The Supreme Court has decided not to hear a case challenging Don't Ask, Don't Tell, which according to TPM was in response to the Obama Administration's request. From Talking Points Memo:
The Supreme Court has turned down a challenge to the Pentagon policy forbidding gays and lesbians from serving openly in the military, granting a request by the Obama administration.The court said Monday that it will not hear an appeal from former Army Capt. James Pietrangelo II, who was dismissed under the military's "don't ask, don't tell" policy.
The federal appeals court in Boston earlier threw out a lawsuit filed by Pietrangelo and 11 other veterans. He was the only member of that group who asked the high court to rule that the Clinton-era policy is unconstitutional.
The AP has more details here.
The optimist in me hopes this is because the Obama Administration wants to handle the dismantling of Don't Ask Don't Tell legislatively through Congress. It was one of his campaign promises, but we have yet to see any movement on overturning the policy, or stalling the dismissals of people in the military based on this policy.
From HuffPo:
During last year's campaign, President Barack Obama indicated he supported the eventual repeal of the policy, but he has made no specific move to do so since taking office in January. Meanwhile, the White House has said it won't stop gays and lesbians from being dismissed from the military.
The Servicemember's Legal Defense Network has counted 238 discharges based on DADT since Obama was sworn in.
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I'm starting to think the Obama administration lacks balls.
Whoa. Associating the idea of metaphorical "guts" with having testicles = not cool.
"man up" "sack up" "grow a pair" "have the balls to..." all associate the general steadfast determination with being male.
Stephen Colbert calls them "Thatchers" for women (as in Margaret Thatcher).
LOL !
i dont think ive heard that one, but i love it!
Perhaps he's just trying to leave our servicemen and -women a way to go home voluntarily before he can get them out of Iraq and whatever other hellholes they're currently stuck in? I can see how DADT could be a "get out of jail free" card if you've become totally disillusioned with what you're doing...
I agree. Plus, in my opinion, the less people in the US army the better.
There are already fewer people in the army relative to the size of our overseas commitments. Which is why the burdens of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are being shared by a very small group of people with multiple extensions of their tours.
Until we lessen our commitments by 1.) avoiding unnecessary wars and 2.) building real coalitions for necessary wars and interventions, I'm not in favor of shrinking the army.
Of course, a dishonorable discharge looks pretty fuckin bad on a resume or job application.
I'm pretty sure it is an honorable discharge. Big fucking woop though, right?
Thing is, we all know the SCOTUS is very unfavorable right now. It is unfavorable for Roe and any other socially progressive issue. It is almost better that the Court denied certiorari, because this policy WILL be repealed legislatively. It will. Just like marriage equality will snowball through the states. We will see it, we will see it soon. We have to keep pushing.
So, not to be all sing-songy for Obamamania,but part of me wants to think that he petitioned for that very reason. Think how damaging it would be for the Court to take the issue under advisement and then uphold it. Because they would have upheld it, even though it is very much unconstitutional in my opinion, but they would have upheld it because it would have opened the door for finding same-sex marriage bans unconstitutional. It would have been huge precedent, and this stupid fucking Roberts court is not going to do that. They just aren't.
It will definitely not be an honorable. General, or other than honorable.
And, actually, it is a big fucking woop, especially for the less privileged. Almost all job applications ask about prior military service, and anything but an honorable discharge will immediately raise questions and/or get your application shredded.
The cases I have looked at challenging DADT all had honorable discharges...but I was saying big whoop sarcastically. We are on the same side here. I know it is a big fucking deal, I fight against this the same as you do. I gave a moot court oral argument on this very topic out at UCLA law school. I give a shit, don't worry.
The level of discharge for DADT is up to the commander (as are many things, like if you rape someone they can "decide" to give an administrative punishment).
A discharge id NOT automatic. Your commander can disregard an admission of being gay.
Also your discharge will state "Homosexuality", so any perspective employer will be able to see that should they look.
Women are disproportionately affected by DADT and within that number women of color are disproportionately affected. In the Army women are about 17% but make up almost 50% of discharges.
DADT also makes reporting sexual assault, something that happens to both men and women, harder because an investigation may end up revealing a persons sexuality.
I think it's generally an administrative discharge with a general or honorable characterization. However, they will list homosexual admission/conduct/DADT as reason for discharge. That means if a future employee wants to see the discharge form they just got outed. They would still get post-military benefits if characterization is honorable (I believe they get everything but G.I. Bill if characterization is general).
You don't sound cynical. =)
I'm just hoping... I can only be unequivocally outraged at so many things at once, and after all this Dr. Tiller business I'm about at my limit for the month. o.O
Still stuck in the "OBAMA CAN DO NO WRONG, CHANGE!!! CHANGE WE CAN BELIEVE IN!" mode, eh? As far as I'm concerned, this is him proving that he doesn't care half as much as he claimed to have during the campaign, proving that, yes, even Obama is still a politician.
Well, uh, I think we understand this. The policy was FIRST INSTITUTED under ANOTHER Democratic president, after all. Yes, the two major parties both suck ass about 75% of the time.
Just to put it out there, DADT was considered an improvement (but a severely flawed one) over existing policy 15 years ago.
But 15 years ago was also a different environment for gays and lesbians -- just look at the the number of states legalizing gay marriage in the past few months alone.
