Free Republic

ANNAPOLIS, Md. — Gay students at America's military service academies are wrapping up the first year when they no longer had to hide their sexual orientation, benefiting from the end of the "don't ask, don't tell" policy that used to bar them from seemingly ordinary activities like taking their partners openly to graduation events. For the first time, gay students at the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis were able to take a same-sex date to the academy's Ring Dance for third-year midshipmen. The U.S. Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs, Colo., officially recognized a club for gay students this month....

Former Secretary of State Colin Powell isn’t yet ready to endorse a presidential candidate, but on Wednesday evening, he endorsed same-sex marriage. Powell, who was chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff in 1993 when “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” was implemented, said in an interview on CNN’s The Situation Room with Wolf Blitzer that he has “no problem” with marriage equality and speculated that most Americans are prepared to adapt to changing times. “As I've thought about gay marriage, I know a lot of friends who are individually gay but are in partnerships with loved ones. And they are stable...

City official consults Ouija board before vote SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — A San Francisco supervisor says he consulted a Ouija board before city leaders voted on whether to recommend naming a Navy ship after slain gay rights activist Harvey Milk. Supervisor John Avalos tells the San Francisco Chronicle (http://bit.ly/KnVnbu ) that he believes he made contact with Milk's spirit and that Milk spelled out letters indicating: "Good riddance to don't ask, don't tell." The Board of Supervisors approved the non-binding resolution Tuesday on a 9-2 vote. Milk was a city supervisor and former naval officer. He was fatally shot in...

WASHINGTON – Military leaders have concluded that last year's repeal of the ban on gays serving openly in uniform has not affected morale or readiness so far, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said Thursday. "My view is that the military has kind of moved beyond it. It's become part and parcel of what they've accepted within the military,"

Romney on DADT (Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell) Question: How do you feel about gays serving openly in the military. Romney: That’s already occurred and I’m not planning on reversing that at this stage. < Question: But you’re comfortable with it? Romney: I was not comfortable making the change during a period of conflict, by virtue of the complicating the features of a new program in the middle of two wars going on, but those wars are winding down and moving to that direction at this stage no longer presents that problem. November 9, 2011: Romney meeting with the editorial board...

Calls from national media, state activists, and more POSTED: Jan. 8, 2012 Calls and emails have been coming in from across the country. As we've recently reported, former Mass. Governor Mitt Romney publicly re-stated his support for homosexual "rights" in America while campaigning in Iowa last month. This included his agreement with the repeal of "Don't Ask Don't Tell" in the military; he said he wouldn't reverse that. He does say that marriage itself should be one man and one woman — but that homosexual relationships should be recognized, respected, and supported. Romney discusses his views on "gay rights" with...

...Six months after the military dropped the controversial “don’t ask, don’t tell” law barring gays from serving openly, Pentagon officials and gay rights advocates say the policy change has largely been a non-issue, with few complaints and no major headaches resulting from the new rules...

The Thomas More Law Center, this past Tuesday, filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit against the Department of the Navy. The purpose of the lawsuit is to obtain records believed to show intentional deception by the Pentagon to gain congressional support for repeal of the 1993 law regarding open homosexual conduct in the military, usually called "Don't Ask, Don't Tell." Erin E. Mersino, the Thomas More Law Center attorney handling the case, explained the reason for the lawsuit, “Based on what we know thus far, the Pentagon engaged in a pattern of deception in its efforts to persuade...

ANCHORAGE, Alaska - A recent spike in HIV infections has been linked to military men in Fairbanks. The Anchorage Daily News (http://bit.ly/ybxrzi ) says newly-released public health data shows that the increase is linked to military men finding sex partners online. Data shows that the outbreak involves nine cases of HIV infection from Jan. 1, of last year to Jan. 31 of this year. The state Department of Health and Social Services says from 2007 through 2010, the number of HIV cases reported in the Fairbanks area was fairly stable. However, that changed this last year. Health officials say of...

WASHINGTON — "We don't need you, so shut up!" That's the message the Obama administration has sent loud and clear to America's Roman Catholics. And it's a message now being sent to U.S. military chaplains — to the detriment of our armed forces. During World War II, the War Department and the Department of the Navy urged — the operative word is "urged," not "ordered," mind you — U.S. military chaplains to encourage soldiers, sailors, airmen, guardsmen and Marines that God was on our side in the global battle against fascists, Nazis and the godless heathens running rampant across...

