Court Rules Military CAN Discriminate Against Gays!

[Breeze54]

'Don't ask, don't tell' suit dismissed
Judge says military can exclude gays

By Shelley Murphy, Globe Staff | April 25, 2006

A federal judge in Boston yesterday dismissed a lawsuit challenging the military's "don't ask, don't tell" policy,
ruling that Congress has the authority to exclude gays from the armed services.

US District Judge George A. O'Toole Jr. found that Congress made a rational decision
to adopt the policy in 1993 after holding lengthy hearings and concluding that openly
homosexual service members would have a negative impact on the military.
The policy prohibits the military from asking about sexual orientation, but orders the
dismissal of personnel who disclose that they are gay, engage in homosexual activity,
or are outed by someone else.

"The legitimacy of the end Congress sought to serve -- maintaining effective military
capability by maintaining high standards of morale, good order and discipline,
and unit cohesion -- cannot be doubted," O'Toole wrote.

But, in his 41-page decision, O'Toole added that
"deciding that Congress has made a rational choice is not the same as deciding
it has made a wise choice."

O'Toole wrote that "the remedy for bad decision-making by the Political Branches
is to be found in the working of the political process."

The judge concluded that the 12 former service members who filed the suit had failed
to prove that their constitutional rights were violated because they were forced to
leave the service after their sexual orientation was known.


More at Link...
http://www.boston.com/news/local/articles/2006/04/25/dont_ask_dont_tell_suit_dismissed/

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I'm speechless....unbelievable!!

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EDIT: COPYRIGHT. PLEASE POST ONLY 4 OR 5
PARAGRAPHS FROM THE COPYRIGHTED NEWS
SOURCE PER DU RULES.

[sarcasmo]

1. IMHO, it's good to know that saying you are gay will still you out of

the service. I will teach my teenager this when the draft comes in a couple of years.

[greekspeak]

3. It won't do any good...this issue will disappear when a draft comes

They will take your child (unless you are rich enough to keep him or her out of the armed forces) whether said child is gay or straight. If they didn't, every little member of the College RePukes would suddenly like hot man on man action.

[xchrom]

2. o'toole is a tool.

does this make ANY sense?

"deciding that Congress has made a rational choice is not the same as deciding
it has made a wise choice."

[Breeze54]

4. No it doesn't!!

I'm totally shocked by this ruling! Who is this guy anyway? :shrug:

And they are allowing this??
They can be excluded if they are outed by someone else.

Just by mere accusation they can be kicked out??? :wtf:

What century is this? Let the witch hunt's begin...yikes!! :sarcasm:

[Tesha]

5. Why would this ruling shock you?

> I'm totally shocked by this ruling!

Why would this ruling shock you?

Given the current state of the law in our country, this was the
only ruling possible.

1. Gays are *NOT* a protected class in the eyes of Federal law.

2. With the exception of some restrictions on what it can do
vis-a-vis those protected classes and within the context of
the full Constitution, Congress can make whatever rules it
likes regarding the regulation of the military.

Until #1 changes, don't look for the rules to change.

Tesha

[Breeze54]

6. I was going to rephrase that...

but I won't. I suppose I shouldn't be shocked that they ruled
against gays in the military. I'm 'shocked' at the blatant prejudice!
It's ridiculous!

[xchrom]

7. i think that one can readily draw the conclusion

that ''don't ask don't tell'' was about creating a culture of witchhunts and institionalizing them.

what will be interesting is to see if a case of ''son't ask don't tell' is broght by a straight person who was wrongly singled out.

maybe it's already happened and i don't know about it.

[Tesha]

8. DADT was a typical Clintonesque straddle.

Clinton routinely tried to do the popular rather than
the morally correct. Don't Ask/Don't Tell was just an
early example of his morally bankrupt form of governance.

A true leader would have taken the opportunity to shame
the Republicans and say: "Equal rights for all. Is there
some part of that that you don't understand?"

Tesha

[Big_Mike]

9. Truer Words!

You know, the President could have changed to allow gays to serve openly simply by issuing an Executive Order, like Truman in '50, disbanding the colored units and forcing integration. The same arguments were bleated about, but if the Commander in Chief pushes it, military must salute and "yessir, yessir, three bags full, sir" is the rule of the day.

Unfortunately, BC lacked the courage to do this. While there is much about what he did I appreciate, he well and truly failed on this one. Had he echoed Truman's rationale, he would still have had problems, but this DADT boondoggle would never have arisen.

[gratuitous]

10. So, do they have to pay war taxes?

After all, if they're not going to be allowed to serve, should gays get a refund of the portion of their taxes that goes to defense and war spending? As well as an exemption from the interest payments due our country's creditors because of the all borrowing we're having to do to finance the war effort.

I smell refund!