Latest News
06-11-09
Playboy: Forum
By Ana Marie Cox
"Don't Ask, Don't Tell" is dangerous and wrong, sapping the Armed Forces of thousands of skilled, patriotic men and women anxious to serve their country. So why is Obama stalling on repealing it?
Last January, Robert Gibbs, spokesman for then-President-elect Barack Obama, fielded a citizen-submitted question about the military's policy of dismissing openly gay soldiers. Thaddeus from Lansing, Michigan asked, "Is the new administration going to get rid of the 'don't ask, don't tell' policy?"
Gibbs, looking a tad paler and heavier than he is now, was obviously pleased with his own answer: "Thaddeus," he said, "You don't hear a politician give a one-word answer much. But it's 'Yes.'"
Last month, I asked Gibbs on two occasions if the administration would be getting rid of "don't ask, don't tell," and he took over 105 words and several minutes to give a qualified "maybe."
The administration has moved to the center on a lot of issues since Inauguration, with Obama changing his position on the release of detainee abuse photos, slowing down his timetable for withdrawal from Iraq, and deciding to keep some of the expanded executive powers that he (and other Democrats) used to criticize. He's also caved on moderate criticism of the stimulus plan and refused to come out against California's Proposition 8. But of all the national security decisions he will make, where Obama winds up on "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" (DADT), has the most potential to affect the everyday lives-and the safety-of troops and civilians alike.
About 12,000 troops have been dismissed under the policy since 1993, and the non-partisan Government Accounting Office has tallied the cost of their loss at $95.4 million in wasted recruiting costs, and $95.1 million in training replacements. These numbers are almost certainly too low. Lt. Col. Victor Fehrenbach, an 18-year Air Force fighter pilot currently fighting a DADT dismissal, estimates that the United States has spent about $25 million training him alone.
Today, Obama's official position, articulated (or not) by Gibbs, is that "the only durable and lasting way" to overturn the policy is via an act of Congress, but that they are "actively" working with the Pentagon to change it.
On the latter point, the Pentagon's own spokesman told reporters the day before Gibbs' response, "I do not believe there are any plans under way in this building" for don't ask-don't tell to be repealed. Later, pushed by the White House to "clarify" his remarks, Pentagon spokesman Geoff Morrell issued a statement saying "President Obama has been clear in his direction to Secretary Gates and Chairman Mullen that he is committed to repeal" of the DADT policy.
And on Monday, in a lengthy interview with The Air Force Times, Joint Chiefs of Staff chairman Michael Mullen expanded on what actions (loosely defined) the White House has taken: "We've had preliminary discussions. I've had preliminary discussions with the President about this. And I think it's important, as we look to this change, that it be done in a way that doesn't disrupt the force at a time where it's under a lot of stress, and that to me means in a measured, deliberate way over some time to be determined. And I don't know what that would be."
When Obama installed GOP congressman and ranking member of the House Armed Services Committee John McHugh as Secretary of the Army, it was difficult to square the assurance that repealing DADT was "a priority" for both men given McHugh's lack of action on the issue in Congress.
Let me unwind this a little for you; I speak fluent Washingtonese. There are, in all likelihood, no active discussions between Obama and the Joint Chiefs to undo DADT. It is something that "doesn't make us more safe" (as Obama put it in April 2008), that Obama hasn't changed his mind about, but that he has made a calculated decision not to do anything about. Sometimes I try to imagine how the media might react to the administration taking a similar position on, say, domestic terrorism.
Pressed on their lack of leadership among the Joint Chiefs, White House aides say that the President's ability to act further is restricted by DADT's status as a federal law. And it's true that this is where parallels to Truman's racial integration of the military fall apart-a favorite example of proponents of repealing DADT, who say that, like Truman, Obama could end this particular form of discrimination "with the stroke of a pen."
"We're a nation of laws," pleaded Mullen to the Air Force Times. As a sign of just how uncomfortable the White House is in explaining its shift in policy, at the second press conference where I posed a DADT question Gibbs actually changed the subject to the arguably more explosive issue of Guantanamo Bay-75 percent of Americans favor gays serving openly in the military, only 53 percent think we should close the controversial detention facility. Gibbs brushed off purely executive action by saying, "Try as one may, a President can't simply whisk away standing law of the United States of America. I think that's maybe been the undercurrent of some of the conversations we've had over the past few days on Guantanamo Bay. But if you're going to change the policy, if it is the law of the land, you have to do it through an act of Congress."
As our last president proved again and again, this is not actually the case. (And the administration did not in fact wait for congress to act before issuing an executive order to close Gitmo.) Few would advocate that Obama attempt to extend the reach of the executive office to the extralegal lengths Bush and company pushed for, but having already stated his intent to keep some of those expanded powers in place-and, in the case of environmental regulation, use them - why not employ them to restore equality and social justice within the one truly meritocratic institution in American society, the Armed Forces?
