matthearn.com

Lots of interesting happenings in gay rights over the last few weeks. The Prop 8 trial concluded testimony in California last week, with closing arguments and judgments to come later. Yesterday, a major hearing was held on “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” with Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, Admiral Michael Mullen, pressing for a repeal of the policy. Conservatives, of course, are opposed. Bill Kristol had this to say:

There is no basic right to serve in the military. That’s why forms of discrimination we would ban in civilian life are permitted: Women have less opportunity to fight than men. The disabled are discriminated against, as are the short, the near-sighted, and the old.

Advocates of repeal will say sexual orientation is irrelevant to military performance in a way these attributes are not. But this is not clearly true given the peculiar characteristics of military service.

He doesn’t actually spell out what those peculiar characteristics are. He also quotes John McCain, who said:

This successful policy has been in effect for over 15 years, and it is well understood and predominantly supported by our military at all levels. We have the best trained, best equipped, and most professional force in the history of our country, and the men and women in uniform are performing heroically in two wars. At a time when our Armed Forces are fighting and sacrificing on the battlefield, now is not the time to abandon the policy.

This is the same John McCain who said in 2006:

We have the most qualified, the bravest and most capable military we‘ve ever had in our history, and so I think that the policy is working. And I understand the opposition to it, and I‘ve had these debates and discussions, but the day that the leadership of the military comes to me and says, Senator, we ought to change the policy, then I think we ought to consider seriously changing it because those leaders in the military are the ones we give the responsibility to.

Huh.

Responding to Kristol, Glenn Greenwald had this to say, which is spot on:

In American culture, there has long been a group of men (typified by Kristol and [Michael] O’Hanlon) who equate toughness and masculinity with fighting wars, yet who also know that they lack the courage of their own convictions, and thus confine themselves to cheerleading for wars from afar and sending others off to fight but never fighting those wars themselves. It seems that individuals plagued by that affliction are eager to avoid having it rubbed in their faces that there are large numbers of homosexual warriors who possess the courage (the “testosterone-laden tough-guyness”) which the O’Hanlons and Kristols, deep down, know they lack.

Chris Matthews had a fellow named Peter Sprigg of the “Family Research Council” on his show to discuss DADT, and he said:

As Sprigg mounted an increasingly illogical defense of the policy based on discrimination, Matthews pressed him on the question: “Do you think we should outlaw gay behavior?”

“I think that the Supreme Court decision in Lawrence v. Texas which overturned the sodomy laws in this country was wrongly decided,” said Sprigg. “I think there would be a place for criminal sanctions against homosexual behavior.”

“So we should outlaw gay behavior?” asked Matthews again.

Yes,” said Sprigg.

How about that.