Slammed Today

It's just not in the cards for bloggy goodness.

While I have a spare moment, let me give a tip o' the cap to former Sen. Alan Simpson for his exquisite article on gays int he military (I can't believe we're still having this conversation 16 years after it started. Everything old is new again). I wish I could excerpt it all, but here's a piece and you can go read the whole thing.

My thinking shifted when I read that the military was firing translators because they are gay. According to the Government Accountability Office, more than 300 language experts have been fired under "don't ask, don't tell," including more than 50 who are fluent in Arabic. This when even Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice recently acknowledged the nation's "foreign language deficit" and how much our government needs Farsi and Arabic speakers. Is there a "straight" way to translate Arabic? Is there a "gay" Farsi? My God, we'd better start talking sense before it is too late. We need every able-bodied, smart patriot to help us win this war.

It seems like gay isn't always so gay, as discharges drop during times of war when the military needs all of those able bodies. But turning one willing soldier away is ridiculous at a time when the Army is broken.