Navy Times is reporting that besides screwing over retirees in the 2012 Defense budget, Congress approved Fags marrying on base. We were busying arguing over who one the budget battle and our Tea Party Consrvative Congress slip us one in the rear. If this were a war heterosexuals have lost, defeated by our own Quislings in Congress. Every day in the military we are bombarded with gay love stories. How in Gods name did we ever win a war without the butt pirates and carpet munchers. There are no conservatives left in American politics. They give fags whatever they want....

Three months after President Obama lifted the ban on homosexuals serving openly in the military, Pentagon officials say heterosexual troops are adjusting well to the new policy. However, critics say they are just following orders, and many are complaining privately. “I’m very pleased with how it has gone,” Gen. James Amos, the commandant of the Marine Corps, told reporters on a recent trip to Afghanistan to visit U.S. troops. However, a recent survey by the Military Times newspaper showed a rise in tensions in units with troops who declared themselves to be homosexuals. The online poll from Sept. 26 to...

CNSNews.com) – Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, a candidate for the Republican presidential nomination, says he has no plans to reverse the Obama administration’s repeal of the ban on homosexuals serving in the U.S. military In an editorial meeting in early November with the Des Moines Register, which endorsed him for the Iowa caucuses pending on Jan. 3, Romney was asked, “How do you feel about gays serving openly in the military?” Romney said, “That’s already occurred. I’m not planning on reversing that at this stage.” The reporter followed up, “But you’re comfortable with it?”

The American soldier alleged to have leaked vast numbers of classified documents to Wikileaks was prone to tantrums and at one point struck a female superior, a court heard today. Captain Casey Fulton, an Army intelligence officer who worked in the same secure facility as 24-year-old Bradley Manning, described a violent outburst in May 2010 at their secure office or SCIF (Sensitive Compartmentalized Information Facility). Fulton said she ordered a derogatory report against Manning, who is charged with downloading hundreds of thousands of sensitive files from the military's classified network when he was a U.S. Army intelligence analyst in Iraq,...

FORT MEADE, Md. (AP) -- An Army witness says the intelligence analyst blamed for the largest-ever leak of U.S. secrets boastfully declared he was changing history in a letter adjoining some data he allegedly sent to WikiLeaks.

FORT MEADE, Md. (AP) -- The young Army intelligence specialist accused of passing government secrets spent his 24th birthday in court Saturday as his lawyers argued his status as a gay soldier before the repeal of "don't ask, don't tell" played an important role in his actions. Lawyers for Pfc. Bradley Manning began laying out a defense to show that his struggles as a gay soldier in an environment hostile to homosexuality contributed to mental and emotional problems that should have barred him from having access to sensitive material. Manning is accused of leaking hundreds of thousands of sensitive items...

Bestiality isn’t a common subject of White House press briefings. But that changed Monday, when White House Press Secretary Jay Carney granted WorldNetDaily reporter and radio host Lester Kinsolving a question during a press briefing. Kinsolving proceeded to ask about the president’s support for a recent Senate vote that would repeal bans on sodomy and bestiality in the U.S. military. “The Family Research Council and CNS News both reported a 93-to-7 U.S. Senate vote to approve a defense authorization bill that, quote, ‘includes a provision which not only repeals the military law on sodomy, but also repeals the military ban...

I could be wrong about this but here goes: This grotesque bill, see link below, was passed on Thursday. I didn't listen to talk radio on Friday but I suspect it wasn't mentioned by Rush, Hannity or Levin. I could be wrong. My guess is our talk radio pundits won't touch it. The fix is in. THe Pink Hand touches all, even Jim Demint. Cowards.Original thread link. Senate Approves Bill that Legalizes Sodomy and Bestiality in U.S. Military

Military chaplains could decline to perform same-sex marriage ceremonies under a measure approved this week by the Senate. The amendment, proposed by Sen. Roger Wicker, R-Miss., was added Wednesday to the massive, must-pass defense spending bill. The Senate approved the spending bill Thursday night by a vote of 93-7.

Texas Gov. Rick Perry said individuals should not be questioned on their “decision about their sexuality” and said he would be “comfortable” returning to the military policy of “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell.” Perry said DADT worked well before President Obama repealed it in what Perry described as a response to Obama’s political base. “I think you go back to commanders in the field and have that conversation. I think Don’t Ask Don’t Tell worked very well,” Perry said in an ABC News/Yahoo interview with Christiane Amanpour. “I think the idea that the president of the United States wanted to make...

