By TVC Executive Director Andrea Lafferty
February 3, 2010 – Yesterday's Senate Armed Services Committee hearing on the "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" (DADT) policy on gays and lesbians in the military was a pro-homosexual love fest among most of the Senators and the two panelists who spoke.
Department of Defense Secretary Robert Gates and Joint Chief of Staff Chairman Admiral Mike Mullen both expressed their wholehearted support for permitting gays and lesbians to openly serve in the military.
President Obama wants the "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" law overturned by Congress and has directed Secretary Gates to begin changing Defense Department policies as soon as possible.
The "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy was created by former President Clinton in response to Congress passing a 1993 law (Section 654, Title 10 U.S.C.).
Congress rejected the idea that gays and lesbians had a right to serve in the military. But, Clinton circumvented the law by creating the "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy. The military was prohibited from asking if a person engaged in homosexual conduct and gays were free to remain silent about their sexual behaviors.
Secretary Gates proposed a 45-day period that would be used to create policies under the current law that will result in even more lax enforcement of the 1993 than in the past.
If repealing the law or current policy does not improve the readiness of our troops, then we cannot in good conscience expect our Armed Service Members to shoulder this additional burden when they are already fighting two wars.
Senator John McCain, Republican leader on the Armed Services Committee was the most aggressive in his opposition to abolishing the 1993 and was critical of Gates and Mullen. He held up a document with the signatures of 1,152 distinguished retired military leaders, including two former Chairmen of the Joint Chiefs Of Staff. These men and women do not want the 1993 law abolished. They stated:
Our past experience as military leaders leads us to be greatly concerned about the impact of repeal [of the law] on morale, discipline, unit cohesion, and overall military readiness. We believe that imposing this burden on our men and women in uniform would undermine recruiting and retention, impact leadership at all levels, have adverse effects on the willingness of parents who lend their sons and daughters to military service, and eventually break the All-Volunteer Force.
Retired Commandant of the Marine Corps, General Carl Mundy has also expressed opposition to the repeal of the 1993 law.
Pink Shirts, Placards, But No Overt Transgenders
TVC staffers attended the DADT hearing and took photos of members of the radical group Code Pink who held placards calling Sen. McCain a "bigot" and calling for the repeal of the 1993 law.
Placards are never allowed in hearing rooms, but Levin let them remain. Since the Democrats have taken over Congress, the Capitol Hill police have been told to keep their hands off of Code Pink activists and let them disrupt at will. This is particularly true on the House side.
Sen. Carl Levin (D-MI) should have ejected these radicals and their placards attacking McCain, but he permitted them to stay. This is non-standard practice in such hearings. But, since Levin is a collaborator with the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer agenda (LGBTQ), he apparently thought they deserved to be there.
What was conspicuously absent in the discussion of DADT, was any mention of transgendered individuals serving openly in the military. This omission is significant because the LGBTQ movement has fully embraced the gaggle of cross-dressers, drag queens, transsexuals and she-males (males with female breasts and male genitals).
These transgendered individuals have a mental disorder known as a Gender Identity Disorder and/or Transvestic Fetishism.
Transgenders are lobbying to serve openly in the military, but they face the obstacle of the military still considering sex change operations and transsexualism to be evidence of disordered thinking.
The LGBTQ movement has deliberately left transgendered persons out of any military discussion because they know this is a "bridge too far" for them to accomplish right now. They will first get their gay, lesbian and bisexual goals done and then come back later to demand that she-males and other mentally disordered persons be permitted to "serve" in the military.
Incrementalism is the name of the game to the LGBTQ movement.
The DADT hearing was the opening salvo in the new war against the military being waged by LGBTQ activists.
Helping them in this war against military readiness is Rep. Patrick Murphy (D-PA), who has introduced H.R. 1238. It will overturn the 1993 law. No where in his bill is there any mention of transgender or "gender identity," which is code for what is actually a Gender Identity Disorder.
H.R. 1238 mentions gays, bisexuals, and lesbians "real or perceived" but leaves out any talk about "gender identity." This omission is deliberate.
In every other piece of pro-LGBTQ legislation in recent years, the words "gender identity" have been included. The hate crimes bill included "gender identity" and the current Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA) includes it.
Convincing Senators and Representatives that she-males should serve openly in the military is probably just a bit too much at this point.
So, for the time being, the cross-dressers, drag queens, transsexuals and she-males must remain in the shadows while their gay, lesbian, and bisexual allies work to capture the military. Once the 1993 bill is overturned, they'll return to a liberal Congress with a vengeance to demand that transgenders persons be given the "right" to openly serve.
Sen. Levin, Rep. Murphy and their other compliant allies will be only to happy to bend over to serve them.
Rep. John Boehner Speaks Out On DADT
House Republican Leader John Boehner (R-OH) was on NBC recently to discuss health care and the "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy. During his discussion, Boehner said this:
In the middle of two wars and in the middle of this giant security threat, why would we want to get into this debate? While at a time when Americans are asking where are the jobs, why do we want to get in this debate? While we're fighting over health care and trying to find some way to come to common ground, why do we want to get into a divisive debate that will do nothing more than distract [from] the real debate that should occur here about helping to get our economy going again and getting American people back to work.
Rep. Mike Pence (R-IN) is also opposed to repealing the 1993 law. He points out that Congress held 14 hearings on gays in the military before passing the 1993 law. Legislators drew the following conclusions:
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Success in combat requires military units that are characterized by high morale, good order and discipline, and unit cohesion.
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Military life is fundamentally different from civilian life with unique conditions and responsibilities that require the military community to exist as a specialized society characterized by its own laws, rules, customs, and traditions, including restrictions on personal behavior that would not be acceptable in civilian society.
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Standards of conduct apply to military members 24 hours a day whether on duty or off duty, whether on the installation or off the installation.
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The prohibition against homosexual conduct is a long-standing element of military law that continues to be necessary in the unique circumstances of military service.
The Center for Military Readiness has numerous publications and studies available on gays in the military, including: Extreme Social Engineering Not a Pretty Sight.
TVC is watching this disturbing effort against the military and will have updates in the next few days.