At yesterday’s Senate Armed Services Committee hearings, Army Secretary John McHugh and Army Chief of Staff Gen. George Casey continued the parade of military officers before lawmakers going back and forth about whether Don’t Ask Don’t Tell should be repealed, how to repeal it, and whether Sen. John McCain needs a good talking to. (Okay, we made the last one up.) But McCain continued his rampage against armed services brass jumping the gun on DADT, before that awesome review is made available, and locked eyes with McHugh (pictured, left), quizzing him on whether even a moratorium on DADT dismissals is worthwhile. We already know how McHugh answered: don’t do it. But why?
Because the DADT dismissals-in-progress “would be greatly complicated” by a moratorium, he told McCain and his colleagues. “We have Lt. Choi in New York, for example. I’m just saying it would bring a lot of legal complications to the circumstances.”
Indeed, the reason for not issuing even a moratorium on DADT dismissals is because it would be, like, hard!, you guys. Think of all the papercuts involved with shuffling all those documents around!
Yes, that’s sarcasm in our voice, but understand what this means: The Army’s leaders would prefer to not deal with the “complicated” legal matters of dismissals than allow competent, talented, and trained soldiers remain within the ranks. We respect these men very much. They perform meaningful jobs and make difficult decisions that are, literally, matters of life and death.
How about we take this to the next level?
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But this isn’t leadership. This is cowardice.
UPDATE: At this morning’s House hearings, Navy chief Adm. Gary Roughhead joined his fellow military heads and said a moratorium would be “extremely confusing” but, in his “personal view,” a DADT repeal should move forward.
(NB: McHugh, a congressman from New York before becoming Army secretary, represented the district that included Fort Drum; Choi served in Iraq with Fort Drum’s 10th Mountain Division at Fort Drum.)
Jon
Sen. Levin wants to know if current cases could have a stay in their case anyways due to statements by the Prez. Which would make a lot of legal sense. It’s worth looking up on your own. I don’t know that much about JAG law, but still.
Mike in Asheville, nee "in Brooklyn"
These guys are all sacks of shit! And I don’t give a flying fuck whatever their efforts at keeping America safe. There are some 16-32 million LGBT Americans who are being denied the very founding principles of our nation (our rights, by our Creator, God, to our own pursuit of our own happiness).
ChicagoJimmy
This is an example of how Washington is broken and how weak a leader the President has turned out to be. Normal people see a problem in their lives and fix it. The solutions are not always pleasant or easy, but that’s what you do when something is broken.
Ugh, the car needs new tires. The refrigerator is broken. Our son needs extra help in math. I lost my job and need to find a new one. etc, etc.
People deal with shit that is broken every day, and then we move on. We expect our elected officials to do the same thing. Huge majorities of Americans want DADT repealed. It doesn’t make sense. We’re fighting two wars, and kicking people out that are well trained and needed is stupid. Fix it!
Huge majorities in America want tough regulations on Wall street bankers and insurance companies that ruined the economy. Huge majorities want Health Care reform enacted. They don’t get why insurance companies are allowed to keep gaming the system at our expense. Huge majorities want real credit card reform legislation. We don’t get why they can’t get together to protect tax payers from they predatory companies.
Fix this shit, or don’t be surprised when no one shows up to vote for you next time around.
Cam
Somebody needs to ask McCain why he would allow his Cheif of Staff, the man who runs his entire legislative office, and the man who he formerlly promoted from the mail room all the way up to this position, to run his political life, if, as a homosexual he is less qualified than even an undereducated high school drop out to become a private in the army. His Cheif of staff, Mark Buse, is gay and out. So how come having a gay cheif of staff hasn’t hurt “Office Coheasion” in the Senators office? It’s HUGELY hypocritical for him to be depending on a gay man to run things for him at the same time he is saying that we are unqualified.