State Dept. spokesman ousted

PJ Crowley stepped down after decrying gay soldier Bradly Manning’s prison conditions.

State Dept. spokesman ousted

PJ Crowley stepped down after decrying gay soldier Bradly Manning’s prison conditions.

Gay soldier: “The love of my life is in the next room”

“Stories from the Frontlines: Letters to President Barack Obama” is a new media campaign launched to underscore the urgent need for congressional action and presidential leadership at this critical point in the fight to repeal “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” (DADT). Every weekday morning as we approach the markup of the Defense Authorization bill in the Senate and House Armed Services Committees, SLDN and a coalition of voices supporting repeal, will share an open letter to the President from a person impacted by this discriminatory law.

We are urging the President to include repeal in the Administration’s defense budget recommendations, but also to voice his support as we work to muster the 15 critical votes needed on the Senate Armed Services Committee to include repeal. The Defense Authorization bill represents the best legislative vehicle to bring repeal to the president’s desk. It also was the same vehicle used to pass DADT in 1993. By working together, we can help build momentum to get the votes! We ask that you forward and post these personal stories.

May 14, 2010

President Barack H. Obama

The White House

1600 Pennsylvania Avenue Northwest

Washington, DC 20500

Dear Mr. President,

I am writing to you from a kitchen in the state of Washington. The love of my life is in the other room. It has been eight months since I saw him last and I cherish every moment we spend together. Next week, my mid-tour leave will be over and I will return to Iraq and finish my second deployment. I don’t know when I’ll see my partner again.

When serving in a war zone, you learn quite a bit about yourself and what’s important to you. I’ve had the chance to work on a close and personal level with the people of Iraq, and in doing so, I have realized more than ever that the freedoms we enjoy as Americans should not be taken for granted – we must protect them at all costs. These freedoms are essential to the very foundation of our society. Yet so many men and women who fight for these freedoms aren’t allotted their own. Our freedom to love and be loved by whomever we choose. The freedom to live of a life of truth and dignity.

Recently I was informed that the military was investigating me for violating the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” law. Another service member had apparently “outed” me. At first I felt free: I didn’t have to lie anymore. But after that initial sense of relief, I’m left knowing just how little the Pentagon and the United States government think of me.

Mr. President, my unit is extremely undermanned. We’re working around the clock in Baghdad. My commander informed me that the Army cannot afford to lose me. I was told that they would prepare my discharge paperwork, “stick it in a Manila envelope, and keep it in a desk — for now.”

One moment they wanted to throw me out and the next they are hiding evidence to keep me in.

My comrades now know that I am gay, and they do not treat me any differently. Work runs as smoothly as ever, and frankly the only difference I see — besides my pending job loss — is that I am free of the burden of having to constantly watch my words and ensure my lies are believable.

Having this out in the open makes things a bit less stressful. But it’s also clear the Army is only keeping me around until they are done with me. After I have served my two deployments — and am only a year shy of separating from the military honorably — I suspect they will kick me to the street.

It’s bad enough that there is a law that denies tens of thousands of service members from serving with integrity, but it’s even worse when such a law is carried out with such inconsistency, without any warning of when it might come down.

If my suspicions are true, my discharge will move forward after my deployment. I am good enough to serve in war, but not at peace? I will never be at peace until this law is repealed – and neither will my partner. In fact, he won’t even be informed if I am killed in action. That might be the hardest part for us both.

Mr. President, when you took office I remember watching your inauguration knowing that history was being made. I remember feeling like this weight was being lifted off of my shoulders. I truly believed in you, and I still do.

But, Mr. President, please keep your promise to me.

Please do everything in your power to help Congress repeal “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” this year. Our government called upon us to fight for our country. So many of us answered the call; we did not delay. We were sent world’s away to defend your freedoms. Mr. President, won’t you fight for mine?

With deep respect,

A soldier returning to Baghdad

(The writer is currently serving and unable to identify himself publicly.)

Gay soldier dies in Afghanistan

A unit found out about a gay soldier after he was killed by an IED and his partner wrote them.

Gay soldier dies in Afghanistan

A unit found out about a gay soldier after he was killed by an IED and his partner wrote them.

Gay soldier may be discharged

Syracuse – A military administrative board recommended on Tuesday that a National Guard officer who publicly announced he was gay should be discharged for violating the military’s policy against homosexual conduct.

Lieutenant Dan Choi would be the first New York National Guard member discharged for violating the so-called “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy, Lieutenant Colonel Paul Fanning, a spokesperson for the New York Army National Guard, said.

Choi, 28, appeared here before a Federal Recognition Board, a panel of four military officers, which deliberated for four hours before deciding to recommend the army no longer recognise him as an officer.

Choi, a combat veteran who on Sunday was a celebrity grand marshal in San Francisco’s Gay Pride Parade, said it amounted to firing him “for nothing more than telling the truth about who I am”. See Gay soldier may be discharged

Independent Online

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Op-Ed Video: A Gay Soldier’s Husband

A gay man talks about “don’t ask, don’t tell” and the difficulties he faces having a partner on active duty in Iraq.