... Raymond Chandler, the sergeant major of the Army, tells Army Times correspondent Lance Bacon that in preparing updated Army regulations on grooming and appearance, he's taken to Facebook to debate the finer points of French manicures, earrings, pony tails, and tattoos for U.S. troops...

With the US economy suffering through its deepest slump since the Great Depression, the Obama administration has designed a political strategy to match, with echoes of the campaign rhetoric deployed by Franklin Roosevelt in the 1930s. Throwing out the standard presidential playbook dictating an aspirational pitch to centrist voters, the White House is cementing a high-risk message that strikes firmly at wealth and privilege.

Scott Olsen survived two tours of Iraq, but his life could be over after being critically injured by a police projectile at Occupy Oakland, The Guardian reports. He's 24 years old. As we know, Occupy Oakland got incredibly ugly this week as police tried to remove protesters from their camp in front of City Hall by using tear gas, fire crackers, and rubber bullets. Olsen suffered a head injury on Tuesday night, and is now in critical condition in Oakland's Highland Hospital. Jay Finneburgh, a photographer on the scene, managed to witness and take pictures of the incident. Police policy...

After being struck by a projectile at Tuesday's Occupy Oakland evictions, Iraq war veteran Scott Olsen is lucid and awaiting brain surgery. The Guardian reports Olsen "responded with a very large smile" when his parents arrived from Wisconsin to visit him at the hospital. Medical officials say Olsen's able to write and hear, but is having trouble speaking. Meanwhile, Oakland's Mayor Jean Quan who left town after authorizing the raid, has separated herself from the police. Quan said, "I only asked the chief to do one thing: to do it when it was the safest for both the police and...

Documentary filmmaker Michael Moore plans to visit Occupy Oakland's re-established tent city today, according to his blog. At the end of an Thursday blog post entitled "Life Among the 1%," Moore writes "P.S. I will go to Oakland tomorrow afternoon to stand with Occupy Oakland against the out-of-control police." Moore is among a growing list of celebrities and organizations critical of the city's actions and Mayor Jean Quan's role in evicting protesters three days ago, when police moved in using tear gas and other devices. Injuries sustained by Iraq veteran Scott Olsen in the melee have sparked criticism from many...

In an interview with former White House press secretary and Obama campaign advisor Robert Gibbs on Thursday's NBC Today, co-host Matt Lauer fretted over a report showing "the rich are getting richer" and pleaded: "So what responsibility does President Obama have in terms of dealing with income distribution in this country?" [Audio available here] Lauer began his push from the left by explaining: "Some of these young people are the same young people who are occupying parks across the country and they're out there protesting Wall Street. They're also protesting the White House."

OAKLAND, CALIF.—Anti-Wall Street demonstrators held vigils for an Iraq War veteran seriously injured during a protest clash with police in California as some occupy encampments came under growing pressure from authorities to abandon sites in parks and plazas. A crowd of at least 1,000 people, many holding candles, gathered Thursday night in Oakland in honour of 24-year-old Scott Olsen, who is hospitalized with a fractured skull. In Nashville, police cracked down overnight on an Occupy protest camp near the Capitol under a new policy setting a curfew for the complex. They moved in a little after 3 a.m. and arrested...

Meanwhile, in Oakland’s city center, about three dozen tents had sprung up by Friday morning on the lawn where an Occupy encampment was razed earlier in the week. That mirrored action in San Francisco, where city officials had removed tents only to see them return. “For every action there’s a reaction,” Saiid Shabazz, 35, of Oakland, said of the razing of the camp early Tuesday and the massive protests that followed. "The people are going to continue to use this camp as a training facility, an educational facility, a healing facility and a place to live facility.” Olsen, 24, a...

Marines have been flocking to the social networking/aggregator site Reddit to voice their anger at the life-threatening injury inflicted on 24-year-old Iraqi war veteran Scott Olsen by Oakland police during the recent Occupy protests. Video showed Olsen go down after taking a tear gas canister to the head. As fellow protesters tried to assist him, police lobbed a flash grenade into their midst–right next to Olsen’s already fractured skull.The picture above, submitted by Reddit user aburger, has generated well over 1,000 comments on the site–many from fellow Marines who are absolutely livid at the injury to one of their own...

