Frank: Don't Discharge Fehrenbach

Here's the bottom line... Whether or not DADT is repealed, and gays are in fact "allowed" to be themselves in the military, partyly because "we are all equal"... there will always be ignorance in the military in accepting gays, whether you force the issue on them or not ! If you are a gay person in the military, the fact the 'other people preceptions' way heavily on their interaction with you, you will never be able to be who you are within 'miltary standards'. Woman have faced the same issue as have African Americans. Promotions? Leadership? FORGET IT.... There will be alot of "Privates" running around trying to find their place in an 'unaccepting environement', and the 'pressure' will even be greater than it is now !

TOD of West Hollywood you "hit the nail on the head" and I agree with you 100 percent. Great analogy.

Bill, are you familiar with the climate of the times in 1948 when Truman signed that executive order? It wasn't his idea really, his proposal for the party plank was considered "tepid" until the known firebrand Hubert Humphrey fired things up. The result was a splitting up of the Dem. party into 3 groups. I don't think any politition today would risk that. In 1948 the masses were much more frightened of communists than they were of blacks in the military. Maybe that is why we have made what gains we have now because so many of the sheep, I mean Americans, are more afraid of muslims than they are of us. Or the fearmongers can follow in their fascist fathers footsteps and keep muslims, gays , and latinos as the bogeymen like jews, communists and non-aryans once were. Our problems are backburner issues to the str8 majority, but we have come a long way baby from the days when "decent people" didn't even mention homosexuals!

Frank, Pelosi, Reid, Polis. and all the others on the Hill who believe that DADT should go should show some backbone. STAND UP AND DEMAND that ALL discharges be HALTED under DADT and pressure Obama into signing an Executive Order. THAT is YOUR job!

"Why doesn't Obama issue an executive order" -- Because gays are not important to him. Bankers (more bank bailouts) , chicago businessmen (protects his own friends from indictments), abortion (lied that health care reform will not pay for abortion and now HHS says they have to pay for the procedure, executive orders are not law) , ACORN (his DoJ called the de-funding of ACORN "unconstitutional" and it is fighting it in court), and illegals (used the DoJ to sue Arizona unnecessarily) are more important to him than you. Has he sued Florida for banning gays from adopting? NO. Has he declared DOMA unconstitutional? NO. He defends it. And the list goes on and on. But at least gays get invited to all of those fundraisers. Gee I wonder why. It's pretty easy to yell at me and call me names, I wish all of you drones have the same set of balls you showed me and stand up to NObama and do the same, oh wait you wont. Weak...

I support Rep. Frank speaking out for this. The discharges should stop altogether. I was watching the movie, The Diary of Anne Frank the other day and this reminds me of that. The story goes, they were so close to being free. They hid successfully. The allied forces were almost there to save them. They heard reports of more and more territory being taken back. They could taste their freedom, but just before they could be freed the Nazi's got them instead. This is what these discharges are like to me right before DADT is repealed. People aren't losing the lives, but they are losing their livelihood, their reputations, their retirements and still very much their lives. It's disgraceful, shameful, how they are being treated.

This isn't rocket science. Why doesn't Obama issue an executive order -- just like Truman did -- making the discharge of gays and lesbians from the military illegal. I disagree that it is solely a matter of Congress. What happened to the three, co-equal branches of Government? The president needs to grow some -- he just doesn't respect us and at this point anyone who doesn't see it is just deluding him/herself.

Isn't everybody equal under the law,why is an exception being made for this one person when more valuable soldiers have been discharged without qualm. If the law is discriminitory then rule as such but not in the case of one man, but then again a man comes back after committing treason and is declared a hero and can even run for president. So why should the military be any different now.

Go back to your grotto Frank, I agree what about the other thousands of soldiers that are getting discharged. This is just like when our middle of the road Lawyer in Chief injected himself into the dialogue when Prof Gates was arrested and not really saying anything about the thousands of minority men who get profiled everyday. I guess you have to have rank and be high profile before you are considered something other than bare life. This administration and Frank are like coitus interruptus......without the coitus.

What about the other 15,000 soldiers that have been thrown out based on the unconstitutional DADT? When will the Senate follow the House and pass repeal? Why won't the President by executive order halt all discharges since repeal is supposedly scheduled for February (when anti-gay/Bush-appointee Gates finally retires)? How long will millions of our tax dollars be wasted to ferret gays out and weaken our military? When will we say ENOUGH and finally start a revolution?