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Today, Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell Became Even More Dishonorable

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Obama’s Call For 21,000 Troops To Afghanistan Makes Gay Troops Indispensable

 

Today, President Obama announced far-reaching plans that commit the United States to aggressive action in Afghanistan and Pakistan, possibly for the next quarter-century. Initially, the president is asking for $1.5 billion each year for the next five years, and is ordering 21,000 additional U.S. troops to train Afghan security forces, and hundreds of civilians from the State Department and other US Government agencies to assist the Afghan government.

Where are all these people going to come from? 

Think about this for a moment:

“Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell, Don’t Pursue”, the law of the land since 1993, is responsible for the discharge of over 12,000 service men and women, at a direct cost of over $363 million – and those figures are only through 2006. And that doesn’t even take into account the actual value those men and women added to the military.

Consider this post I wrote just a few weeks ago:

Nathaniel Frank, author of “Unfriendly Fire: How the Gay Ban Undermines the Military and Weakens America”, appeared on The Daily Show last night and offered an interesting theory: The military’s ban on gays is in part responsible for the success of the 9/11 attacks. 

It’s well-known that the military has discharged dozens of Arabic linguistics because of their homosexuality.

About four minutes into the video, Frank says, “You know that on September 10th, 2001, the U.S. government intercepted a cable that said, ‘Tomorrow is zero-hour.’ It wasn’t translated until the 12th because we didn’t have enough Arabic linguists.”

Think about that again: “didn’t have enough Arabic linguists.”

The military has fired over 12,000 people, the sole reason for their termination is because they are gay.

Just a handful of those people, possibly just one, could have been the difference between 9/11 being just a warm day in September, and the day 3000 innocent people died and the world was changed forever.

I’ll go one step further: Taking Nathaniel Frank’s premise, had we translated that cable and been able to act, the global economy wouldn’t be in such terrible shape right now. The US wouldn’t be spending an average of ten billion dollars a month, for the past six years, in Iraq. The bailouts wouldn’t be as damaging to the economy, to the strength of the US dollar, because we’d have more money around. 

If you’ve lost your job because of the recession, there’s a chance you wouldn’t have, had 9/11 not happened, had we not gone into Iraq, had we kept our eye on the ball in other areas. Tell me I’m playing the “what-if” game if you want, but these are serious “what-ifs”.

Regardless of your personal view of homosexuality, regardless of your personal view of gays in the military, the fact is that gay men and women have served in the military since there was a military. The fact is that in many other countries, gay men and women serve in the military, openly, without damaging “unit cohesion”, which is a made-up term that had no meaning until “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” had to actually be justified.

In 2003, ten years after Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell became law, 91% of military-aged men and women “were supportive of allowing gays to serve openly, as were 85 percent of all women, and 73 percent of all men.” Last year, 75% of Americans “said gay people who are open about their sexual orientation should be allowed to serve in the U.S. military, up from 62 percent in early 2001 and 44 percent in 1993.”

And the fact is that our troops have done double, triple tours of duty, their time home has been compromised, their families have had to shoulder the burden of lost wages and lost companionship. Surely, if you were to ask every soldier if twelve thousand openly gay men and women were back in the armed forces, and they could in turn spend more time with their own families, surely they would say, “yes”.

Two former chairmen of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, John Shalikashvili and Colin Powell have said, “Yes.”
Senator Sam Nunn has said “Yes.”
113 Congressmen in the US House of Representatives have said, “Yes.”

It’s time for you to say “Yes”, too. 

 

(photo: dbking)

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News

Watch: House Dem Mocks Republicans by Thanking Them for Taking Time Away From ‘Trump’s Memorial Service to David Koresh’

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March 29, 2023

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U.S. Rep. Jared Moskowitz (D-FL) mocked the entire GOP Wednesday afternoon by sardonically thanking his Republican colleagues for taking time away from Donald Trump’s “memorial service to David Koresh,” referring to the ex-president’s rally Saturday in Waco, Texas during the 30th anniversary of that deadly siege.

“I want to thank the majority for finding the time to fit this hearing in between attending former President Trump’s memorial service to David Koresh, just last week, who was a real advocate for young girls in this country.”

