The Pentagon's report on the President about ending "don't ask, don't tell," due to be on the desk in the Oval Office on December 1, will tell Obama that "the military can lift the ban on gays serving openly in uniform with only minimal and isolated incidents of risk to the current war efforts" according to sources talking with the Washington Post.
In other words, DADT should be dead by now. But it isn't and perhaps it won't be any time soon. Ending the policy depends on a partisan political decision, not a decision based on evidence.
More than 70 percent of respondents to a survey sent to active-duty and reserve troops over the summer said the effect of repealing the "don't ask, don't tell" policy would be positive, mixed or nonexistent, said two sources familiar with the document. The survey results led the report's authors to conclude that objections to openly gay colleagues would drop once troops were able to live and serve alongside them.
One source, who has read the report in full, summarized its findings in a series of conversations this week. The source declined to state his position on whether to lift the ban, insisting it did not matter. He said he felt compelled to share the information out of concern that groups opposed to ending the ban would mischaracterize the findings. The long, detailed and nuanced report will almost certainly be used by opponents and supporters of repeal legislation to bolster their positions in what is likely to be a heated and partisan congressional debate. ...WaPo
Once again we're up against people for whom knowledge is secondary to ideology.
