I think Greg Sargent has the right take on the military service chiefs' testimony on DADT repeal today.
It's being widely reported right now that at the Senate hearings this morning, the Service Chiefs issued very stark warnings against repealing Don't Ask Don't Tell. And it's true that Army Chief of Staff George Casey and U.S. Marine Corps Commandant James Amos did say negative things about repealing DADT immediately.
But come on, let's have some nuance here. What's missing from the discussion is that these same men also said that in an overall sense they do in fact favor repealing DADT. And more crucially, under subsequent questioning, they said they found it reassuring that the current repeal proposal gives Defense Secretary Robert Gates the leeway to implement repeal on a flexible timeline that would work for them.
Right. If the courts overturn the policy, and there's no repeal, there's no flexible time line, and the GOP might ultimately prefer it that way. Of course, there are going to be some problems, and those problems will be seized on by opponents to argue repeal was a bad idea. That's what happened after desegregation, and it'll happen once DADT is repealed. But the point is there's no empirical case for keeping the policy beyond those problems, which in and of themselves do not justify continuing to treat gay and lesbian service members as second-class citizens.
