Joints Chiefs vice chairman Gen. James Cartwright and Clifford Stanley, undersecretary of personnel and readiness, are going to teach the military how to work with open homosexuals by using PowerPoint. So this should go swimmingly! In a Pentagon presser today, military brass unveiled the plan to “expeditiously” get the repeal of Don’t Ask Don’t Tell certified by the president, Obama, and Gates, so gay soldiers can bitch and moan openly at all those “cocksucker” jokes, because you know now that they have the chance, gay troops are just totally going to start whining and falling out of line. In addition to PowerPoint, each military branch will host lectures and show videos to get troops — 1.4 million active duty soldiers and 800,000 reserves — up to speed on how repeal will affect them. Or, you know, how it won’t, because repealing DADT really isn’t going to change much for straight soldiers. Each military branch will be responsible for its own training schedule, and by next Friday Defense Sec. Gates must have a copy of their plans. In addition to its three-phase system, the Pentagon also announced after DADT is finally dead, troops kicked out under the policy will be welcome to reenlist but “there will be no preferential treatment,” because really, why start giving gays an upper hand all of a sudden? As for those training videos each branch must create on its own, I know a certain somebody with mad editing skillz currently twiddling his thumbs at a desk job!
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The briefing today was a multiple vehicle car wreck, some driven by Pentagon representatives who knew too little about what they are in charge of implementing, and some driven by members of the media who were either too ignorant of the facts or too afraid to challenge Stanley, et al., on their ignorance and illogic—all adding up to the likelihood that the destination of open service is far off. Unknown territory???? One would have thought it was a presentation by NASA on the first space shuttle rather than actualizing a change that really comes down to nothing more than “yesterday we kicked gays out, tomorrow we won’t.”
When Cartwright said that “the certification required by the DADT Repeal Act ‘does not require 100 percent’ of the servicemembers to be trained, why did no one point out to him that the Act does not require ANY training of ANY kind BEFORE certification?
Why did no one challenge them with the Palm Center’s December 19th report that found that:
“Any claim that [implementation cannot happen] until after the completion of exhaustive training is inconsistent with DoD history and not based on military necessity. Whatever preparations are ultimately deemed necessary, the Pentagon ought to be able to pull them off faster than it did the implementation of DADT in 1994, which took approximately 40 days. [Case studies demonstrate that training can take place quickly, even in combat zones, and that policies are generally implemented BEFORE OR CONCURRENT WITH training. The Pentagon’s request for up to a year to train the troops prior to the repeal of DADT is unprecedented. Training is not a prerequisite…to claim otherwise is a vote of no confidence in members of the armed forces, is not supported empirically, and is suspiciously dilatory. Training, like the formal publication of instructions, can occur (and has occurred) ex post facto.” Emphasis mine.
Or with DADT expert and Palm Center Director Aaron Belkin’s recent statement:
“It shouldn’t be a long process because the Pentagon ALREADY ESTABLISHED A POLICY TO ALLOW GAYS TO SERVE OPENLY in the military when [in the LCR case] a California federal court in October issued an injunction that temporarily enjoined enforcement of the law. Although they haven’t acknowledged this in public, THE REPLACEMENT REGULATIONS HAVE ALREADY BEEN WRITTEN, and so the Pentagon could easily repeal the ban TODAY if there was the political will. [Army Chief of Staff] Casey in particular is leaving soon and doesn’t want to be known as the Army chief of staff who let gays in on his watch. The foot-dragging is not about some sincere or legitimate sense that the troops need to be trained on how to deal with gays; it’s because they don’t want to be around when the policy happens.” Emphasis mine.
As for the substance of that training, in addition to the military scenario vignettes already created by the Working Group, why did no one ask why the modules applying to gays that the Defense Equal Opportunity Management Institute has been using for decades to train managers of 700,000 civilian DoD employees couldn’t be used rather than wasting further time trying to reinvent the proverbial wheel?
Stanley and Cartwright’s responses about already existing legal remedies for gays who are discriminated against post repeal, for instance, in promotions was so much bullshit. In 2004, SLDN said:
“There is no available avenue for service members who would typically report discrimination [based on sexual orientation] through an equal opportunity office. … In reality when a service member does report it through the chain of command it is rarely taken seriously. There’s no consequence for commanders who ignore anti-gay harassment. The environment has created second-class citizenship for gay and lesbian service members and it permeates all military.”
And I was surprised that no one pointed out that the recent scandal of videos starring no less than the XO of the 6000 troop aircraft carrier Enterprise was glaring proof of an absence of understanding and enforcement of respect for everyone among military leaders Stanley seemed so proud of.
Maybe if, rather than first class equality for gays in the military, overdue by several decades, the news was that it might be the end of the 3rd year, or into the 4th year, of Obama’s presidency before the Pentagon stops killing baby seals, more would give a damn & demand an end NOW. HELLO OUT THERE???!!!
Danny
First, the proper response to a cocksucker joke is “Your mom (or your sister, or your girlfriend, or your wife) taught me everything she knows since you could fill a football stadium with the number of guys she’s swallowed.”
Second, they should just show the troops Spartacus: Blood and Sand as well as Spartacus: Gods of the Arena (show them again, since they already watch it) and just say “treat the gay soldiers like that” – as fellow warriors.
alan brickman
Soldiers watch alot of gay porn and then go audition for it..no problem here..