Congressman Moskowitz was referring to the Branch Davidian religious cult leader who allegedly was a polygamist and child sex abuser. In 1993, the ATF’s attempt to serve a warrant on Koresh for “unlawful possession of fully automatic machine guns and destructive devices” turned into a 51-day siege of his Waco compound, which ended with the deaths of 86 people. Experts point to that event as fueling the rise of right-wing domestic terrorism, including by Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh.

READ MORE: Here’s How Five Republicans in Congress Are Responding to the Mass Shooting of 3 Children and 3 Adults in Nashville (Video)

Wednesday’s hearing of a House Oversight Committee subcommittee focused on Washington, D.C. also offered Rep. Moskowitz the opportunity to pose this question related to Monday’s Nashville school mass shooting: “Do you think parents, putting their young kids into pajamas at night, and tucking them into bed, do you think they’re worried about public urination in Washington, D.C. or do you think they’re worried about sending their kid to school and their kid not coming home?”

Moskowitz wasn’t done blasting Republicans for refusing to do anything to address mass shootings after Monday’s school massacre in Nashville.

“You know, speaking of crime, Republican on Republican crime, former President Donald Trump held a rally in Waco, Texas with his ‘Rasputin’ Ted Nugent. He said the number one national security threat to this great nation isn’t Russia or China or DC crime. But is an 81-year old slip and fall survivor in Minority Leader Mitch McConnell. I’m just wondering if we’re gonna find time in between, you know, some folks here attending the next rally to celebrating Timothy McVeigh, if we’re gonna find time to hold a hearing on mass murder in schools? When are we holding that hearing?”

Watch there videos above or at this link.

READ MORE: ‘Troubling Questions’: Experts Slam Ginni Thomas’ Group That Waged Cultural War Against the Left via Web of Dark Money Orgs

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News

No Indictment in the Trump Hush Money Payoff Case for at Least Another Month

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March 29, 2023

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Despite his false claim he would be indicted last week, Donald Trump isn’t going to see any indictment any time soon – at least not by New York District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s grand jury investigating his role in the hush money payoff to Stormy Daniels.

The grand jury will be on hiatus from the Trump case for the next month, according to Politico, which says the break was previously planned.

Jurors are not expected to hear any evidence in the case this week or next week, and will break for the Passover holiday next Thursday. They will be off for the following two weeks, Politico’s source says, citing a schedule drawn up in January.

“There is no official deadline for bringing an indictment against Trump, although there were indications in recent weeks that the grand jury’s activity was nearing a vote, particularly when prosecutors offered Trump the chance to testify before the panel. That is typically one of the final steps of a criminal investigation,” Politico notes.

READ MORE: Here’s How Five Republicans in Congress Are Responding to the Mass Shooting of 3 Children and 3 Adults in Nashville (Video)

There is one caveat to the “no official deadline” claim. Journalist Marcy Wheeler notes, if the grand jury “were to charge witness tampering in conjunction with the Costello [communications] to [Michael] Cohen, they would create a hard deadline before the end of April.”

Costello is Robert Costello, who Trump asked the grand jury to interview, hoping he would refute his longtime former attorney’s testimony.

Of course, anything is possible and DA Bragg could call the grand jury into session at any time.

There is also the unlikely possibility that he will not ask them to vote on an indictment in the case. They could also vote against indicting Trump.

 

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COMMENTARY

Here’s How Five Republicans in Congress Are Responding to the Mass Shooting of 3 Children and 3 Adults in Nashville (Video)

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March 29, 2023

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There are 535 seats in the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives, and another six non-voting seats for delegates. After Monday’s horrific mass shooting at a private Christian elementary school, where three nine-year olds and three adults were shot to death, very few Members appeared on-camera to talk with reporters about the tragedy.

The Democrats who did advocated for various gun control measures, including reinstating the federal assault weapons ban signed into law in 1994 by President Bill Clinton that Republican lawmakers and President George W. Bush refused to renew in 2004, after which mass shootings and gun violence skyrocketed.

President Joe Biden this week repeatedly called on Congress to pass an assault weapons ban, a call he has made over and over again.

70 times.

