Last week, Defense Secretary Robert Gates — after 1,260 days in office in which more than 2,000 people have been discharged under Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell (DADT) — belatedly issued more lenient guidelines for enforcing the policy that prohibits gays and lesbians from openly serving in the military. The new rules represent the first significant step by the administration in addressing the policy, but they’re not necessarily an indication of how committed the military is to repealing DADT. In fact, some military leaders, including Gates, continue to insist that Congress should not change the policy or impose a moratorium on discharges before the Pentagon completes its year-long review. Others, like Marine Commandant James Conway and General Benjamin Mixon are publicly opposing repeal.

On Tuesday, Army Chief of Staff Gen. George Casey — who testified last month that a moratorium would complicate the Pentagon’s study — said that “any resistance must be understood and addressed in order for a potential repeal to be effectively implemented,” suggesting that the military would slow-walk the process. “You get a sense that, at least within the Army, a little better than half the force is probably opposed to the repeal right now, given what they know,” Casey told CQ in an interview:

In his most extensive comments yet on the issue of gays in the military, the Army chief said the opposition to allowing gays to serve openly runs deep and needs to be approached carefully. He said he fears a repeal could even result in some midcareer personnel — the service’s backbone — retiring prematurely. But he also allowed that education and leadership can help allay fear and uncertainty about a possible change.

“What I worry about is you’ve got a force that’s already been stretched and been at war for eight-and-a-half years,” he said. “The young company commanders and midlevel non-commissioned officers — the ones who would have to implement this policy — when I talk to them, they’re kind of in the mode of, ‘My God, what else do you want us to do right now?’ Those are the folks that are frankly the ones that are most at risk. If the midlevel and non-commissioned officers start walking, they’re the ones that take a decade to grow. I don’t want to overdo that, but that’s a possibility.”

But Casey’s concerns of mass resignations are unsubstantiated. “Studies done by and for the Pentagon for the past 50 years and the experiences of our closest allies, like the British, Canadians, and the Israelis, demonstrate that allowing openly gay people to serve will not undermine unit cohesion or military readiness” or lead to mass resignations. Moreover, the personal opinions of military members — who already serve alongside gay and lesbian soldiers — should not determine the policy. As Rep. Susan Davis’ (D-CA) explained, we have previously desegregated the armed forces despite the military’s opposition to integration and allowed women in without regard to military or public opinion. “It’s not usual for us to go to the military and to have necessarily them believe that their personal feelings are going to determine the policy that moves forward,” she said. They should be surveyed, but they should not be determinative.

If anything almost all of the polls show that a growing number of servicemembers have no problem serving with openly gay or lesbian troops:

- 73% of Iraq and Afghanistan veterans say it is “personally acceptable to them if gay and lesbian people were allowed to serve openly in the military.” [The Vet Voice Foundation, 3/2010]

- 51% of active-duty troops oppose allowing gay men and women to serve openly in the military, down from nearly two-thirds 65% in 2004. [Military Times, 2/2010]

- 73% of military members are comfortable with lesbians and gays. [Zogby Poll, 12/2006]

As CAP’s Larry Korb argues in the Huffington Post, Gates “must speed up the work of the high-level group that is examining the administrative and legal changes that must be made when DADT is repealed and drop his opposition to Congress replacing DADT until the Pentagon completes its year-long review. There is no plausible reason that it needs to take a year to make the changes necessary to implement DADT or why it is necessary to complete the review before repealing the law.” “Gates and Mullen must push back not only on statements like those made by Mixon and Conway, but those of commanders like General David Petraeus, who said he was withholding judgment on whether to drop the ban until he sees the impact on recruitment and retention. That day is past,” Korb writes.

Fortunately, some military officials seem to have already adopted this line of thinking. Army Secretary John McHugh said today that he’s interpreting Gates’ new guidelines as a de facto moratorium on third-party discharges and promised not to take action against members who have have told him they are gay.

Recently, the Catholic Church — and even the Pope himself — have been coming under increasing criticism for failing to appropriately discipline church officials who had sexually abused thousands of children. On March 24th, the New York Times characterized “Pope Benedict XVI’s latest apology for the emerging global scandal of child abuse by predatory priests,” as inadequate, noting that Benedict “made no mention of the need to discipline diocesan leaders most responsible for shielding hundreds of priests from criminal penalties by moving them from parish to parish to continue their crimes.”

The Catholic League responded the op-ed by running an ad in the New York Times criticizing the paper for its editorial and blaming the scandal on homosexuality:

The argument itself is confusing and contradictory. If “homosexuality does not cause predatory behavior” then why is is the “pedophilia crisis” a “homosexual crisis”? Most of the molesters were also over the age 30 but the Catholic League does not rename the “pedophilia crisis” an “older man crisis” or an “white older man” crisis or anything of the sort. But all this misses the point. What the Catholic League is trying to do is imply that there is a connection between homosexuality and molestation, just like segregationists once accused African Americans of raping white women, and Jews were accused of murdering Christian babies.

In reality, pedophilia has little to do with the gender of the child or the orientation of the molester; pedophiles are attracted to youth and control. “Accessibility is more the factor in who a pedophile abuses,” psychotherapist Joe Kort writes. “This may explain the high incidence of children molested in church communities and fraternal organizations, where the pedophile may more easily have access to children.”

Last night on Larry King Live, Catholic League President Bill Donahue tried to dismiss this argument by claiming that “it’s not a pedophilia” because “most of the victims were post pubescent,” as old as 12 or 13 years of age. Anything older than that is the fault of gays.

