I agree that Cal Thomas is an idiot. I even agree with some of your arguments against DADT, but I'm afraid that's where it ends. Your casual disrespect for the American military as a whole (not limited to outdated policies like DADT that we are trying to change) makes me wonder if you are really the best voice for repeal and change. The vast majority of the Servicemembers who are discharged under DADT are enlisted, just as the vast majority of Servicemembers are enlisted. Every discharge marks the end of another potentially great career, enlisted or officer. But while attempting to publicize the tragic story of their discharge, you're disrespecting the path they would have chosen should they have been allowed to stay.

My fear is that the public might see an enlisted Servicemember as "just another soldier" we can do without because there are ample replacements. Perhaps the reason officers' stories are featured so prominently is because there are so relatively few of them. Whatever the source of your disdain, perhaps you might consider that these officers are speaking out as leaders, even under the circumstances of their discharges. Lt Dan Choi, for example, has championed the cause and is providing a voice for all Servicemembers facing discharge, just as he led his soldiers in the Army. Sure, there may be some bad officers around, and many of them favor DADT. Who better to speak out against them than shining examples of true officership?

I did not mean to imply that enlisted Servicemembers who are discharged would eventually become officers. I was instead referring to your disdain for the military, and that if they were allowed to stay in the military, even openly, you don't seem to respect the military or their devotion to it. The real crime against LGBT Servicemembers is not that they're being harassed and discharged, but that they're being denied their desire to pursue their chosen careers.

Joseph Rocha's account of his harassment hits me as well, because it brings to light the side effects of DADT that are so often overlooked. In the military, the command climate is often one of ridicule towards LGBT issues because DADT effectively squashes any type of discourse supporting LGBT through fear (or threat) of persecution.

Incidentally, I agree that the military has been misused to advance instead of protect American interests. Unfortunately, the invasion ordered by a previous administration cannot simply be undone. The current administration has no choice but to try to make the best of a bad situation while keeping an eye on the ultimate goal of withdrawing forces from Iraq and Afghanistan.

Nevertheless, I think there is tremendous honor and virtue in devoting one's life to the defense of one's nation. I also happen to think that the US military is the world's finest, not because of its ability to wage war with superior firepower, but because of its extremely high standards of discipline in waging war in the defense of America, its interests, and its citizens. Ironic as it may seem, the ultimate goal of the military is peace, and despite recent challnges to that goal, I think everyone who devotes his or her life to the military shares that goal.

With all that altruism out of me, I'll just add one final point. I agree the military is too large. In fact, the recent Marine Corps effort to grow the force led to an increase in retention and the noncommissioned officer ranks have swelled disproportionately. If all these people who threaten to get out if the ban on LGBT service were lifted actually did, we might just end up with an appropriately-sized force that also possesses an appropriate view of diversity and equality--definitely not bad qualities when you're looking to employ a force that isn't inclined to shoot first and ask questions later.

I'm a 20 year veteran of the US Navy.

Who gets to serve?
Whoever is able bodied and can do the job reliably, that has the maturity needed along with the skills and knowledge. The ones who can stand when others flee to face whatever danger there is. The one’s willing to sacrifice themselves for others.

The “Open to all behaviors” comment? I’ve worked with people who entered the Navy using waivers. Persons convicted of;
man-slaughter (discharged due to being a total nut job)
felony evasion and drunk driving (discharged after yet another felony evasion and drunk driving incident)
possession with intent to distribute (guess what, yep, caught by the DEA, FBI and Customs transporting)
felony robbery (…a bank job on base. Another two guys who did a smash and grab that cost you the tax payer 1.8 million dollars.)
rape (date rape drugs came along and he got bagged the 3rd or 4th time)
child molestation (worked closely with him, wanted to do something very nasty when I found out)
Yeah, those were a bunch of upright folk there all right.

‘Countries that allow Gays to serve in the military’
All of our NATO allies allow GLBTI citizens to serve. Try being in a NATO battle group on a US Navy ship, they not only look down their noses at us but ridicule us to our faces as well.

‘The mission is National defense, not experimental physiology’
Believe it or not, those people defending your asses are people. The military doesn’t really care about them and do physiological tests and experiments all the time. When was the last time you just had to work 12 days straight with no time off and minimal rest? Just so someone with a PhD could gauge our reactions…

On Rocha
Yeah, what happened to him is typical when crusty’s (chiefs) run wild with little or no supervision.
PO1 Valdivia… well, I was a PO1. It’s typical of chiefs to blame everyone but the chief for the chiefs actions. Been there, seen that. A PO1 or another Junior person cannot bring charges up on a senior person unless directed by someone senior to the person being put on report. (a PO1 cannot write up a chief unless a senior chief or officer says too. They can lodge a complaint thru various other means but those routes are not ‘official’.) Some commands I was in were horrific for these kinds of things.
But these abuses will not stop until DADT is removed and GLBTI citizens are allowed to serve openly.