In May, a study by University of California at Santa Barbara laid out exactly how Obama might use recognized, non-controversial executive powers to stop the implementation of DADT, if not turn it over completely. U.S. Code Title 10, 12305 gives the President authority to "suspend any provision of law relating to promotion, retirement, or separation applicable to any member of the armed forces who the President determines is essential to the national security of the United States." This power, colloquially called "stop-loss," is at present keeping more than 13,000 soldiers on duty past the point that they wanted to leave the military. This involuntary extension of service, which has affected more than 500,000 troops since the war on terror began, has been highly criticized and Defense Secretary Robert Gates has assured the new administration that the practice would be retired by March 2011-except for the "scores" of soldiers who have "skills that were particularly important to the war effort," a description that would seem to fit Lt. Dan Choi, a West Point-grad Army Arab linguist fighting a DADT discharge from the National Guard, not to mention the 20 Arabic-speaking soldiers discharged under DADT between 1998 and 2004. But then, the Commanders-in-Chief who presided over those dismissals publically supported DADT; Obama does not.
Most Americans probably think of the ability of gays and lesbians to openly serve in the United States military as a civil rights issue. And, of course, it is. But as he hesitates to take leadership on it, Obama should remember just how urgent a national security issue it is. In the end, Harry Truman didn't integrate the military because it was the "right" thing to do-truth be told, Truman was something of a bigot; with no apparent irony, he once called the White House's black waitstaff "an army of coons." While reportedly horrified by racial violence in general, Truman integrated the military in part because advisers told him that the most "efficient use of African-Americans in the Army" would eliminate discrimination, and because his White House counsel, Clark Clifford, believed that championing civil rights and the courting the African-American vote were essential to winning re-election.
Obama was able count on-and most likely will continue to count on-the votes of those interested in equality for the LGBT community; at the national level, they're not likely to get a better alternative. (Dick Cheney's recent public reversal on marriage equality notwithstanding.) But one of the key components of recent Democratic victories has been candidates' refusal to cede military issues to the traditionally hawkish GOP. Repealing DADT should be a part of reclaiming national security as a bipartisan issue. Honestly, would there be a more "efficient use of gays in the Army" than having them hunt down Islamic extremists, arguably the only group more uncomfortable with the idea of homosexuality than social conservatives?
There are signs of hope. For one thing, anonymous administration aides still echo the language of the campaign, saying DADT "does not make us more safe." That's just a small step from acknowledging DADT makes us less safe. Also, LGBT activists I've spoken to see McHugh's silence on the issue over the course of his career as a potentially good sign. And Wednesday, Gibbs reiterated that changing the policy "is a priority of the president's" while fielding questions about McHugh. Also, Democratic consultants are already suggesting the new Secretary of the Army is the right person to institute change: his bona fides from membership on the House Armed Services Committee and the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence will allow him to recast the issue in national security terms, while his GOP affiliation will help dispel the notion that this is a partisan issue.
White House aides I've spoken to seem personally frustrated with the administration's slowdown on the issue, and emphasize that the president has not changed his mind. "He brought it up today," one senior staffer told me recently, as though it were a pesky but distant concern. That, too, is Washingtonese. Rough translation: "We'll get it done when we get it done; don't bother me." Such non-affirming affirmations are the order of the day in most administrations. Still, it's disappointing that a White House run by a former community organizer will need to be prodded by activist pressure simply to do the right thing-particularly when it is also the smart thing.
Update:
On Monday, June 8, the Supreme Court - in agreement with a brief filed by the administration - announced that it had refused to accept a petition from one of the plaintiffs in the DADT case of Pietrangelo v. Gates, where the lower court upheld the policy. This in itself is not a significant legal setback: The Servicemembers Legal Defense Network (the organization that fights the legal battles over DADT) pointed out in a press release that the Court could not have done much even if it had heard the case-they would have simply sent it back to the lower court. In the same release, the SLDN also made the argument that the courts are not even the right place to fight this battle. Rather, "the best place to make our core argument-that openly gay and lesbian service members do NOT negatively impact unit cohesion, morale, or good order-is in the political arena, i.e., in Congress and the White House."
But if you've made it all the way to end of this article you probably already realize that there hasn't been a lot forward motion in the political arena on this issue. As with the issue of marriage equality, activists have put a lot of effort into court fights on this issue because right now that's where progress is being made. The fact that the Obama administration had little choice in asking the Court to reject the Pietrangelo case (doing otherwise would put them in direct legal opposition to the Pentagon), however, does not make it any easier to accept the logic they used in their brief: DADT, it argued, is "rationally related to the government's legitimate interest in military discipline and cohesion."
They're half right. DADT is a threat to both of those things.
