Lets go back in time to 2010 when “Old Blue Eye’s” little girl and iconic singer and personality Nancy Sinatra took to her Twitter account to help end LGBT inequality and tolerance in the military and spoke out to repeal DADT.
Nancy posted the above tweet complete with a link to Democracy For America’s “End “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” Now” petition.
Way to go Nancy! Brava Diva! Walk those boots all over them guuuurl!
Multi gold record recording artist, and “Proud to be an American” country singer Toby Keith. Who’s best known for after the September 11 attacks writing the song “Courtesy of the Red, White, & Blue”, has come out in favor of same sex marriage (sort of) and also for the recent Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell Repeal in a recent interview with “CMT Insider” airing Saturday on Country Music Television
At 12:01 am Navy Lt. Gary Ross and Dan Swezy, partners of 11 years were finally able to get married.
The two traveled from their home in Tucson, Ariz., so they could get married in Vermont, the first state to allow gays to enter into civil unions and one of six that have legalized same-sex marriage. They also chose Vermont because it was in the EST time zone and that they could get married at the first possible moment after midnight when the discriminatory DADT policy was finally officially repealed.
Ross wore his dress uniform for the ceremony beginning at 11:45 p.m. Monday at Duxbury’s Moose Meadow Lodge. Montpelier.Justice of the Peace Greg Trulson proclaimed the marriage at exactly midnight.
“This is Gary’s official coming out,” Trulson said.
Congratulation boys!
The Wall Street Journal is printing that Pentagon officials are ready to announce the certification of repeal of the military’s “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy, and will do so tmorrow
Top defense officials plan to certify Friday that the Pentagon is ready to end the ban on gays serving openly in the military, officials said, a landmark moment after almost two decades of controversy.
The military now has to resolve crucial questions such as what benefits same-sex couples will receive.
While the military will be free to provide some services to same-sex spouses, such as family support for spouses of deployed service members, federal law blocks it from providing them the full range of health, housing and education available to heterosexual couples.
Only after Pentagon finally announces the certification, can President Obama certify it, and then a 60-day waiting period begins before the repeal is implemented for good.
One of the best things (and I’ll be honest, sometimes noit so best) about Netroots Nation and the LGBT Bloggers Initiative Pre Con was meeting and learning about other LGBT bloggers, advocates, and activist. I had the honor of having lunch next to the EXTREMELY hot and humpy Jarrod Chlapowski of Servicemens United and I watched in car crash amazement as Dan Choi theatrically ripped up an autograph and threw it as a kid who was with the Obama campaign (who i think might have been mildly special needs) when the kid said he didn’t agree with gay marriage even though he was Bi. (Very long story and by the way Dan. A major part of public speaking us trying NOT TO show that you have been coached in it because when it does it comes off more theatrical than sincere)
Now where DADT is concerned everyone knows Choi and many people know Jarrod but who knows Ian Finkenbinder or the other heroes of the DADT Repeal Movement?
I’ve tweet chatted with Ian who writes the “One Angry Queer“ website for months before we met at Netroots Nation 11 and I always knew that Ian was a major HIV advocate and angry at the trials, tribulations, and obstacles that HIV+ men and women in the LGBT community have to deal with it. What I didn’t know was that Ian is also one of the unsung hero’s of the fight for the DADT repeal.
Ian was an Army Arabic linguist who graduated from the Defense Language Institute in 2002 and was discharged from the military in 2005 after announcing to his superiors that he’s gay. Ian served eight months in Iraq and was about to return for a second tour when he let his sexuality be known and was discharged.
I looked at myself and said, ‘Are you willing to go to war with an institution that won’t recognize that you have the right to live as you want to? It just got to be tiresome to deal with that — to constantly have such a significant part of your life under scrutiny.” – Ian Finkenbinder – MSNBC 2005
Ian has been at the forefront of the movement of the DADT Repeal since its inception. He’s been featured on PBS’s Imdependent Lens – Unfriendly Fire, has held vigil at the graveside of vigil at the grave site of Sgt. Leonard Matlovich along with other DADT heros who have been overlooked including Miriam Ben-Shalom, Evelyn Thomas, Robert Smith, James Pietrangelo, and Mara Boyd. And was also arrested for handcuffing himself to the White House Fence, along with this group which forced the hand of the Obama administration to push Congress to get the DADT repeal through before the Republicans took over the House.
It’s a shame that Ian and other men and women actively involved don’t get the credit that they deserve.
Ian Finkenbinder, along with Miriam Ben-Shalom, Evelyn Thomas, Robert Smith, James Pietrangelo, Mara Boyd and others are the unsung heroes of DADT and should be recognized as such.
It’stime to give credit where credit is due because we all know it’s not all about Dan Choi you know, right?
According to Stars and Stripes Magazine Defense Secretary Robert Gates has ordered the Defense Department to speed up the the steps it will take to begin training to begin as soon as possible for the DADT repeal to take affect.
Gates in a Pentagon press conference revealed a three-step plan: finalize changes in related regulations and policies, and get clearer definitions on benefits; prepare training materials for chaplains, lawyers, commanders and troops; and then begin to train servicemembers worldwide.