"I think it's worked out well," he said. "Keeping that all out of the workplace makes common sense."
Anyone saying DADT has worked out well is on some good crack. And ‘keeping it out of the workplace’? The only time I ever stumbled across anyone having sex in the workplace was heterosexuals. Not a single gay or lesbian had the stupidity to do that. The only people talking about sex? Geeze, only the guys and no one else. They still act like the workplace is the highschool boys locker room. Totally forgot Tailhook.

As an Honorably discharged Army Infantry Vet who completed my service contract I think the arguement over don't ask don't tell is masking a larger problem. As Americans we should wish to live in a Country so great that all Americans should want to serve and be encouraged to serve regardless of the fact they may be physically handicapped, lgbt, a minority, Christian, Jewish or even Muslim.
We've allowed whoever it may be to convince us that being different is UnAmerican or less than human instead of Diversity is what makes America great.When we over come our differences and work towards a common goal great things happen when we allow ourselves to be separated bad things happen history proves this.
If all life is truly sacred then why our we fighting for things that divide and separate us that much more.Why not fight to make the laws about murder and employment truly equal for all not just us.By doing that we end don't ask don't tell without making it just an lgbt issue and elevate ourselves above partisian politics.
Amy
P.S I'm proud to say I was enlisted(as in not an officer) because in the Army it's an insult to call an enlisted mam or sir as we work for a living.

A. It is true that more enlisted personnel are discharged than officers. The explanations for this are obvious:

1. Officers are more likely to be careerists and, therefore, all the more focused on keeping their sexuality secret. Victor Fehrenbach succeeded for 18 years in the Air Force until he was outed by an apparent psychopath, and now stands to lose tens of thousands of dollars in retirement benefits he’d otherwise been eligible for had he lasted just two more years.

2. Except for those officers who receive their promotions upon graduation from a 4-yr. military academy, "through the ranks" officers have had more experience keeping their sexuality secret.

B: Those who've made a public issue of their discharges over the years have neither been "usually" nor "all" officers. While there seems to be a trend toward more officers doing it, historically it's been about an even split.

The first to do it, Leonard Matlovich, in 1975, was not an officer. Copy Berg, whose case was joined with his by the courts, was. As I recall, most others were enlisted until Col. Grete Cammermeyer’s 1992 case. Navy Lt. Tracy Thorne [-Begland] outed himself on "Nightline" that May...a few hours after non-officer Keith Meinhold outed himself on "ABC Evening News."

Zoe Dunning was an officer when she outed herself in January of ’93. Jose Zuniga was not when he outed himself during the 1993 gay march on Washington. Not only was Eric Alva not an officer, but neither were Alex Nicholson nor Jarrod Chlapowski, featured in the recent documentary “Ask Not” and leading the current Voices of Honor cross country anti-DADT educational tour.

The larger point is that no one “decides” to place officers over enlisted in the limelight. The process is driven first by the decision of the individual to publicly fight and so few do of any rank [out of the tens of thousands that have been discharged since Leonard came forward in 1975] that advocacy groups are thankful for every one.

And whether “the choir” thinks a non-officer is a better poster person is irrelevant. The average American gravitates quickest toward higher achievers as they define them, be it sports, business, the arts [there’s no Oscar for “extras”], or the military.

RE transgender and DADT: while it is imperative that we advocate for the right of the transgendered to be in the military if they choose, and the bigotry that perpetuates DADT is at its core the same as transphobia, technically DADT cannot be used as a mechanism to discharge anyone transgender.

Finally, though I was indicted by a federal grand jury for refusing to be inducted into the Army many moons ago, one grows weary of the repeated clichés about the inherent evils of the military. Their purpose is merely to be our police force in the world community. In order to justify broadbrush demonizing the institution for the many sins of many individuals one must similarly unilaterally oppose domestic police forces for theirs.

Try calling the Boy Scouts the next time someone steals your tofu.

YOUR "concepts" of varying expressions of gender are irrelevant to me for the purposes of this thread, the subject of which remains the reality of DADT no matter how aggressively you keep trying to hijack it.

Ignorant commanders do consciously confuse some nonconforming gender expression with homosexuality and some move to discharge the person under the latter label. Others know the difference but dishonestly use DADT as a way of getting rid of someone they perceive as being [to them] unacceptably nonconforming, but the "charge" will be homosexuality. No institution is better at finding a way to get rid of someone they don't want than the military, but as vile as many of its commanders are, it would be rare to find one that would be stupid enough to try to use DADT to openly discharge someone labeled anything other than "gay."

Even the 2008 survey of servicemembers by Transgender American Veterans Association did not assert that anyone is being DISCHARGED as anything other than "gay." The respondents reported being suspected of being or asked if they were GAY. Period.