The New York Times reported in January that President Obama, who deeply believes banning gay men and women from serving openly in the military is “just wrong,” was finally spurred to push for repeal of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell by the realization that “if he did not change the policy, his administration would be forced to defend publicly the constitutionality of a law he had long opposed.”

Unfortunately, that’s exactly what the Justice Department is doing, defending the constitutionality of DADT against a lawsuit filed by the Log Cabin Republicans in 2004. This brief, submitted yesterday, notes that Congress is considering repealing the policy, but quotes “from retired Gen. Colin Powell’s statements nearly two decades ago in favor of the gays-in-the-military ban without noting that Powell has since reversed himself on the issue.” The brief also regurgitates numerous conservative talking points:

- General Colin Powell similarly testified that, “[t]o win wars, we create cohesive teams of warriors who will bond so tightly that they are prepared to go into battle and give their lives if necessary for the accomplishment of the mission and for the cohesion of the group and for their individual buddies.” Id. Congress found that unit cohesion is improved by reducing or eliminating the potential for sexual tension to distract the members of the unit, and by protecting the personal privacy of service members.

- General Powell testified that homosexual conduct in units “involves matters of privacy and human sexuality that, . . . if allowed to exist openly in the military, would affect the cohesion and well-being of the force.”…He further testified that “it would be prejudicial to good order and discipline” if the military required heterosexuals and persons who demonstrate that they do or are likely to engage in homosexual acts “to share the most private facilities together,” id. at 283, and that “[c]ohesion is strengthened or weakened in the intimate living arrangements we force upon our people.

- Among other things, Congress determined that the statute was necessary because “[t]he presence in the Armed Forces of persons who demonstrate a propensity or intent to engage in homosexual acts would create an unacceptable risk to the high standards of morale, good order and discipline, and unit cohesion that are the essence of military capability.

Gen. Collin Powell officially announced his opposition to DADT back in February, noting that “attitudes and circumstances have changed.” Yet DOJ continues to cite his outdated views to justify a policy that the government is supposed to be unraveling.

All this puts Obama and repeal advocates in a strange position. It’s difficult to push for reform and push back against supporters of the policy when the federal government is using their arguments to defend it. If anything will motivate the president and his national security team to begin working directly with Congress to get repeal legislation into this year’s defense authorization bill, this is it.

In October, President Obama signed The Matthew Shepard Act, expanding the reach of the 1969 hate crimes law to “authorize the Department of Justice to investigate and prosecute certain bias-motivated crimes based on the victim’s actual or perceived sexual orientation, gender, gender identity, or disability.” Previously, the law only allowed for the federal prosecution of anyone who “willingly injures, intimidates or interferes with another person, or attempts to do so, by force because of the other person’s race, color, religion or national origin.”

State lawmakers in Oklahoma argued that the Shepard Act would trample on the free speech rights of religious leaders “who preached out against the lifestyle of the victim who was attacked.” On March 10, the Oklahoma state Senate thought it was passing a bill prohibiting “local and state law enforcement agencies from sharing information about hate crimes with federal authorities if the state of Oklahoma did not recognize the crime as a hate crime by its own statutes.” Oklahoma state law does not recognize “sexual orientation or gender identity” as a special class and fails to provide gay and lesbians with hate crimes protections.

But in trying to strip gays and lesbians of their rights, the Oklahoma State Senate inadvertently cited the wrong section of the U.S. code. The bill stripped protections under Title 18 U.S. Code Section 245, but protections for sexual orientation and gender identity is actually under Section 249. From the bill:

Section 24A.12. Except as otherwise provided by state or local law, the Attorney General of the State of Oklahoma and agency attorneys authorized by law, the office of the district attorney of any county of the state, and the office of the municipal attorney of any municipality may keep its litigation files and investigatory reports confidential, except they shall keep their litigation files and investigatory reports confidential upon request of any federal agency when such request is made for the purpose of an attempt to investigate or prosecute an individual or individuals pursuant to 18 U.S.C. Section 245, except for those records of any individuals convicted pursuant to Section 850 of Title 21 of the Oklahoma Statutes.

Section 245 of the Code refers to race and religious protections. Therefore, Oklahoma actually passed a statute allowing state law enforcement officials to keep information about crimes motivated by race or religion out of the hands of federal authorities.

“The bill in its current form doesn’t take away rights from gays and lesbians,” Oklahoma State Senate Minority Leader Andrew Rice explained. “It takes away rights for religion and race.” Rice said the error occurred during the creation of the bill. “This is most likely a legislative error or at least a typo,” he said. “Gay and lesbian citizens should be upset because someone tried to take their rights away, but minority groups should be concerned that their rights have already been voted to be taken away by the Senate.” “People who consider themselves Jewish, black, even Christians should be outraged,” he added. The bill will likely be modified before it is voted on in the House.

Yesterday, Virginia Governor Bob McDonnell — who recently issued an Executive Directive 1 stating that discrimination “based on factors such as one’s sexual orientation or parental status” will not be tolerated — said that gays and lesbians do not need protections against workplace discrimination because “there isn’t really any rampant discrimination on any basis in Virginia.” The state discriminates only “based on merit and ability and getting results” in hiring decisions, McDonnell told WRVA’s Ask the Governor program, adding that he would probably not sign a law that included protections for gays and lesbians:

MCDONNELL: First of all, I don’t know if we need it. Based on the numbers I’ve seen, there isn’t really any rampant discrimination on any basis in Virginia…the question is, is that really need? As I said, this is going to be an administration, like previous administrations that isn’t going to discriminate. So, if you’re going to have a law, it needs to actually address a real problem and you know, I would have to look at that when it gets to me.

