But when he’s done in court, he should get rid of the policy altogether.
As a veteran, I think Don’t Ask Don’t Tell is really stupid. It was imperfect in 1993, and it’s just a waste of effort now.
In my experience, most people in uniform simply don’t care. One of the things I learned in the Navy is that B.S. decreases inversely proportionally to the seriousness of the mission. What matters is basic professionalism and getting the mission accomplished in the face of risk to life and limb. The things that really matter come into stark relief, and everything else is just noise.
In my six years on active duty, I saw two people who were discharged for being gay. Both of them were “volunteers” – they were getting in trouble for performance and/or other, unrelated issues, and so they “told” in order to get out. In at least one case, it was common knowledge that the guy was gay. People were only really upset about it when he outed himself and was discharged, because it meant more work for everyone else in the division.
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But like it or not, the policy is a legitimate judgment call, put into policy by the elected civilians in charge of the military (while Democrats controlled both the White House and Congress, no less). It should be dumped, but it should be dumped properly.
Instead, the courts are taking the policy out. This is a horrible precedent that any Commander-in-Chief and defender of the Constitution should battle to the end.
The Constitution specifically gives the Congress the power to regulate the military, and makes the President its top commander. The military is a special and unique institution. It requires that within its ranks, certain freedoms civilians take for granted like free speech and association, or even the ability to simply quit your job, be curtailed. The normal rules, even freedoms ordinarily guaranteed by the Constitution, don’t apply. They can’t if we are to maintain an effective military.
So for courts to start micromanaging military policy, even if I agree with those courts that the policies in place are foolish, is a terrible and unconstitutional thing. It invites and legitimizes all manner of lawsuits against the military by its members, and in the end, will weaken our nation’s ability to defend itself.
Imagine a young Army recruit suing because of the “hostile work environment.” Or a guy who wants to wear long hair demanding his “free expression” rights be respected. Or the sailor who decides he can write letters to the editor of his local paper slagging his ship’s commanding officer. Imagine the time and energy spent by the military battling these types of lawsuits – time and energy which would necessarily be taken away from our warfighters at the tip of the spear. It would be chaos, and it cannot be allowed.
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Whatever “damage” might be caused by permitting the military to discriminate against gays (or for that matter, “damage” caused by gays being allowed to serve openly), it is nothing compared to the damage we risk as a country with a military crippled by constant lawsuits for any person or group who feels aggrieved by its policies. The Constitution rightly leaves the military to the two political branches. Whatever our disagreements are over military personnel policies are, they MUST be resolved through our elected officials, and not by judges who simply don’t understand either the military or the Constitution.
Obama is getting some snark from my side of the philosophical divide for fighting FOR a policy he campaigned against, but that criticism is misplaced. He must fight this encroachment. But once that fight is over and hopefully won, the President should fulfill one of the few campaign promises I actually agreed with him on, and lead the Congress in ending Don’t Ask Don’t Tell.
