So today, thanks to an emergency request from the Obama administration, "don't ask, don't tell" has been reinstated. Last week a federal court ordered the administration to stop enforcing the military policy immediately. In accordance with the court's order, the military instructed its members to stop any ongoing investigations and discharges, and the Pentagon had started allowing gay recruits to sign up.
As I wrote when the court first made its decision, all Obama had to do was sit back and let the court ruling stand. Instead, the Justice Department filed an emergency appeal with the Ninth Circuit. It was granted, and now DADT is back in effect. For all intents and purposes, it is now Obama's baby.
The president put himself in a tough spot by kowtowing to the military brass, ordering yet another "military readiness" review that will show -- as three previous studies already have -- that allowing gays to serve openly will not harm national security. He has said repeatedly that Congress -- not the courts -- should repeal the law, and this has been his primary excuse for defending DADT and the Defense of Marriage Act in court. In the case, the president could either recant this "level-headed" position or do the right thing and allow the court ruling to stand. It was a choice of politics over principle, and he chose politics.
Showing so much deference to the military establishment was a mistake in the first place -- discrimination is discrimination, and it shouldn't matter if members of the armed forces don't want gays in the military (after all, when the military was integrated racially, most service members did not want to serve next to blacks). But the real lesson here is about what happens when you respond to a glaring injustice with cautious deliberation. Obama's DADT imbroglio illustrates, as simply as in a child's primer, that deferring justice is denying it.
-- Gabriel Arana