Listen:

McDonnell’s categorical denial of discrimination in state hiring practices would surprise some in his very own government. On March 31st, the Supreme Court of Virginia will hold oral arguments on the case of Michael Moore v. Virginia Museum of Natural History, in which Moore is claiming that he was fired from his job at the museum for being gay.

Over at the Bilerico Project, Moore’s attorney Michael Hamar writes, “It is hard to tell what the Virginia Supreme Court will rule in the matter. If the Court adopts the Attorney General’s arguments in the case, it will confirm that McDonnell’s Executive Directive 1 (2010) is a meaningless political stunt. If the Court accepts the arguments in the briefs submitted on behalf of Moore, employment discrimination – at least when involving state agencies and departments – based upon sexual orientation/religious belief will be struck down as illegal under the U.S. Constitution.”

Yesterday, as Secretary of Defense Robert Gates issued more lenient guidelines for enforcing Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell, General James Conway — Commandant of the U. S. Marine Corps — reiterated his opposition to repealing the policy and told Military.com he will insist that the Marines have the option of not living alongside gay servicemembers:

CONWAY: We just think that our corps will not want to see it changed. If it is changed, it’s going to require some leadership, engaging, to ensure our order are carried out. It’s going to require some resources. Because right now we billet by twos. We’re the only service that billets by twos. We like that, we want to continue doing that. But I would not ask our Marines to live with someone who is homosexual, if we could possibly avoid it. And to me, it means we have to build BEQs [Bachelor/Base Enlisted Quarters] that have single rooms.

QUESTION: Why not, why wouldn’t you let them live with someone who’s homosexual?

CONWAY: Well, ah. I think, I think, one I would, in this case, want to preserve the right of a Marine who thinks he or she wouldn’t want to do that. Okay? And again, that’s the overwhelming number of people that say they wouldn’t like to do so.

Listen:

Marines are forced to do and live in a whole host of disagreeable conditions and it’s unclear why Conway wants to preserve Marine choice “in this case,” particularly since “men and women of all races, religions, and values train together, sleep in extremely close quarters, and eat in the same mess halls without detriment to unit cohesion or military effectiveness.” Living with a gay servicemember, however, is apparently so insidious that Conway must carve out a special exemption for those Marines who “wouldn’t want to do that.”

Should his request be granted, the United States will become the only nation (of the 25 that have dropped the ban) that segregates its servicemembers on the basis of sexual orientation. As Larry Korb argues in this new report, “the militaries of Great Britain, Canada, and Israel amply demonstrate that lifting the ban on openly gay service will not require the U.S. military to provide separate housing, shower, or other common-use facilities for gay and lesbian service members.” In fact, even General Carl Mundy, commandant of the Marine Corps from 1991 to 1995 and an opponent of a repeal, has predicted that segregating the forces “would be absolutely disastrous in the armed forces. …It would destroy any sense of cohesion or teamwork or good order and discipline.”

In February, Defense Secretary Robert Gates ordered a 45-day review into how the Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell military policy could be enforced more humanely, and this morning Gates announced more lenient guidelines for enforcing the ban against homosexual conduct and behavior. The new rules, which would apply to all pending and future discharge cases, effectively limit enforcement of the policy to those cases where a servicemember actively outs himself or herself:

- Raise the level of the officer who is authorized to start a fact-finding inquiry or order a separation proceeding

- Raise what constitutes credible information to begin a fact finding inquiry. Information provided by third parties should be given under oath and use of hearsay will be discouraged.

- Revise what constitutes a reliable person. Special scrutiny on third parties that may be motivated to harm the accused servicemember.

- Certain confidential information from lawyers, clergy, doctors and security clearance information cannot be used to begin a separation.

Watch it:

During the press conference, both Gates and Mike Mullen — the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff — reiterated that they did not recommend changing the law before the Pentagon completes its year-long study of the policy. “There is a great deal we don’t know about this, in terms of the views of our servicemembers, in terms of the views of their families and influences,” Gates said. “There is a lot we’d have to address in terms of what would be required in the way of changed regulations in terms of benefits. There are a lot of unanswered questions in terms of the implementation of this.”

But many are arguing that changing the regulations is easier and can be done more expeditiously than Gates and Mullen are suggesting. On Tuesday, the Center for American Progress released a report noting that any repeal “of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell [must] not be perceived as a complicated puzzle requiring complex solutions to minor problems.”

The report points out that “numerous official government studies dating back to the 1950s” have already confirmed that “reversing the ban on gays and lesbians in the military will not undermine unit effectiveness or cohesion” and recommends dealing with benefits by applying the June 2009 White House memo — that establishes a procedure for extending certain benefits to the same-sex partners of federal civil service employees — to same-sex partners of service members. Read the full report here.

Last month, Servicemembers United — a national organization of gay and lesbian troops and veterans — proposed a plan that would lock in a date for full Congressional repeal and give the military 18 months to “do its studies, work through its issues, and plan for successful implementation.”

Over in England, Tory leader David Cameron has been “courting the gay vote over the past 12 months” and is “fielding a number of openly gay candidates at the next general election,” but during a recent interview with Gay Times magazine, he struggled to justify the party’s weak voting record on gay issues.