Isn’t it Ironic: DADT in Playboy
Playboy: Forum
By Ana Marie Cox
"Don't Ask, Don't Tell" is dangerous and wrong, sapping the Armed Forces of thousands of skilled, patriotic men and women anxious to serve their country. So why is Obama stalling on repealing it?
Last January, Robert Gibbs, spokesman for then-President-elect Barack Obama, fielded a citizen-submitted question about the military's policy of dismissing openly gay soldiers. Thaddeus from Lansing, Michigan asked, "Is the new administration going to get rid of the 'don't ask, don't tell' policy?"
Gibbs, looking a tad paler and heavier than he is now, was obviously pleased with his own answer: "Thaddeus," he said, "You don't hear a politician give a one-word answer much. But it's 'Yes.'"
Last month, I asked Gibbs on two occasions if the administration would be getting rid of "don't ask, don't tell," and he took over 105 words and several minutes to give a qualified "maybe."
The administration has moved to the center on a lot of issues since Inauguration, with Obama changing his position on the release of detainee abuse photos, slowing down his timetable for withdrawal from Iraq, and deciding to keep some of the expanded executive powers that he (and other Democrats) used to criticize. He's also caved on moderate criticism of the stimulus plan and refused to come out against California's Proposition 8. But of all the national security decisions he will make, where Obama winds up on "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" (DADT), has the most potential to affect the everyday lives-and the safety-of troops and civilians alike.
About 12,000 troops have been dismissed under the policy since 1993, and the non-partisan Government Accounting Office has tallied the cost of their loss at $95.4 million in wasted recruiting costs, and $95.1 million in training replacements. These numbers are almost certainly too low. Lt. Col. Victor Fehrenbach, an 18-year Air Force fighter pilot currently fighting a DADT dismissal, estimates that the United States has spent about $25 million training him alone.
Today, Obama's official position, articulated (or not) by Gibbs, is that "the only durable and lasting way" to overturn the policy is via an act of Congress, but that they are "actively" working with the Pentagon to change it.
On the latter point, the Pentagon's own spokesman told reporters the day before Gibbs' response, "I do not believe there are any plans under way in this building" for don't ask-don't tell to be repealed. Later, pushed by the White House to "clarify" his remarks, Pentagon spokesman Geoff Morrell issued a statement saying "President Obama has been clear in his direction to Secretary Gates and Chairman Mullen that he is committed to repeal" of the DADT policy.
And on Monday, in a lengthy interview with The Air Force Times, Joint Chiefs of Staff chairman Michael Mullen expanded on what actions (loosely defined) the White House has taken: "We've had preliminary discussions. I've had preliminary discussions with the President about this. And I think it's important, as we look to this change, that it be done in a way that doesn't disrupt the force at a time where it's under a lot of stress, and that to me means in a measured, deliberate way over some time to be determined. And I don't know what that would be."
When Obama installed GOP congressman and ranking member of the House Armed Services Committee John McHugh as Secretary of the Army, it was difficult to square the assurance that repealing DADT was "a priority" for both men given McHugh's lack of action on the issue in Congress.
Let me unwind this a little for you; I speak fluent Washingtonese. There are, in all likelihood, no active discussions between Obama and the Joint Chiefs to undo DADT. It is something that "doesn't make us more safe" (as Obama put it in April 2008), that Obama hasn't changed his mind about, but that he has made a calculated decision not to do anything about. Sometimes I try to imagine how the media might react to the administration taking a similar position on, say, domestic terrorism.
Pressed on their lack of leadership among the Joint Chiefs, White House aides say that the President's ability to act further is restricted by DADT's status as a federal law. And it's true that this is where parallels to Truman's racial integration of the military fall apart-a favorite example of proponents of repealing DADT, who say that, like Truman, Obama could end this particular form of discrimination "with the stroke of a pen."
"We're a nation of laws," pleaded Mullen to the Air Force Times. As a sign of just how uncomfortable the White House is in explaining its shift in policy, at the second press conference where I posed a DADT question Gibbs actually changed the subject to the arguably more explosive issue of Guantanamo Bay-75 percent of Americans favor gays serving openly in the military, only 53 percent think we should close the controversial detention facility. Gibbs brushed off purely executive action by saying, "Try as one may, a President can't simply whisk away standing law of the United States of America. I think that's maybe been the undercurrent of some of the conversations we've had over the past few days on Guantanamo Bay. But if you're going to change the policy, if it is the law of the land, you have to do it through an act of Congress."
As our last president proved again and again, this is not actually the case. (And the administration did not in fact wait for congress to act before issuing an executive order to close Gitmo.) Few would advocate that Obama attempt to extend the reach of the executive office to the extralegal lengths Bush and company pushed for, but having already stated his intent to keep some of those expanded powers in place-and, in the case of environmental regulation, use them - why not employ them to restore equality and social justice within the one truly meritocratic institution in American society, the Armed Forces?