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Original source : http://gay_blog.blogspot.com/2009/06/op-ed-video-g…

When asked, this gay soldier told

TUSTIN In a calm corner of his garage, a soldier rummages through reminders of the last ten years of his life. Silver coins. A Middle Eastern sash. An Army pistol. Only a few of the souvenirs in Dan Choi’s war chest will fit into his travel duffel.

As he packs, his mom walks in. She reaches around her son’s boulder-sized biceps for a hug.

“Are you staying for dinner?”

“I’m not sure.”

By nightfall, though, Choi will surely be gone. He’s getting out of Tustin, maybe for good.

Monumental change has unsettled the 28-year-old combat veteran and his family. In March, on national television, he said, “I am gay.”

That was news to a lot of people, including his bosses. And, the three short words thrust Choi into the limelight, booked his calendar with equal-rights rallies – and earned him a pink slip from the military.

But all the cameras and microphones that have trailed Choi since then have captured only part of the story. They haven’t been privy to his parents’ distress, his past anxieties or his newfound sense of liberation.

Thousands of other troops have gotten booted for outing themselves (or being outed) as gay or lesbian. But, like clockwork, most have disappeared from public view. Choi figures he will too at some point.

But he’s not going away now, and he’s not going away quietly.

HIGH SCHOOL LOWS

Over loudspeakers, he ranted.

It was 1998, and President Clinton was getting grilled by national media for his then-alleged affair with a 22-year-old intern. At Tustin High School, Choi, 17, took on the role of Clinton scold. He locked himself in a room and commandeered the public address system to decry the commander-in-chief’s weakness and offer what he saw as a cure-all: faith in Jesus Christ.

Choi’s sister, Grace, then a freshman, recalls her brother’s outburst as “surprising, but not embarrassing.”

Their dad, a Baptist minister who fought in the South Korean Army, helped raise his three kids to battle against injustice and sin. Years later, that duty to speak out would inspire Choi to talk about his sexuality – and throw a crimp in their father-son relationship.

“I always think of the story of a throng of people telling Christ to silence his disciples,” Choi says, adding: “And Christ said, ‘… if they keep quiet, the rocks will cry out.’”

But, in high school at least, Choi’s bold talk came with a cost. The acne-faced student body president lost his job as morning news announcer, and was forced into a sabbatical from student government.

Graduation cleaned his slate. Reinstated as president, the straight-A student gave a parting address to his peers. And, bound for the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, Choi left a rousing, two-page letter in the back of his own yearbook.

“Leave your kingdom,” he wrote to himself, “to be a lonely plebe down in the dump.”

STANDING UP

In a forest near the academy, Choi smeared earth-tone paint on his face and hunkered down with his rifle. Energy-sapping practice missions, he says, were key to his college experience.

On campus, Choi studied environmental engineering. Critically, he also began mastering Arabic.

And he held onto his faith. He led Bible studies in the dorms and recited the “Cadet Prayer” every Sunday with the West Point choir. “Make us to choose the harder right instead of the easier wrong,” he prayed, “and to never to be content with a half truth when the whole can be won.”

Still, Choi concealed a truth. Since fourth grade, he had begged God to take away his attraction to other males. In college, he says, he remained unwilling to “explore” his sexuality.

In 2003, the Iraq War kicked into gear. Choi, now clear-faced and brawny, was soon sent to serve in the Persian Gulf.

There, he says he “greased hands” with elder Muslim Sheikhs, patrolled the Triangle of Death and designed a reverse-osmosis water plant for Baghdad citizens. He also passed on his knowledge of Arabic, as a teacher to thousands of American troops.

Throughout it all, compelled by the military’s “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy, Choi kept mum about his sexual preference.

His final wartime task, delivering backpacks full of cash to contractors, kept him awake at night. It was around the time of that mission, sleepless in the desert, that he started asking a tough question:

Do I really want to keep lying?

When his tour ended, he wanted to boomerang back to Iraq. But that dream was brought to a halt in March when, on behalf of scores of West Point alumni and active-duty servicemembers, he went public with his sexual orientation.

WAR IN PEACE

On his last afternoon in town, rice steams in the kitchen as, upstairs, Choi sorts through a box of Army accolades.

“Who knows? Maybe one day I’ll be one of those stodgy old veterans wearing all his stuff,” he says, laughing, clutching a handful of medals.

Proud but tired of the half-truth, the highly decorated soldier returned from Iraq in 2008 and ditched reenlistment. Instead, he became a platoon leader in the National Guard. Stationed in New York, he met someone, parked down the street and lived in his car to be close to his first boyfriend.

Then Choi came home to Tustin to come out to his mom and dad – 19 times in fact, to show he wasn’t bluffing. He handed his dad a copy of the book “Loving Someone Gay.” A few days later he discovered it unopened on the floor of his closet.