Asked why, “in light of his recent pronouncements on gay rights” and belief that gay equality is a fundamental human right, his party refused to “support a motion condemning a homophobic law in Lithuania,” Cameron fumbled with an answer before asking the magazine to pause the interview:

CAMERON: The party has changed and I think all center-right parties, all conservative parties have to go on this journey and I think we’ve probably gone a bit further and faster than some conservative parties in other countries and there won’t be any turning back. So I understand the concern, but I think the change that’s happened is rea, lasting and irreversible.

QUESTION: But when you say you have free votes in this Parliament. The Parliament for which you are responsible. If you accept, as you did in the beginning of the interview that gay equality is basically a fundamental human right, it shouldn’t be a free vote.

CAMERON: You’re right…the two votes are very different, sorry….You know, it’s right that it should be a free vote…Can we stop for a second? I really want to answer these questions…I almost like to start completely from scratch…

Watch it:

The Guardian points out that last summer, “Cameron offered a public apology for section 28, the controversial Tory legislation introduced in the 1980s that banned the “promotion” of homosexuality in schools” even though he voted “against the repeal of section 28 as recently as 2003.

So in Britain, the change in conservative attitudes towards gay rights seems more rhetorical than substantive, which, incidentally, would be considered progress in the States, where many lawmakers are still trafficking homophobic slurs and innuendos.

Today, the Center for American Progress released a new report urging President Obama and his national security team to “begin working directly with Congress to enact legislation decisively overturning” the military’s Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell policy. Emphasizing that the Pentagon’s ongoing review is designed to study how rather than whether the policy should be overturned, the report argues that Congress should act swift and decisively to repeal the policy.

To that end, it reviews the experiences of Great Britain, Canada and Israel and concludes that any repeal “of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell [must] not be perceived as a complicated puzzle requiring complex solutions to minor problems.” The report notes eight areas “where we believe the military must change rules and regulations in order to effectively implement the new policy”:

1. Training: Mandate that the Department of Defense make sexual orientation part of existing servicewide nondiscrimination training programs.

2. Legal issues arising from repeal: After “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” is repealed, there will be no federal law prohibiting service members’ same-sex partners from receiving certain benefits afforded to the same-sex partners of civilian DoD employees and employees of other federal agencies, including the State Department. Certain benefits can be provided if the president revises and reissues his June 2009 White House memo on same-sex domestic partners to include the military services.

3. Housing and common-use facilities: Signal clearly that the military will not segregate housing, showering, and other common-use facilities based on sexual orientation.

4. Benefits: “There is no federal law (beyond “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell”) that prohibits the president from applying the June 2009 White House memo that establishes a procedure for extending certain benefits to the same-sex partners of federal civil service employees to same-sex partners of service members.

5. Code of Conduct issues: Congress should repeal the ban on sodomy in the Uniform Code of Military Justice, which is rarely enforced on heterosexuals, and replace it with a ban on all sexual acts that undermine good order and discipline.

6. Discipline and promotion: The military’s equal opportunity program should be amended to include issues of sexual orientation, as discussed in the training section.

7. Retroactive compensation and reinstatement: DoD should allow previously discharged service members the opportunity to re-enlist provided that they meet all other age, fitness, moral, and educational standards as all other prior service members must.

8. Health concerns: Existing health regulations are adequate and do not need to be revised, including pre-entry HIV testing and regular testing for active duty service members and troops about to deploy.

Defense Secretary Robert Gates “will lay out elements of the department’s strategy to repeal the prohibition on openly gay and lesbian servicemembers later this week.” Whether he’ll consider implementing any of the above recommendations before completing the year-long review is unclear.

Ret. General John J. Sheehan, former Supreme Allied Commander for NATO, testified before the Senate Armed Services Committee today on “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” (DADT), arguing against repeal. Sheehan argued that repeal should not occur unless the review of the policy shows that a change would improve the U.S. military with no net-negative consequences.

Committee Chairman Sen. Carl Levin (D-MI) asked Sheehan whether he had heard any complaints about unit cohesion or morale in his experience with NATO allies who have integrated forces. Sheehan not only said that he did, but he said that having openly gay men and women serve could affect combat cohesion. Singling out the Dutch military’s response to the Srebrenica genocide by the Serbs in 1995, Sheehan said that the Netherlands’ allowance of gay men and women to serve openly actually played a role in the massacre:

SHEEHAN: The case in point that I’m referring to was when the Dutch were required to defend Sbrenecia against the Serbs, the battalion was understrength, poorly led. And the Serbs came into town, handcuffed the soldiers to the telephone polls, marched the Muslims off and executed them. That was the largest massacre in Europe since World War II.

LEVIN: And did the Dutch leaders tell you it was because there were gay soldiers there?

SHEEHAN: It was a combination –

LEVIN: Did they tell you that?

SHEEHAN: Yes.

LEVIN: That’s my question.

SHEEHAN: They included that as part of the problem.

LEVIN: That there were gay soldiers among the Dutch force.

SHEEHAN: The combination was the liberalization of the military, the net effect of basically social engineering.

