The Obama administration offers a legal defense of “don’t ask, don’t tell” – on the grounds that it’s “rationally related to the government’s legitimate interest in military discipline and cohesion.” (In other words, the administration isn’t just delaying repeal, but is actively affirming the reasoning behind the policy – a policy our President Incarnate claims to oppose.)
The Obama administration offers a legal defense of the Defense of Marriage Act – on the grounds that “courts have widely held that certain marriages performed elsewhere need not be given effect, because they conflicted with the public policy of the forum.” (Quite true – the Supreme Court did uphold anti-miscegenation laws, for example. Still, an awkward precedent for this administration to invoke, one would have thought.)
Meet the new boss, same as the old boss.
Y’know what would be funny? If after having revealed that stance on DADT, whoever was in charge on the ground in Afghanistan outed himself in protest.
A thought: does DADT + that the POTUS is the commander in chief of the armed forces => no gay POTUS?
Is there really anything unlibertarian about DADT? Or, for that matter, about actively making sure no gays end up in the military?
It seems to me that the situation is something like this: The government steals money and other resources, so that it may set up a variety of programs and nonsense, and is then restrictive about the use of said nonsense. Much like the Mafia in restricting their members to Italians. But what would we think of two people arguing about the mob’s racist policies? “The mob really ought to be more open in their hiring. It’s discrimination!” “No no no. Standards must be kept. Mobsters have difficult jobs. They can’t just let anybody in, or they could never fully trust each other!” The argument seems to miss the real point: The mob is a criminal enterprise to be opposed root and branch. Arguing about the merits of their (non rights violating) practices treats the existence of the mob as a given. But it is the existence of the mob that is the real issue.
My feelings about DADT are that arguments about whether the policy is just or unjust tend to assume the legitimacy (or unavoidability) of the government military. (And I certainly realize you are not doing this.) Keeping or abandoning DADT are both subsets of an unacceptable situation.
Furthermore, would it really be that bad if the military discriminated much more severely? Only white males. Or, even better, only second generation Mongolian-American lesbians. It seems to me that the more restrictive the government is in its hiring, the less employees it will tend to have.
Is it…. a VEERUS (known as “virus” to us white folks)?
Thanks Professor Long! That discussion addressed most of the points I was interested in.
Why your reply appears before my post that you were replying to is one more of those unutterable mysteries …
No mystery here. Just an accident on my part.
But your reply also has an earlier timestamp than the comment it’s replying to.
And the mystery resumes…
There was a discussion about this here last month. Unfortunately the nastiness that has been deleting or truncating posts seems to have infected that talkback (I’m beginning to fear this may go all the way back) but you can read the surviving posts.