“They don’t accept it,” Choi says. “And I don’t think they will anytime soon.”

Neither will the military. After his first of several prime time TV appearances, Choi, the rare Arabic-speaking serviceman, received an ultimatum from his employer – accept discharge or stand trial.

His chances before a judge seem slim, based on the dismissal of 12,500 past soldiers.

But he believes the fortunes of an estimated 65,000 gay and lesbian members of the armed forced could be changed if Congress were to repeal “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” a move President Obama favors. So, Choi keeps talking to news anchors and shouting to crowds, which strains his home life – and, recently, compelled him to pack up and move.

“Silence is not a right,” Choi says.

“Silence is an unacceptable, inexcusable wrong.”

See When asked, this gay soldier told

OCRegister

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Openly gay soldier Dan Choi dismissed from National Guard under DADT

Lieutenant Dan Choi, the National Guard soldier who publicly came out live on national television, has been dismissed from duty.
He was dismissed for “homosexual conduct”.
Choi is a campaigner for the repeal of the military gay ban and a founding member of the Knights Out group.
He came out live on US television on the Rachel Maddow Show, where he will reappear tonight to discuss his dismissal.
In a preview of the show, Maddow reads a letter received by Choi from the Army National Guard.
It states: “This is to inform you that sufficient basis exists to initiate action for withdrawal of Federal Recognition in the Army National Guard for moral or professional dereliction.
“Specifically you admitted publicly that you are a homosexual, which constitutes homosexual conduct. Your actions negatively affected the good order and discipline of the New York Army National Guard.” See Openly gay soldier Dan Choi dismissed from National Guard under …
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Souter proves a gay rights surprise

Wednesday, May 6, 2009

Deb Price

Souter proves a gay rights surprise

When David Souter was nominated to the Supreme Court in 1990, gay-rights groups quickly lined up to oppose him: Three years earlier, as a state judge he had signed onto an advisory opinion saying nothing prevented New Hampshire from banning gay adoption.

But once on the court, Souter stepped into the shoes of civil rights giant William Brennan and quietly grew into them. What a joyful surprise Souter’s nearly two-decade run turned out to be.

Using his intellectual gifts and good heart, Souter helped produce a warming trend, enabling the court to begin moving away from four decades of icy treatment of gay men and lesbians.

Thanks to Souter, the court turned a major corner in 1995, when a unanimous opinion that he wrote for the court finally used the respectful term “gay.”

Souter’s ruling also spoke respectfully of Massachusetts’ gay-rights law, igniting the hope that major breakthroughs would come soon.

The first–Romer v. Evans–came the very next year. Souter voted with the majority in ruling gay Americans have a right to equal protection of the laws. He also voted with the majority in the landmark Lawrence v. Texas decision, which in 2003 declared gay Americans have a right to sexual privacy.

In between, Souter wrote a gay-friendly dissent to the 2000 ruling allowing the Boy Scouts to ban gay scoutmasters. And, in a 1998 signal that the court was not undercutting Romer, Souter signed onto an unusual statement by Justice John Paul Stevens stressing that the court’s refusal to hear a challenge to a sweeping anti-gay amendment in Cincinnati “is not a ruling on the merits.”

Within his own chambers, as my co-author Joyce Murdoch and I documented in “Courting Justice: Gay Men and Lesbians v. the Supreme Court,” Souter reacted respectfully when one of his law clerks came out. Souter hired another clerk who was a gay-rights scholar.

Souter, appointed by a Republican president, added a parting gift: By choosing to retire when a gay-supportive Democrat will pick his successor, he likely ensured the court will continue its trend toward reading gay rights into the Constitution’s promises of equality.

Obama offered a hint at what Souter’s replacement may look like when he said two years ago that he’d appoint justices with the “empathy to recognize what it’s like to be a young, teenaged mom … to be poor or African-American or gay or disabled or old.”

More recently, Obama vowed to “seek someone who understands that justice” affects whether people feel “welcome in their own nation.”

That kind of Souter replacement would maintain what’s now believed to be a 5-4 split in favor of basic gay rights. She — or he — will join the court’s progressive wing amid a sea change in public attitudes and legal rights for those of us who are gay.

Knowledge of that “real world” could prove helpful: Unless Congress finally addresses two pressing injustices, the court might hear challenges in the next few years to the bans on openly gay soldiers and on federal benefits for same-sex married couples, notes gay law scholar Arthur Leonard.

Souter’s replacement hopefully will feel a special kinship to him, as he did to Brennan.

Even when ruling against a specific gay group in 1995 — declaring that forcing organizers of Boston’s St. Patrick’s Day parade to let an Irish-American gay group participate would violate the First Amendment — Souter was careful not to suggest the court agreed with anti-gay prejudices.

Thank you, Justice Souter, for making gay Americans feel more welcome in our own nation.

dprice@detnews.com (202) 662-8736