Later in the hearing, former Air Force Major Michael Almy — who had been discharged because of DADT — cited his experience with the Dutch army, describing their integration of openly gay soldiers as a “non-issue.” Levin also disputed Sheehan’s charge that gay men and women were not great fighters and contributed to the genocide:

LEVIN: I think we all remember Sbrenecia. But I think that any effort to connect the failure on the part of Dutch to the fact that they have homosexuals or did allow homosexuals I think is totally off target. And I’ve seen no suggestion of that, I’ve seen the failures that you talk about general, that their training being peacekeeping and not being trained to do the combat work that needed to be done is accurate. In terms of any attribution to the fact that they have allowed gays in the military is no more on point than the fact that they may have allowed Dutch Africans or women, if there were women. [...]

They were trained to be peacekeepers, not peace enforcers. I totally agree with that. But to slip over, slide over from that into a suggestion that it had something to do with the fact that homosexuals were allowed in the Dutch army suggests that somehow or other homosexuals are not great fighters. And I think that’s totally wrong.

Watch it:

Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-CT) also disputed Sheehan’s argument that integrated foreign militaries were somehow less combat ready, citing the British force, which has served alongside U.S. servicemembers in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The Srebrenica genocide was the largest mass murder in Europe since World War II. In July 1995, over 7,000 Bosnian Muslims by the Bosnian Serb Army. A force of 450 Dutch soldiers, serving as U.N. peacekeepers, were unable to prevent the massacre, but that had nothing to do with the fact that their force was integrated.

– Nick McClellan

As the Pentagon prepares to survey soldiers about President Obama’s decision to repeal Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell, a new poll of military personnel who served in the Afghanistan or Iraq wars has finds that sexual orientation is “not a burning issue that overwhelms veterans’ lives.”

The new poll, commissioned by The Vet Voice Foundation and conducted jointly by Republican and Democratic pollsters finds that most veterans are “comfortable around gay and lesbian people, believe that being gay or lesbian has no bearing on a service member’s ability to perform their duties, and would find it acceptable if gay and lesbian people were allowed to serve openly in the military.” Fifty-eight percent of veterans said they served alongside gays or lesbians, and only 22 percent thought they had not:

– 60% of Iraq and Afghanistan veterans believe that being gay or lesbian “has no bearing on a service member’s ability to perform their duties.” Only 29% disagree.

– 73% of Iraq and Afghanistan veterans say it is “personally acceptable to them if gay and lesbian people were allowed to serve openly in the military.” Only a quarter (25%) would find it unacceptable.

– 73% Iraq and Afghanistan veterans say “they are personally comfortable in the presence of gays and lesbians.” Only a quarter (23%) is uncomfortable, and hardly anyone is very uncomfortable (only 7%).

The survey, which sampled 45% self-identified Republicans and just 20% Democrats, suggests that military personnel are more comfortable serving alongside openly gay and lesbian troops than previously thought. The poll also contradicts the findings of a widely circulated Military Times survey, which reported that 58% of respondents are opposed to efforts to repealing DADT, and undermines the claims of some conservative lawmakers who claim that lifting the ban would undermine the primary goal of the military.

“Simply put, our military is the most professional organization the world has ever known. Not only will service members abide by a repeal, but they’ll largely accept it and move on to the task at hand. For all of the hyperbolic rhetoric from those opposed to a repeal, today’s military really doesn’t see an issue here,” said Jon Soltz, Chairman of the Vet Voice Foundation. Indeed, the survey concluded that veterans under age 35 lean toward favoring allowing gay and lesbian people to serve openly (41% favor to 35% oppose) while veterans over age 35 lean toward opposing by five points (31% favor, 36% oppose).

This afternoon, two Florida lawmakers introduced legislation to overturn the state’s ban on gay adoptions, something the legislature hasn’t debated in the law’s 33-year history.

Rep. Scott Randolph’s measure, which amended a bill about gun ownership and adoptions, would have prevented “adoption agencies from inquiring about a person’s sexual orientation as a requisite for adoption.” Randolph was forced to withdraw his amendment after the Speaker ruled that it was not germane to the bill. Sen. Charlie Justice also withdrew his bill in the Senate.

“This amendment points out that government should not ask irrelevant questions in the adoption process which tell us nothing about a person’s ability to provide a permanent and loving home. Rather, it’s lawful and responsible gun ownership or a person’s sexual orientation,” Randolph announced on the House floor. He also explained how lifting the ban would benefit children:

RANDOLPH: Three thousand children are in need of adoption and are waiting for us to do the right thing. But Florida’s current adoption ban does not allow gay and lesbians to adopt in this state. In an era of very tight budgets, this cost of inaction on this issue is $2.5 million a year. It’s time to let family judges and child welfare advocates do their job by making the best standard for each child to be the only standard for deciding adoption cases. The legislature has the power to stop that right now today.

Watch it:

Florida, which enacted its ban in 1977 — two years before the first reported case of an adoption by an openly gay person anywhere in the country — is the only state to explicitly prohibit gays and lesbians from adopting children. “Even those who voted for this ban more than three decades ago say they were caught up in they hysteria of the time and regret passing this legislation,” Randolph observed, referring to activist Anita Bryant’s campaign against expanded rights for homosexuals. At the time, Bryant and other conservatives claimed that “the recruitment of our children is absolutely necessary for the survival and growth of homosexuality–for since homosexuals cannot reproduce, they must recruit, they must freshen their ranks.”

“I hope there is a day very soon when this body will truly debate this issue,” Randolph said. “But unfortunately, that’s not today.” Randolph’s office told me that it’s unlikely that measure would pass the Republican dominated House or Senate, but stressed that a vote on the amendment would force lawmakers to publicly register their support for the restriction.

