart? 

I’ll go out on a limb and speculate he is reacting to poll numbers.  Also, compared to the problems on his desk this is pretty small potatoes, but, off course, it’s the easiest to fix.  Clearly he doesn’t think it’s worth it.

Skipshot - 13 May 2009 05:55 AM

Clearly he doesn’t think it’s worth it.

(Andrew):  There ya go!

Skipshot - 13 May 2009 05:55 AM

Has a reason been given for Obama’s change of heart? 

I’ll go out on a limb and speculate he is reacting to poll numbers.  Also, compared to the problems on his desk this is pretty small potatoes, but, off course, it’s the easiest to fix.  Clearly he doesn’t think it’s worth it.

It’s possible that he feels he needs to “lay the groundwork” politically.  Yes, he could do it right away—it’s within his power—but what would the backlash be?  If all he did was create a culture of resentment in the military and a groundswell of reactionary opposition in the electorate, then the policy doesn’t outlast his Administration.

Don’t forget, Obama models himself after Lincoln.  And Lincoln was very shrewd about giving the public time to move in a certain direction so that he could appear to be, to some degree, going with the flow rather than brashly ignoring the public will.

Now, this is optimistic, hopeful bigredfutbol talking.  The more cynical Me worries that he’s just paying lipservice to a marginalized group.  We shall see.  But my optimistic scenario does have the virtue of following in the footsteps of his political idol.