Belkin: Don't Like DADT? Blame Falls at the Top

Think President Obama ought to address Don't Ask, Don't Tell policy regarding gays in the military in a hurry? Then this will really get you fired up.

What I like most about Belkin's assessment is that the Pentagon and Congress can't protect the commander-in-chief from ultimate responsibility for the dismissal of capable, talented, and driven men and women from America's armed forces. Belkin cites a study--due out shortly, we're told--from a group of "experts in military law" who have determined that the president does indeed wield the power of the pen on the issue of gays in the military. If that's true, then Obama won't have to "spend his precious political capital trying to ram a repeal bill through Congress."

If political capital translates as media exposure, then at this point, if the administration feels wary about picking battles, I'd favor a quiet, Friday afternoon repeal versus a whole lot of public fanfare. Whatever it takes so long as guys like Dan Choi can continue to serve this country.

Where's DADT on the White House Web Site?

Is revision of "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy off the agenda? Via Benen, Greg Sargent catches a discouraging omission.

Same-sex Marriage and Don't Ask, Don't Tell (All in a Day)

TPM posts divergent pieces today on equality for gays. While Steve Schmidt prepares to drag the GOP kicking and screaming toward acceptance of gay marriage, Robert Gates throws cold water on high hopes regarding the military's "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy under the Obama administration.

Schmidt earned all my scorn as the architect of John McCain's 2008 campaign of bile. But this move makes me wonder if Schmidt learned something during the campaign; namely, that the big tent can't help Republicans if it's empty. Steve Benen asks how prominent Repubs will treat Schmidt for his breach with party etiquette. True, it may not be pretty. But Schmidt is on the right side of this one and, I believe, is reading the social change tea leaves correctly. He may get lambasted today, but if the GOP has any hope for a reemergence in the foreseeable future then they'll need guys like Schmidt, high-profile operatives who can move the party forward around some bigger truths. We'll see, of course, whether Schmidt truly is that guy. But I give him props for demonstrating reason at a time when, to be blunt, the Republican establishment seems to delight in shunning that particular quality.

DADT is a little harder to get my head around. It'd be one thing if administration figures framed the debate as "We have to be deliberate, we have to be smart, and our policy has to be sound." There's been some of that floating in the ether since March, when Gates made his "push that one down the road" comments on FOX. But TPM points out that Gates now goes so far as to invoke the conditional. "If we do it, it's very important that we do it right, and very carefully." My question is why does Gates invoke the conditional?

Obama and Gates may have different politics, but I think they're both smart, both thoughtful, and both very intentional. Also, I believe they both want what's good for the country. So why the hedging? Gates is Obama's guy on DADT policy, and yet he can't just come out and say "We're working on this, we're going to make this happen." Why? The NYT piece TPM refers to gives us Gates invoking Harry Truman: Truman signed the order to integrate the military in 1948, and still it took five years before it happened. Gates: “I’m not saying that’s a model for this, but I’m saying that I believe that this is something that needs to be done very, very carefully.’’

More Gates:

“To get people’s real feelings about it, you have to have almost a one-on-one private conversation,’’ Mr. Gates said. “I think it’s very difficult for people to speak in front of their peers about this issue.’’

Man, I just don't get it. Sure it's politically tricky. The idea of gays in the military always has been. But Gates sounds like he's giving cover here. Just as the GOP has to come around to same-sex marriage (if the party wants to survive), the military also has to quit discharging capable, talented, and effective soldiers who want to serve. This is not rocket science. So what's all this "if" crap?

Keeping Sight of "Don't Ask Don't Tell"

I heard that Robert Gates had gone on FOX News last weekend and pushed a promised revision of the military's Don't Ask, Don't Tell policy "down the road a little bit." Here's more Gates: "The president and I feel like we've got a lot on our plates right now," and, "It continues to be the law and any change in policy would require a change in the law . . . We will follow the law, whatever it is."

By "would require a change in the law" I take it Gates means that DADT revision/repeal would necessarily involve Congress, and that's where things get hairy. CNN offers that

Obama said he would work to end the policy, but because it is dictated by federal law, he can not end it unilaterally.

Congress must pass legislation overturning the policy, which was put into place at the beginning of the Clinton administration. Former President Bill Clinton tried to overturn the "don't ask, don't tell" policy when he took office in 1993, but he was strenuously opposed by the military leadership.

That's in direct contrast to the perception that Obama can simply issue an executive order:

By executive order, however, (and I believe I'm on solid legal ground here), Obama could indeed, at the stroke of a pen, allow "gay men and lesbians to serve openly in the military." And he should include that order among his reversals of Bush's "controversial security policies."

Because this is a security issue -- one that has been medievally delayed for 16 ridiculous years -- and that's precisely how Obama can frame it. It simply dwells among the utterly absurd that a person's open sexual orientation should dictate whether he or she can grip a rifle or translate Arabic in uniform.

That blogger goes on:

Furthermore, this -- not gay marriage -- is the issue on which Obama can call in his rather immense Rick Warren chit. The legal definition of marriage is a state issue, not a White House concern (other than, perhaps, one of "moral suasion"), but the proper fulfillment of Obama's national security obligations demands an end to the don't ask-don't tell nonsense that has interfered with those obligations for far too long.

Now, that's an interesting point, but moot since it appears Obama can't simply consign DADT to the dark ages at the stroke of a pen. While I rather like the notion that Obama might conscript Rick Warren to help endorse long overdue change, all that misses the point. DADT is no longer truly a culture war issue, and therefore Rick Warren is superfluous to the conversation.

When Gates told FOX News that DADT would have to wait, I was a little shocked, if not simply for the speed with which this administration has moved to reverse many of Bush 43's policies. Guantanamo, stem cells, labor, environment, the lasting scope of executive privilege, the global gag rule . . . I'm certainly missing some.

To be fair, while the commitment to end DADT was clear and decisive, it did not include a timeline. And so we should be patient, to a point. It's still the first 100 days, after all. If this change happens in 2009, that'd probably be enough. Not for the men and women our strapped military continues to lose as a result of bad policy, but there is a reasonable expectation for how quickly things can be finessed through Congress. And Republicans have already demonstrated their determined commitment to pure obstructionism.

Obama is almost certainly concerned to avoid Bill Clinton's 1993 mistakes on this, and will move with it when his team can definitely arm him with an upper hand. All the same, we're talking about much-needed translators, engineers, intelligence specialists, and health care providers in addition to general infantry. It's cavalier and self-defeating to believe we can continue to put such people out of work.

Remember also that Obama campaigned on being able to do more than one thing at a time. And to detractors who say he's trying to do too much, he more or less smiles and keeps on multitasking. This is why we elected him, remember? With all this in mind, and then some, Matt Yglesias calls the full plate excuse weak sauce. And I agree. As Steve Benen put it:

Do we want to discharge capable U.S. servicemen and women in the midst of two wars, based on nothing but their sexual orientation, or is military readiness a higher priority than some misguided culture war?

The gay community and ousted military are well organized on this one, but it's in all of our interests to keep an eye and to keep pressure on the administration to tackle this issue soon. I know the Joint Chiefs are busy, but maybe now that Congress has passed the budget we can get the key military policy makers together with our elected officials to shore up this crucial piece of national security policy.