There is some hope that the attitude towards gay adoption is slowly changing in Florida. A recent Quinnipiac poll found that “a majority of Floridians now oppose the ban” and three recent court decisions have ruled that the ban violates Florida’s constitution. Currently, the issue is now “before Florida’s Third District Court of Appeals and is headed most likely to the state Supreme Court.”

Transcript: Read more

“I believe the time has come to consider a change to Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” General David Petraeus told the Armed Services Committee today, in his most direct public comments about the policy. “I think it should be done in a thoughtful and deliberative matter that should include the conduct of the review that Secretary Gates has directed that would consider the views in the force on the change of policy”:

PETRAEUS: It would include an assessment of the likely effects on recruiting, retention, moral and cohesion and would include an identification of what policies might be needed in the event of a change and recommend those polices as well.

Watch it:

In the last few weeks Petraeus refused to explicitly give his personal opinion about whether Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell (DADT) should be repealed and had admitted to serving with two gay CIA officers whose orientation did not undermine their performance or mission. During this testimony today, Petraeus speculated that the new study could show either positive or negative effects of allowing openly gay or lesbian soldiers to serve openly.

This week, the Pentagon’s Office of the General Counsel is also expected to release the results of its 45-day review of how Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell could be implemented in a fairer manner. Repeal advocates are unsure of what the group will propose but “have issued recommendations for changing the application of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” under the current statute.” “Among these changes are mandating evidence when a possible violation of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” comes from a fellow service member and not a civilian; eliminating anonymous tips as the basis for the start of an inquiry; and requiring that alleged homosexual conduct on which any discharge is based occurs after a service member joined the armed forces.”

This morning, CBS’s The Early Show interviewed Constance McMillen about her school’s decision to cancel prom in order to prevent her from bringing her girlfriend as a date. McMillen explained that the school first justified it’s policy against allowing same sex couples to attend the prom by claiming that it was trying to prevent pairs of students from purchasing the cheaper date tickets and gaming the system. “I explained to him that you can’t pretend like there’s not gay people at our school and if you tell people they can’t bring a same sex date, that is discrimination,” McMillen said.

McMillen expressed disappointment over the school’s decision, but said that she did not regret her request. “I was raised…to always be yourself and be proud of who you are,” McMillen said, noting that “now it’s kind of like I’m fighting for prom for everybody now.” ” And it’s like [the school is] asking you, like for prom, you can be gay, just don’t be openly gay. Just you know, hide it for a little while”:

MCMILLEN: I just want other kids to know that it’s not right for schools to do that and I want them to be able to know that they can get a hold of the ACLU or the Mississippi Safe Schools Coalition works with ACLU and they help people through stuff like this. Because schools, they shouldn’t be able to do that.

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The ACLU is now suing the high school, calling upon it to reinstate its prom for April 2. “We’re fighting tooth and nail for that to happen. We filed a lawsuit yesterday. We’re working on an emergency motion to go before the court to get the prom reinstated so that Constance can bring her girlfriend to the prom, to wear a tuxedo, and everyone can be themselves,” McMillen’s attorney Christine Sun said.

As Zaid Jilani points out however, if the school refuses to reinstate its prom, the students have another option. “After hearing about the students’ predicament, a New Orleans hotel owner has offered to pay for the students to come to New Orleans and use one of his hotel facilities for their prom.”

Sen. Mark Begich (D-AK) became the latest Democrat to support repealing Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell yesterday, telling local Alaskan television that “it’s time to move on and change the policy.” “When you look at the militaries of Canada, and Great Britain and Australia, thy don’t have any policies like this. We serve arm-in-arm with them. Right on the front lines, in Iraq, in Afghanistan. It has not caused any disruption of how we perform our duties“:

BEGICH: It’s clear that they are going to look at this issue, they’re going to look at it over a short period of time, but it’s clear that it’s kind of done it’s time. It’s beyond it’s time. It has a lot of ways, people are now re-looking at it because it is time to make the change and so depending on how it’s laid out, and the military leadership has been supportive, in general — there are some who are not supportive at this point, I think it’s done it’s time. It’s time to move on.

Watch it:

Last week, Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-CT) and 12 other Democrats — including Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Carl Levin (D-MI) — introduced legislation that would halt the discharges of gay and lesbian service members and replace DADT with a new nondiscrimination policy that “prohibits discrimination against service members on the basis of their sexual orientation.” Begich did not endorse Lieberman’s bill, however, and his office told me that he “supports the current course of reviewing how DADT will be repealed and taking part in the actions of Congress,” but “has not signed on to Lieberman’s bill.”

That legislation, called the Military Readiness Enhancement Act of 2010, mirrors Rep. Patrick Murphy’s (D-PA) repeal bill in the House but goes several steps further, laying out a timeline for repeal and setting benchmarks for the Pentagon’s ongoing review of the policy. On Monday, nine additional senators joined as co-sponsors, increasing the count to 23.

Democrats hope to include the repeal legislation in this year’s defense authorization act, but the Pentagon’s year-long review of the policy could push back this goal. During his interview, for instance, Begich predicated his support for repeal on the military’s recommendations. “I think the military brass is going through a proper procedure to make sure that they can do it in a way that doesn’t disrupt the process of what they’re doing today,” he said.

Next Thursday, retired Marine general John J. Sheehan, former Air Force major Michael D. Almy, and former Navy lieutenant Jenny Kopfstein will testify to the Senate Armed Services Committee. “Sheehan will testify in favor of maintaining the policy, Almy and Kopfstein in favor of repealing it.” Kopfstein, a lesbian and former Navy surface warfare officer separated under the law, and Almy, who’s gay and served as an Air Force communications officer for 13 years, will discuss their discharges under the policy.

