President hails gay pride month

President Obama has issued a proclamation honoring “Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgendered Pride Month 2009.”
Gay pride month is observed every June to commemorate the “Stonewall riots,” an uprising that took place in 1969 when police tried to arrest gay patrons at the Stonewall Inn in New York City. The bar is shown here on the 25th anniversary of those events — widely viewed at the beginning of the modern gay rights movement.
Brad Luna of the Human Rights Campaign, the nation’s largest gay rights organization, says Obama’s proclamation is not a first: Former president Bill Clinton regularly recognized gay pride month during his second term in office. But Luna says Obama is right in claiming that he has tapped more openly gay nominees for high profile posts early in his administration than any previous president.
See a few excerpts from the president’s proclamation @ President hails gay pride month USA Today –

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New Study Says Obama Can Halt Gay Discharges With Executive Order

Military Law Experts Chart Course to End 16-Year Ban

SANTA BARBARA, Calif. — A study released today by a team of military law experts shows that the president has the legal authority to end gay discharges with a single order. The idea of ending the ban by executive order has gained momentum in the wake of news that mission-critical personnel, including Arabic language speaker Dan Choi, continue to be fired under the Obama administration because they’re gay. Congressman Rush Holt endorsed an executive order to end the ban on Saturday and National Security Adviser James Jones was asked about it by George Stephanopoulos on Sunday morning. The report, “How to End Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell: A Roadmap of Political, Legal, Regulatory, and Organizational Steps to Equal Treatment,” is sponsored by the Palm Center at the University of California, Santa Barbara.

Many have argued that only Congress can lift the ban on service by openly gay troops. But according to the study, Congressional approval is not needed. Dr. Aaron Belkin, Director of the Palm Center and a study co-author, said “The administration does not want to move forward on this issue because of conservative opposition from both parties in Congress, and Congress does not want to move forward without a signal from the White House. This study provides a recipe for breaking through the political deadlock, as well as a roadmap for military leaders once the civilians give the green light.”

There are three legal bases to the president’s authority, the report says. First, Congress has already granted to the Commander in Chief the statutory authority to halt military separations under 10 U.S.C. 12305, a law which Congress titled, “Authority of President to suspend certain laws relating to promotion, retirement, and separation.” Under the law, the President may suspend any provision of law relating to promotion, retirement, or separation applicable to any member of the armed forces who the President determines is essential to the national security of the United States during a “period of national emergency.” The statute specifically defines a “national emergency” as a time when “members of a reserve component are serving involuntarily on active duty.”

The second and third bases of presidential authority are contained within the “don’t ask, don’t tell” legislation itself. The law grants to the Defense Department authority to determine the process by which discharges will be carried out, saying they will proceed “under regulations prescribed by the Secretary of Defense, in accordance with procedures set forth in such regulation.” Finally, the law calls for the discharge of service members if a finding of homosexuality is made, but it does not require that such a finding ever be made. According to the study, these provisions mean that the Pentagon, not Congress, has the “authority to devise and implement the procedures under which those findings may be made.”

Diane H. Mazur, Professor of Law at the University of Florida College of Law and another study co-author, said the presidential authority to stop firing gay troops, known as “stop-loss,” is different from the highly unpopular stop-loss policy that the Army recently announced it would phase out. “That use of stop-loss forcibly extends service by those who wish to leave the military,” she said, “whereas suspending discharges for homosexuality would do the opposite: allow ongoing service by those who wish to remain in uniform.” The study says the provisions of the stop-loss law, which are granted by Congress, are “sensible because they give the President authority to suspend laws relating to separation when a national emergency has strained personnel requirements.”

The other four authors of the study in addition to Mazur and Belkin are Dr. Nathaniel Frank, a Palm researcher and author of “Unfriendly Fire: How the Gay Ban Undermines the Military and Weakens America”; Dr. Gregory M. Herek, Professor of Psychology at the University of California, Davis; Dr. Elizabeth L. Hillman, Professor of Law at the University of California Hastings College of the Law; and Bridget J. Wilson, who practices law at Rosenstein Wilson & Dean in San Diego. The report will also be published in a forthcoming book, “Department of Defense Social Policy Perspectives 2010,” edited by James Parco, David Levy and Fred Blass.

The Palm Center is a research institute at the University of California, Santa Barbara. The Center uses rigorous social science to inform public discussions of controversial social issues, enabling policy outcomes to be informed more by evidence than by emotion. Its data-driven approach is premised on the notion that the public makes wise choices on social issues when high-quality information is available. For more information, visit www.palmcenter.ucsb.edu * Tags = gay men gay news lesbian news transgender bisexual

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Being openly gay in Dartmouth athletics

In an article on gay pride week at Dartmouth College, the Ivy League school in New Hampshire, the school paper The Dartmouth interviewed two gay athletes and what they said is not a surprise to anyone who has followed the subject: they wish there were more out jocks.
“[Being gay at Dartmouth] has been a very positive experience, but one thing that definitely disappoints me is the very small population of out gay athletes,” Tyler Ford ‘11, a member of the men’s track and field team, said. “That leaves us without a support system.”
A former water polo player at the school who is about to graduate echoed this sentiment.
“Sports is one of the hardest places to come out in, to feel comfortable. Especially for guys, it’s such a macho area,” Taylor Holt said.
“Dartmouth has had a history of out gay athletes, and gay athletes at Dartmouth have the responsibility that they need to represent something more to closeted gay athletes throughout athletics, to the gay community in general,” Holt said.
In the past, Outsports has featured two out jocks from Dartmouth: Andrew Goldstein in lacrosse and Jamal Brown in track and field. Both athletes reported a positive response from coming out. Still, though, there is tremendous resistance among the majority of athletes to take that step. See Being openly gay in Dartmouth athletics
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