Scott Olsen is the Marine Corps veteran critically injured at Occupy Oakland Tuesday night, during a confrontation between the protesters and the police. The latest news is good: his condition has been upgraded from critical to fair and he is apparently conscious and able to respond to doctors and family members. I sincerely wish him a full recovery, and I also hope that a proper investigation is conducted to determine whether police misconduct is responsible for his injuries. But I ran across something this evening that may add a new dimension to this story. It has been widely reported that...

(AP) SAN DIEGO — Three San Diego Marine corporals have been discharged for bad conduct after admitting they faked their marriages to receive housing allowances.

(snip) McCain, who identified herself early in the program as heterosexual, spoke candidly about her own support for a battery of LGBTQ issues on stage...at one point, McCain even indicted pro-Don't Ask, Don't Tell politicians as being "dangerously out of touch.""I support equality," she said. "You can't call this country free if people are being discriminated against. "I'm scared by people who don't evolve," said McCain later on, frustrated by the static nature of conservative politics. The blogger, whose views contradict much of the religious rights' stance on homosexuality, suffered extreme backlash from news pundits throughout her father's campaign. (snip)

LISTEN TO THE REAL REVEREND JESSE ON THE INTERNET OR A RADIO STATION IN YOUR AREA......BOND Action, Inc...Educating, Motivating and Rallying Americans! The Jesse Lee Peterson Radio Show Streamed live online from 6-9 a.m. PST / 9-12 a.m. EST. Call in the same times usually. For Live Questions or Comments Call 1-888-77-JESSE(5-3773) You can email comments and questions to radio@bondaction.org For more information on getting The Jesse Lee Peterson Show picked up on a station in your local area call Ermias Alemayehu at 1-877-WE ACT77 (932-2877) Home of the South Central L.A. Tea Party!

With the repeal of Don't Ask, Don't Tell, lots of military bases are getting free copies of LGBT newspapers - to help the Gay population adjust to the sea-change. I'd thought I would help them out with the debut issue of "The Daily Rear Admiral"! Not copyrighted - feel free to pass around!

An organization representing more than 2,000 of the nation’s 5,000 military chaplains announced Wednesday they would join forces with Catholic Archbishop Timothy Broglio of the Archdiocese for Military Service, saying they will not perform same-sex ceremonies. The 2,000 members of the Chaplain Alliance for Religious Liberty, a group of evangelical clergy, are concerned about the Pentagon’s memorandum – issued 10 days after the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” repeal took effect – that authorizes chaplains to officiate “any private ceremony.” A Sept. 20 order lifted the military’s long-standing DADT policy, allowing homosexuals to openly serve in the armed forces. While the...

VIDEO

Former Vice President Dick Cheney said Sunday he supports the Obama administration's decision to repeal the "don't ask, don't tell" policy banning gays and lesbians from serving openly in the military -- a move that was staunchly opposed by most top Republicans. "I think the decision that's been made with respect to allowing gays to serve openly in the military is a good one" Cheney told CNN's Candy Crowley on "State of the Union." "It's the right thing to do." The policy, first enacted during the Clinton administration, was officially repealed on September 20. Over 14,000 people were kicked out...

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Pentagon has decided that military chaplains may perform same-sex unions, whether on or off a military installation. The ruling announced Friday by the Pentagon's personnel chief follows the Sept. 20 repeal of a law that had prohibited gays and lesbians from serving openly in the military.

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) -- A federal appeals court refused Thursday to decide the constitutionality of the military's now-repealed "don't ask, don't tell" policy banning openly gay troops, saying the issue has been resolved since Americans can enlist and serve in the armed forces without regard to sexual orientation. A three-judge panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco tossed out a lawsuit that had challenged the military policy as a violation of gay service members' civil rights. In doing so, the appeals court also dismissed a Southern California trial judge's year-old ruling that the policy was...

With homosexuals now able to serve openly in the military, the gay rights movement’s next battleground is to persuade the Obama administration to end the armed forces’ ban on “transgenders,” a group that includes transsexuals and cross-dressers. “Our position is that the military should re-examine the policy, the medical regulations, so as to allow open service for transgender people,” said Vincent Paolo Villano, spokesman for the 6,000-member Center for Transgender Equality. The Servicemembers Legal Defense Network (SLDN), which pushed to end the military’s gay ban, is urging President Obama to sign an executive order prohibiting discrimination based on “gender identity.”...