In May, a study by University of California at Santa Barbara laid out exactly how Obama might use recognized, non-controversial executive powers to stop the implementation of DADT, if not turn it over completely. U.S. Code Title 10, 12305 gives the President authority to "suspend any provision of law relating to promotion, retirement, or separation applicable to any member of the armed forces who the President determines is essential to the national security of the United States." This power, colloquially called "stop-loss," is at present keeping more than 13,000 soldiers on duty past the point that they wanted to leave the military. This involuntary extension of service, which has affected more than 500,000 troops since the war on terror began, has been highly criticized and Defense Secretary Robert Gates has assured the new administration that the practice would be retired by March 2011-except for the "scores" of soldiers who have "skills that were particularly important to the war effort," a description that would seem to fit Lt. Dan Choi, a West Point-grad Army Arab linguist fighting a DADT discharge from the National Guard, not to mention the 20 Arabic-speaking soldiers discharged under DADT between 1998 and 2004. But then, the Commanders-in-Chief who presided over those dismissals publically supported DADT; Obama does not.
Most Americans probably think of the ability of gays and lesbians to openly serve in the United States military as a civil rights issue. And, of course, it is. But as he hesitates to take leadership on it, Obama should remember just how urgent a national security issue it is. In the end, Harry Truman didn't integrate the military because it was the "right" thing to do-truth be told, Truman was something of a bigot; with no apparent irony, he once called the White House's black waitstaff "an army of coons." While reportedly horrified by racial violence in general, Truman integrated the military in part because advisers told him that the most "efficient use of African-Americans in the Army" would eliminate discrimination, and because his White House counsel, Clark Clifford, believed that championing civil rights and the courting the African-American vote were essential to winning re-election.
Obama was able count on-and most likely will continue to count on-the votes of those interested in equality for the LGBT community; at the national level, they're not likely to get a better alternative. (Dick Cheney's recent public reversal on marriage equality notwithstanding.) But one of the key components of recent Democratic victories has been candidates' refusal to cede military issues to the traditionally hawkish GOP. Repealing DADT should be a part of reclaiming national security as a bipartisan issue. Honestly, would there be a more "efficient use of gays in the Army" than having them hunt down Islamic extremists, arguably the only group more uncomfortable with the idea of homosexuality than social conservatives?
There are signs of hope. For one thing, anonymous administration aides still echo the language of the campaign, saying DADT "does not make us more safe." That's just a small step from acknowledging DADT makes us less safe. Also, LGBT activists I've spoken to see McHugh's silence on the issue over the course of his career as a potentially good sign. And Wednesday, Gibbs reiterated that changing the policy "is a priority of the president's" while fielding questions about McHugh. Also, Democratic consultants are already suggesting the new Secretary of the Army is the right person to institute change: his bona fides from membership on the House Armed Services Committee and the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence will allow him to recast the issue in national security terms, while his GOP affiliation will help dispel the notion that this is a partisan issue.
White House aides I've spoken to seem personally frustrated with the administration's slowdown on the issue, and emphasize that the president has not changed his mind. "He brought it up today," one senior staffer told me recently, as though it were a pesky but distant concern. That, too, is Washingtonese. Rough translation: "We'll get it done when we get it done; don't bother me." Such non-affirming affirmations are the order of the day in most administrations. Still, it's disappointing that a White House run by a former community organizer will need to be prodded by activist pressure simply to do the right thing-particularly when it is also the smart thing.
Update:
On Monday, June 8, the Supreme Court - in agreement with a brief filed by the administration - announced that it had refused to accept a petition from one of the plaintiffs in the DADT case of Pietrangelo v. Gates, where the lower court upheld the policy. This in itself is not a significant legal setback: The Servicemembers Legal Defense Network (the organization that fights the legal battles over DADT) pointed out in a press release that the Court could not have done much even if it had heard the case-they would have simply sent it back to the lower court. In the same release, the SLDN also made the argument that the courts are not even the right place to fight this battle. Rather, "the best place to make our core argument-that openly gay and lesbian service members do NOT negatively impact unit cohesion, morale, or good order-is in the political arena, i.e., in Congress and the White House."
But if you've made it all the way to end of this article you probably already realize that there hasn't been a lot forward motion in the political arena on this issue. As with the issue of marriage equality, activists have put a lot of effort into court fights on this issue because right now that's where progress is being made. The fact that the Obama administration had little choice in asking the Court to reject the Pietrangelo case (doing otherwise would put them in direct legal opposition to the Pentagon), however, does not make it any easier to accept the logic they used in their brief: DADT, it argued, is "rationally related to the government's legitimate interest in military discipline and cohesion."
They're half right. DADT is a threat to both of those things.
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