Over in the comments section of my post about Gov. Bob McDonnell’s new executive directive, Basil takes me to task for overstating the importance of the governor’s proclamation:

The “executive directive” has no legal import, it is still perfectly legal and laudable in Virginia for state agencies to discriminate against state employees (or students) on the basis of sexual orientation. Absent legislation, which McConnell has consistently opposed, that remains the case. Even an executive order, although better than a directive, would probably provide no legal protection. This directive provides no legal recourse for victims of discrimination, other than a possible appeal to a governor with a long distinguished track record as a homophobe.

I tend to agree with most of this. I don’t think that McDonnell is very interested in protecting gay and lesbian state employees from discrimination and suspect that he issued this directive in response to the public outcry surrounding Cuccinelli’s order. After all, McDonnell’s February 5th executive order intentionally excluded sexual orientation from protection and the governor agreed with Cuccinielli on the school policy issue until the position just became politically untenable. And so, he responded not with a call for the legislature to pass an LGBT inclusive discriminatory measure or a revised executive order, but with a watered-down directive that does not require state agencies to take any additional actions than those already in place under the US Constitution. Certainly, this is something less than full commitment.

Also, a constitutional expert I spoke to tells me that McDonnell’s statement that “‘[d]iscrimination based on factors such as one’s sexual orientation or parental status violates the Equal Protection Clause of the United States Constitution” is a very generous interpretation of Supreme Court precedent. The Court has said that some anti-gay discrimination lacks a rational basis, but the law has to be pretty egregious before if it hits this wall.

Metro Weekly’s Chris Geidner sums it up like this: “The law, by the governor’s own words, is the same on March 11 as it was on March 9. There is no protection provided by the Commonwealth of Virginia or Gov. McDonnell to LGBT people other than the slight protection already provided to them by the U.S. Constitution.” But I think McDonnell’s attempt to distance himself from Cuccinelli is significant. It underscores the effectiveness of campus and state-wide organizing in (at the very least) slowing down McDonnell’s moralistic crusade and certainly complicates Cuccinelli’s effort to change state school’s non discrimination policies.

The Associated Press reports that the New Jersey Supreme Court has chastised Superior Court Judge James N. Citta, who “belittled an immigrant defendant’s poor English skills and compared another defendant to O.J Simpson.”

Citta demeaned a Mexican immigrant who, after pleading guilty to violating his parole, explained that he failed to follow its terms because he didn’t speak or understand English and was provided with a parole officer who couldn’t speak or understand Spanish. According to the official complaint filed against the judge, Citta responded by engaging “in a gratuitous diatribe about immigration and his opinion of illegal aliens”:

CITTA: Now so let me understand this. Not only do we have to let him come into the country illegally and stay here, not only do we have to provide him with public assistance, not only do we have to provide him with free health care, not only do we have to provide him with a free attorney when he gets in trouble, now he wants a bilingual probation officer, because otherwise it’s inconvenient for him.

Well I think it’s a miracle you haven’t been sent back to Mexico as a result of being placed on probation and being charged with these crimes in the first place. If it was up to me, I’d take you just as you’re dressed and bound right now and have you escorted back to Mexico forthwith and forget the prison term, but it’s not.

In another instance, Citta compared defendant Earl Peeples to O.J. Simpson and “berate[d] the defendant at length”:

CITTA: You look up domestic violence in the dictionary, your picture should be next to it. The only difference between you and O.J. Simpson is he had more money and he got off for some reason in a land of fruits and nuts.

The complaint filed against Citta accused him of “creating an appearance of racial or ethnic bias.” In its decision, New Jersey’s high court’s Disciplinary Committee wrote, “We find that [Citta's] remarks were not only inappropriate but highly objectionable, at least outwardly indicative of bias, and wholly unbefitting a court of law.” In a letter to the court, Citta defended his words. Citta indicated that he was simply trying “to make a point” using language that those before him could understand. Citta, a judge in the criminal division of Superior Court, also wrote that his handling of “the most horrific, sadistic, and emotionally charged criminal trials and sentencings” was not his choice and that it has “exacted a toll which, on occasion, has led me to say things better left unsaid.”

Gov. Bob McDonnell (R-VA) has issued a new directive distancing himself from Attorney General’s Ken Cuccinelli’s effort to strip LGBT protections from all state colleges and universities’ non discrimination policies.

The missive — which also updates the February 5th non-discriminatory policy — clarifies the “administration’s position on employment discrimination” and states that discrimination “based on factors such as one’s sexual orientation or parental status” will not be tolerated. Read the full directive here.

The Atlantic’s Marc Ambinder is also reporting that in a separate letter accompanying the directive, McDonnell’s chief of staff specifically instructs “state supported colleges and universities” to follow the new directive “:

While the separation of powers doctrine precludes the Governor from changing the Virginia Human Rights Act via Executive Order, he wants to be clear that discrimination in state employment will not be tolerated. As the chief executive officer for the Commonwealth, the Governor wants to establish a clear standard of conduct ensuring that all cabinet members, agency heads, managers, supervisors and employees of the Executive Branch understand and enforce state and federal law prohibiting employment discrimination. Independent agencies and state supported colleges and universities should likewise adopt a similar standard of conduct.

