the id, the ego, & the single misfiring brain cell

a time-honored tradition in the military

At 3pm today, the Senate voted 65-31 to repeal Don't Ask Don't Tell. President Obama will sign it next week.

Senator Reid has asked Secretary Gates to immediately suspend all discharges proceeding under the policy. Gates isn't doing it, though. Instead, he came forward almost immediately and said:

“It is … important that our men and women in uniform understand that while today’s historic vote means that this policy will change, the implementation and certification process will take an additional period of time,” Gates said. “In the meantime, the current law and policy will remain in effect.”

Mmmhm.

This is an interesting dilemma they have, no? B'cause, see...they already pretty much suspended discharges for homosexual behavior. As of 22 October, they changed the discharge rules. To wit:

According to Clifford Stanley, the undersecretary of defense for personnel and readiness in the DOD press release, “From this point forward and until further notice [service secretaries] are the ones who will be the separation authorities for their services.  This is not delegable.”

There have been no discharges since then.

And I didn't know "delegable" was a word.

It's an interesting problem they have. Since Maj Witt proved that the Air Force actually hurt unit effectiveness (and morale) by discharging her for her homosexuality,* I think the DoD is scared to discharge anyone else. But they have to maintain the facade that "the law is still in effect" because...well, it is. :) So instead of admitting that they're ignoring it, they maintain the facade that it's business as usual.

* She won her case against the Department of Defense on 24 September. The judge ordered the DoD to reinstate her.

This behavior has a distinguished history in the military. The DoD still doesn't admit that it ignores Article 125 of the Uniform Code of Military Justice (except - of course - when it can pin this one on a gay or lesbian). If a man has ever been kicked out of the military for getting a blowjob from his girlfriend, I've never heard of it. It is, however, officially verboten.

You're probably asking why they have to live that lie. Maybe they're punishing themselves for what they've done to gays for the last 17 years.

Naaah. They're living that lie because that's how the military does business. To wit: These are The Rules. We all pretend no one breaks The Rules when we know those rules are stupid. We wait, sometimes for decades, for the brass to figure out that some of The Rules need to be discarded, then we wait, sometimes decades longer, for them to actually do it.

That's what's going on right now. They're pretending they're still booting people out for the policy even though they aren't and they won't because this is the military's way of maintaining good order and discipline.

Don't ask me why. I just work here.

d