Beginning at 9am PST/12pm EST, the monotonous proceedings begin in Log Cabin Republicans v. United States of America, which itself represents the Obama administration’s failure to act on DADT before it had the chance to alone decide its fate.
Federal Judge Victoria A. Phillips will hear the case alone in a California courtroom; there will be no jury. And depending on its outcome, it might give the Justice Department another opportunity to defend, on appeal, laws the president believes to be discriminatory. Score!
[photo: Leonard Matlovitch, receiving the first Air Force Commendation Medal in 1966, before he came out]
Michael @ LeonardMatlovich.com
Thank you for keeping your readers informed about this important case which the ODOJ has fought for over a year and a half to kill before it even came to trial with the kind of ruthless tactics more suited to Chicago dirty politics than a court of law.
Their most shameful tactic was trying to get co-plaintiff “John Doe” kicked off the case insisting that since he is still IN the military, serving in Iraq, he couldn’t CLAIM that he is affected by DADT!
Further illustrating the Administration’s hypocrisy:
Thank you, too, for the photo of my late friend, Leonard Matlovich, the first gay servicemember to out himself to fight the ban, trying to end it in court himself, even before it became “DADT,” even before Dan Choi was born. How insane is it that 35 years after he did that we are still fighting the ban, and that Barack Obama who was only 13 years old at the time has sided with Pentagon homophobes in delaying ending discharges?
For the record: this pinning was for the Bronze Star which Leonard received for risking his life to repair base security lighting under enemy fire.
[img]http://leonardmatlovich.com/images/365_MAT-BRONZE-HANDSHAKE-clean.jpg[/img]