McDonnell initially supported Cuccinelli’s legal reasoning, telling the Washington Post on Monday that “[t]here’s a long list of opinions. It’s all separation-of-powers issues,” he said. “But that doesn’t mean that a governor can’t say to his managers, I will not tolerate discrimination in this administration.”

Public outrage over the Cuccinelli letter and impressive organizing campaigns on college campuses however, seemed to have pressured the politically ambitious McDonnell to issue the new, more inclusive, rules. The document is a big step froward for the Virginia government but still excludes gender identification from protection.

As Washington DC celebrates its first gay marriages, Virginia residents are organizing against their state’s reactionary Republican leadership. Last week, Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli asked all state colleges and universities “to rescind policies that ban discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation,” and in the days since, thousands of college students and faculty members have joined a movement to protect gay rights policies at the commonwealth’s public universities. “More than 3,000 people joined the Facebook page “We Don’t Want Discrimination In Our State Universities And Colleges!” and nearly 1,000 have “joined another, started by activists at the College of William and Mary. The University of Virginia group Queer & Allied Activism urged students to protest on Cuccinelli’s Facebook page and on Twitter.”

Today, Ken Plum, a Democratic member of the legislature ,mounted another protest of Cuccinelli’s letter by forcing a vote on a measure that would ban discrimination in public employment “on the basis of sexual orientation.” Gov. Bob McDonnell omitted such protections for state workers in an executive order signed on February 5, and the House has “repeatedly rejected such legislation and voted against floor consideration of the bill.” Citing last week’s letter, Plum argued that protecting LGBT workers from hiring discrimination was “particularly timely at this time because the eyes of the nation are upon us”:

Del. David Englin (D-Alexandria) also rose to address the House, recalling his parents and grandparents’ stories of anti-Semitic discrimination by employers. Englin said the state must act to protect Virginia’s reputation as a desirable place to do business because some companies might see the state as intolerant. “Let there be no mistake – Ken Cuccinelli wants to hang a sign in front of the public colleges and universities of this Commonwealth that reads ‘Gays need not apply,‘” Englin said.

Plum’s attempt to revive the measure failed, but his intentions capture the public rejection of Cuccinelli’s directive. Earlier today, about 250 people attended “the first of four forums being held today on VCU’s academic and medical campuses” to discuss Cuccinelli’s letter. The Richmond Times Dispatch reports that most of the attendees urged administrators “to take a strong stand against” the attorney general’s new policy, citing the detrimental affect removing LGBT protections would have on hiring practices and student retention.

“If VCU did not protect sexual orientation, I wouldn’t have come here,“ said Luke Schlimme, a graduate student in social work. VCU Provost Stephen D. Gottfredson characterized the opinion as mean-spirited“ and promised to stand by the school’s existing non discrimination policy unless “the board of visitors acts to change them.”

Prominent members of Virignia’s higher education community have come out against Cuccinelli’s directive. The head of the Virginia conference of the American Association of University Professors has written a letter to McDonnell, saying that “discrimination not grounded in qualification or merit ‘is abhorrent to the values of higher education‘” and a former head of the University of Virginia told the Washington Post in an e-mail, that “it is far from clear that the Attorney General would be expected to or even empowered to turn back the clock on such a vital issue of public importance,” noting that the state’s higher-education community is “unanimous in its commitment to equality.”

Last month, General David Petraeus suggested that he may be open to supporting a repeal of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell. Petraeus said that he was “not sure” that most servicemembers would care about fighting alongside openly gay men and women, and that he has personally done so without any problems.

Yesterday, during an appearance on CNN’s Fareed Zakaria, Petraeus clarified that he served with two gay CIA officers whose orientation did not undermine their performance or mission and promised to lay out his “thinking on the matter” before the Senate Armed Services Committee this spring:

PETRAEUS: I would like to clarify what I did say. What I said is I served with CIA officers actually who were known to be gay and one who was known to be lesbian. After the ten seconds of awareness wore off, the focus was on the professional attributes of these individuals. So given, again, standards of personal conduct, focus on human behavior, a focus on proper implementation, you know, I think that this is something that can be worked through, frankly. I’ll lay this out to Congress. My thinking on this matter, I’ve been wrestling with this. [...]

ZAKARIA: It sounds to me, though, if these — if the review process of scouting out the opinions of soldiers, if they were to go to this soldier, that is, you, it sounds like what you would tell them is that under — as long as it was carefully implemented, you would be comfortable?

PETRAEUS: I’ll lay that out, again, to the Senate Armed Services Committee.

Watch it:

Lawmakers will have to wait for Petraesus’ testimony before adding him to the ‘military leader who supports repeal’ column, but these statements suggest that the general is at least skeptical about the policy. His answer also betrays a certain level of indifference towards a soldier’s sexual orientation — reiterating the fact that repeal is only controversial in the minds of conservative fundamentalists — and mirrors the reaction of General Raymnd Odierno, the current Commanding General of forces in Iraq. Last month, Odierno was “asked repeatedly” about his stance on the gays in the military, until he finally told reporters, “I don’t have time to think about it…we’re kind of busy right now, trying to do our job in Iraq.”

Significantly, in the seventeen years since Congress passed DADT, real world experiences and the multitude of Defense Department-funded studies on the effects of the policy have convinced former proponents of DADT (i.e. military leaders) to come out against it. Support for the policy has been largely relegated to the most fundamentalist but well organized elements of the conservative movement. And fortunately, these groups and their rhetoric won’t provide cover for undecided moderate lawmakers.