At a fundraiser in San Jose yesterday, President Obama slammed the crowd at the Fox/Google GOP debate for booing a gay soldier, projecting the behavior of a few rude audience members onto more than 5,000 debate-goers and the entire GOP.“Some of you here may be folks who actually used to be Republicans but are puzzled by what’s happened to that party, are puzzled by what’s happening to that party,� Obama said. “I mean, has anybody been watching the debates lately? You’ve got a governor whose state is on fire denying climate change. It’s true. You’ve got audiences cheering at the...

In a press conference with Adm. Mike Mullen Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta joyfully announce September 20, 2011 as a “historic day.” This is the day that the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy was repealed. The repeal is a blatant use of the military to shape public opinion and force the homosexual agenda and gay marriage on the American people a la Saul Alinsky. Shut up! During the press conference Mr. Panetta said “My hope is that the command structure operating with the standard disciplines that are in place will implement those disciplines and will ensure that harassment doesn’t take...

Santorum answers gay soldier's DADT question - YouTube via

On Sept. 20, 2011, a date that will live in infamy, the U.S. armed forces were deliberately and successfully attacked by advocates of the scourge of homosexuality. The elimination of the last vestige of moral restraint on sexual perversion in the U.S. military, commonly known as the “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy, ushers in a new Orwellian era in which the military leadership of our nation will proclaim the unnatural as natural, the unhealthy as healthy and the immoral as moral. On Aug. 25, 2010, before the DADT policy was rescinded by Congress and the current president of the United...

The last three GOP presidential primary debates have been nearly as notable for the actions of audience-members as for the candidates who appeared before them. In California at the MSNBC-Politico debate at the Reagan library, the audience applauded mention of the high number of executions in Texas and Rick Perry's defense of the death penalty. "If you come into our state and you kill one of our children, you kill a police officer, you're involved with another crime and you kill one of our citizens, you will face the ultimate justice in the state of Texas, and that is...

LISTEN TO THE REAL REVEREND JESSE ON THE INTERNET OR A RADIO STATION IN YOUR AREA......BOND Action, Inc...Educating, Motivating and Rallying Americans! The Jesse Lee Peterson Radio Show Streamed live online from 6-9 a.m. PST / 9-12 a.m. EST. Call in the same times usually. For Live Questions or Comments Call 1-888-77-JESSE(5-3773) You can email comments and questions to radio@bondaction.org For more information on getting The Jesse Lee Peterson Show picked up on a station in your local area call Ermias Alemayehu at 1-877-WE ACT77 (932-2877) Home of the South Central L.A. Tea Party!

(CNN) -- In the very early hours of this morning, "don't ask, don't tell" ceased to be U.S. policy. As a result, today is the first day I can write about being the partner of a gay military serviceman without fear that he will lose his job. ... The battle has only been half won. Gay servicemen or servicewomen can no longer be discharged simply for being gay, but they are still treated inequitably. Only by using their newly won free speech can they hope to reap the same benefits as their straight colleagues.

TULSA, Oklahoma -- Openly gay men and women don't have to hide their sexual orientation if they want to enlist in the military. The "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy in place since 1993 was repealed at midnight. Today, the Dennis R. Neill Equality Center hit the ground running and invited military recruiters for the very first time. The director of Oklahomans for Equality says It's an historic day and they wanted to celebrate. He says this is the only gay community center in the country to invite military recruiters to their facilities. Misty McConahy has served in the Oklahoma National...

Even as federal officials laud the end of the U.S. military’s ban on openly gay troops, Justice Department lawyers are trying to dissuade a federal appeals court from deciding if the "don’t ask, don’t tell" policy was unconstitutional. They filed a motion Tuesday asking the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco to vacate a lower court ruling last September that found the ban violated the civil rights of gay service members. The gay political group Log Cabin Republicans, which brought the case, wants the appeals court to address the ban’s constitutional implications.

President Barack Obama on Tuesday hailed the end of the policy banning gays from serving openly in the armed forces, as the Pentagon vowed "zero tolerance" for harassment of homosexuals in the military. "Today, the discriminatory law known as 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell' is finally and formally repealed," Obama said in a statement. "As of today, patriotic Americans in uniform will no longer have to lie about who they are in order to serve the country they love." The repeal went into effect on Tuesday, ushering in a new era in the armed forces. The law had allowed gay men...