It's sort of the problem with compromise measures -- they're by their nature not everything you want them to be. And they often get locked in as official policy for far too long because people are afraid to tackle them again.
Right now, there is an overwhelming military argument for repealing/suspending DADT -- we're fighting two wars without enough soldiers and lowering our recruitment standards while at the same time booting out qualified soldiers, some of whom possess the language skills we desperately need??? It's madness.
While I'd like to see Obama take DADT head on as soon as possible, the part of me that understands political strategy realizes that this and other divisive social issues are not successful early issues for a presidency.
It seems that the Obama camp doesn't want to run headfirst into the gays-in-the-military issue and get sandbagged by conservatives like Bill Clinton did shortly after taking office, thus undermining reforms in economics and health care. I expect Obama to attempt to revoke DADT after the midterm elections in 2010.
Unfortunately, shrewd political prioritization means the delay of human rights for groups that have been waiting long enough...
I agree, especially because now a majority of Americans, including conservatives, oppose DADT:
http://www.gallup.com/poll/120764/Conservatives-Shift-Favor-Openly-Gay-Service-Members.aspx
The DADT policy is one I've just never been able to understand. WHAT IS THE POINT? I can't even see the normally backwards logic at work here.
http://books.google.com/books?id=iOAmL6JPCE0C&printsec=frontcover&dq=Conduct+Unbecoming&ei=FrgtSvKeEp-GzQS11OChBw#PPR9,M1
The point used to placate is that it is way superior to pre-DADT policy. Prior to the legislation, the military could literally conduct witch hunts as well as ask people if they had any homo or bi sexual tendecies. If they lied and were found out, not only could they receive a dishonorable but possibly even jail time. Also, the Don't Ask part is crucial b/c military investigators could harshly interrogate people, threaten to out and jail them, and other things if they didn't produce a list of other LGBs, which resulted in a lot of false accusations and a snowball effect (people named would name names and so on).
But yeah, it's another patetic exampe of how when some people use terms like pragmatism and compromise they really mean selling out.
Also, I would like some help with one aspect. The military was desegregated through executive order. Why not refuse to sign the bill and issue an executive order overriding military policy? Is there something I'm missing on how EOs work? I don't think they had enough support to override a veto.
Then again, Clinton didn't exactly fight tooth and nail. Even when he could have addressed it at the end of his second term. I think when it comes to military support Obama views hisself with even less capital to spend. Even if a majority of servicemembers are okay with it (which some polls suggest and a cadet at West Point getting an award for the paper he wrote on why LGB exclusion is wrong) as long as the top brass is vehemently against, I doubt he'll risk having to explain why he is going against the wishes of Generals.
I think this excerpt from the Washington Post article (http://tinyurl.com/ml4mup) makes a good point:
"The court thus spared the administration from having to defend in court a policy that the president eventually wants to abolish pending a review by the Pentagon."
It would be very bad for Obama's plan to abolish the DADT policy for his administration to have to defend it in court, and even worse if SCOTUS were to uphold the current policy.
I understand that it might be poor political strategy to try to tackle this issue now, seeing as though it would distract people in a negative way from other things Obama is working on at the moment, like health care reform, but the fact that the white house says it will not stand up for those being dismissed from the military under DADT still makes me EXTREMELY angry.
I can't imagine why the military as an entity would even care about someone's sexuality. I can't imagine how the gender a person is attracted to effects their ability to fight, command, and perform other military duties. It seems to me that DADT is bad for the military too, in that is cuts their number of good soldiers, and makes those gays and lesbians who stay in the closet uncomfortable, which can't be good for their performance.
If the military didn't get most of its funding from the religious right wing, I think the military itself would oppose this policy.
The Spartan army actively encouraged homosexuality because they believed that you would fight harder if you loved the man fighting beside you.
Disclaimer: knowledge based on Year 9 history lesson.
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Off the topic a bit, Sparta is an extremely interesting society the men and women were kept separate after the age of 9, before then they were treated essentially equally. Afterward the men were taught to fight, the women ran everything else with a large degree of autonomy, except for the government which was run by soldiers who had reached a retiring age (no mean feat in Sparta). Thereafter men and women were only brought together to procreate. Note: I'm not claiming this as a good model, I just find it interesting. Sorry for getting off topic.
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This pisses me off. And is yet another reminder why it's important to have MORE than just straight white men on the Supreme Court. I find it just crap that they won't even hear it.
It has nothing to do with the straight white men in the Supreme Court and everything to do with the straight biracial man in the White House.
Obama asked them specifically not to field the case. He's a shrewd political operator, we all knew this, and that can be both a good and a bad thing. That's the problem with double-edged swords, folk, they cut both ways.
To follow up on what I posted earlier, thee is now this http://www.palmcenter.org/press/dadt/releases/New+Study+Says+Obama+Can+Halt+Gay+Discharges+With+Executive+Order
which was carried out by military law experts stating that it can be overturned by executive order (which would open the way for an EO allowing LGB to openly serve).
Also, the whole way to get out of the armed forces isn't that sound an argument. Not only does it hurt those LGB who want to serve and do so openly (not have to lie, hide their partners), if the military thinks you are doing it to avoid duty they won't let you that easily (if at all, commanders have a lot of discretion).
The optimist in you thinks that the Supreme Court rejects cases based on the president's legislative timetable?
That's funny, I was under the impression that the judiciary was a separate branch of government and not answerable to the president.