In addition to calling for an assault weapons ban, House and Senate Democrats responded to the mass shooting at Covenant Presbyterian Elementary in Nashville by calling for tighter gun control measures including implementing red flag laws.

READ MORE: ‘Troubling Questions’: Experts Slam Ginni Thomas’ Group That Waged Cultural War Against the Left via Web of Dark Money Orgs

The parents of the Nashville shooter have said their child had an emotional disorder and should not have had any firearms. Three were used in the assault and another four were found at the shooter’s home. Tennessee has no red flag law so police were not legally allowed to take the guns away.

After last year’s school mass shooting in Uvalde, Texas, where 19 children and two adults were shot to death, some states took action. Tennessee, where the Nashville school shooting became the nation’s 130th this year, did little.

“We’re not looking at gun restriction laws in my administration right now,” Tennessee Governor Bill Lee, a Republican, said after the tragedy. “Criminals don’t follow laws, criminals break laws. Whether they are a gun law, a drug law, criminals break laws.”

“We can’t control what they do.”

But in a sense, Governor Lee did control what they do.

READ MORE: Tennessee Governor Slammed After ‘Praying’ for Nashville School Community Without Mentioning Mass Shooting

In 2021 ago he signed into law a permit-less open-carry law: no permit required, no training required, no background check required.

A Tennessee Republican U.S. Congressman, Tim Burchett this week repeatedly decreed there’s nothing that can be done.

Echoing almost word-for-word Governor Lee’s remarks from three years ago, in now-viral video, Rep. Burchett infamously on Monday declared, “We’re not gonna fix it. Criminals are going to be criminals.”

He did, however, invoke religion, calling for a Christian revival, and declaring that was the answer to fixing mass shootings and gun violence.

On Tuesday Rep. Burchett was back in front of the cameras, furthering his call to do nothing.

“I don’t know what law we could pass,” he said. “Evil people are going to do evil things.”

U.S. Rep. Ken Buck (R-CO) appeared on CNN this week and responded to the Nashville slaughter by defending his threat to President Biden to try to take his AR-15 away.

In a rare example of excellent journalism, CNN’s Phil Mattingly pressed Buck after the far-right Republican tried to change the topic.

“If Joe Biden is interested in reaching a resolution on the issue let him deal with the Southern border,” Buck defiantly declared, literally blaming President Biden’s border policies for gun violence.

He also tried to link the Nashville mass shooting to a mental health problem and then tried to link that to drug laws and a lack of funding for states for mental health services.

Rep. Buck last year voted against two mental health bills, and since 2019 has voted against the vast majority of 40 or so health care bills.

“What’s the burden on you?” Matttingly asked Buck.

READ MORE: New WSJ Poll Is Devastating for DeSantis and His ‘Anti-Woke’ Policies

Unyieldingly, Buck replied, “My burden is to follow the Constitution, and the Second Amendment protects – there are more than two million AR-15s.”

Republican U.S. Congressman Andy Ogles, who represents Nashville, Tennessee and came under fire again this week for his 2021 Christmas card showing him and his family, including young children, holding assault weapons, was asked about banning AR-15s.

Rep. Ogles’ response was to answer the question with another question: “Why not talk about the real issue facing this country?” which he declared, like Rep. Buck and others, is mental health. He then walked away.

U.S. Rep. Byron Donalds (R-FL) took a different tact on the GOP’s do-nothing policy while supporting the GOP’s walk-away response.

He equated assault weapons with politics and emotions.

“If you’re gonna talk about the AR-15 you’re talking politics now,” he told CNN’s Manu Raju. “Let’s not get into politics. let’s not get into emotion, because emotion feels good, but emotion doesn’t solve problems.”

He then just walked away.

But perhaps the greatest example of the Republican response to gun violence and mass shootings came from House Republican’s leader, Speaker Kevin McCarthy.

On Tuesday, McCarthy stood in the Capitol’s Statuary Hall to pose for photos with some tourists.

CNN’s Manu Raju asked the Speaker about the “incredibly serious situation” in Nashville, suggesting it required a response from the Speaker of the House.

McCarthy’s response?

He refused to provide one, then walked away.

Watch the videos above or at this link.

 

 

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