“We’re trying to get the first two phases of that process done as quickly as possible,” Gates said, adding he has instructed Undersecretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness Clifford Stanley to accelerate his efforts. “My hope is that it can be done within a matter of a very few weeks so that we can then move on to what is the real challenge, which is providing training to 2.2 million people. And we will do that as expeditiously as we can.”
And in what appears to be news from the Bizarro world. Rabid homophobe Senator John “Grandpa Munster” McCain, DADT’ repeals fiercest opponent in the Senate, now says that he will work to make the DADT repeal work.
McCain signaled that he had made peace with the lame-duck bill to do away with the military’s ban on openly gay and lesbian service members, of which he had been an outspoken critic.
“I think I have to do everything I can to make sure that the important moral, retention, recruitment, and battle effectiveness of the military is minimized as much as possible,” McCain said on Fox Business. “It is a law and I have to do whatever I can to help the men and women who are serving particularly in combat cope with this new situation. I will do everything I can to make it work.”
I guess the nurse finally brought Senile, I mean Senator, Grandpa Munster his JELLO so that he’d stop yelling at the imaginary kids on his lawn. Either that or McCain has a dastardly evil anti-gay plan up his short little Napoleon like sleeve.
I think the latter.
The Curse of John McCain is far from over, at least not for 6 more years.
The Christomaniacs from the Hate Group The American Family Association are worried that the huge controversy around Captain Owen (Un) Honors (able) raunchy, anti-gay Navy video controversy, might stop the freedom of hateful language against gay people and blames it all on the repeal of ‘DADT’,
“Is it an indication that if any body dares say anything negative about homosexuality, or homosexuals, that it’s going to be made public very quickly, and those individuals, who dare say anything about homosexuality in a negative way, are going to be outed themselves?”
The simple answer is, “Yes.”
The awesome site “Good As You” picked up on this current hyperbole from the hate group American Family Associationand its a doozey.
The same people who are so thrilled about this change are also the same ones who preach to us all about how our nation and military should be less offensive to these nations who are our enemies. These same people apologize for American ideals and actions on a regular basis and bow to foreign leaders. There is a complete lack of analysis of this new military policy in this context. If we are to be more sensitive and understanding of these other nations, then our nation’s recent actions certainly are not going to accomplish that goal. It is bemoaned regularly how we need to be politically correct and accommodating to those of Islam, but the same people who believe such things are now offending greatly those whom they say they want to be more sensitive.
As stated on the website of the Center for Military Readiness, “Conspicuously missing from the list of 25 gay-friendly militaries are potential adversaries China, North Korea, and Iran. Their combined forces (3.8 million, not counting reserves) are more than two times greater than active-duty forces of the 25 foreign countries with gays in their militaries (1.7 million).” Our nation is thought to be a Christian nation by many of our adversaries and what this new policy demonstrates is something that certainly is not Christian, but will bring even further persecution of Christians trying to exist in these nations. It will bring further hatred of whom they call “The Great Satan” and even further emboldening against our country. One thing that these nations are right about is that this new policy is not of God.
Ah ladies, gentlemen and everything in between what you arehopefully hearing is the death rattle of Christomaniac opprobrium on gay rights issus.
Rattle on, Christomaniacs, writhe in the last gasps of life for your formerly reliable gravy train.
And remember……..SATAN RULZE!
And so it begins……
World Net Daily is the largest Christomaniac news website online today is reporting that an “unamed” lietenaunt colonel in the US Army has asked to be relieved of duty so he doesn’t have to lead a bunch of sissyboys into combat.
A lieutenant colonel in the U.S. Army has confirmed to WND that he is asking to be relieved of the command of his squadron because of the new policy. And former combat personnel are telling WND that they are continuing to keep the pressure on Congress to reverse itself. “I have already requested through my chain of command that I be relieved of command of my squadron prior to new policy implementation on grounds that my personal beliefs don’t permit me to force the coming ‘behavior modifications’ training and other inevitable policies on my soldiers,” the officer, whose name has been withheld, wrote to WND. The statement highlights the question of whether soldiers themselves are ready to go along with the controversial social experiment imposed by Congress, or whether they’ll carefully withdraw from command positions and troop ranks, pack their bags and leave the military.
It’s amazing that this “unamed” person actually made lietenaunt colonel because it sounds like someone lacks the discipline required to be an effective part of the military team. If said person actually exists, that is. The Army is probably better off without him.
World Net Daily, is also goading other anti-gay soldiers and officers to come forward with their post-DADT plans.
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Of course, the BIG NEWS in the LGBT Community today was the signing of the Repeal of thh DADT Law 2010.
Back2Stonewall.com would like to congratulate the LGBT Community and all involved for working together to get the repeal done.
Due to the enormous amount of news coverage Back2Stonewall.com has not posted any stories today concerning the repeal but would like to suggest that B2S.com visitors interested in the most comprehensive coverage please visit AmericaBlogGay and Towleroad.
Today was a monumental day in Gay History and we deserve to celebrate it. But please lets all remember that we still have a very long road and a hard fight against us to achieve full equality.
Will Kohl
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