Rolling Back DADT; What Bush Can Teach Dems

From Sully:

"A reader writes:


"I just watched This Week with George Stephanopoulos on ABC. Stephanopoulos asked the roundtable whether the next Democratic president should try to abolish DADT right away and risk the same backlash that Bill Clinton experienced in the opening days of his presidency.
Stephanopoulos was a leading advisor to Bill Clinton when a wave of homophobia swept the nation on the issue of gays in the military. Stephanopoulos was clearly reliving that nightmare in his mind in asking this particular question. To my disappointment, almost every member of the roundtable immediately agreed that a Democratic president should wait before tampering with DADT. Most of these journalists were young and should know better that a sea change in attitudes toward gay people has taken place since the early '90s.

"The only person who was aware of this major transformation was George Will, the oldest one sitting at the table. He explained how his 26 year old daughter and all her friends view being gay as no different than being left handed. This accepting attitude is shared by a majority of Americans under 30, the age group that fills the ranks of the military. As he often does on the This Week roundtable, George Will put the other journalists in their place, this time in support of an immediate lifting of the noxious Don’t Ask Don’t Tell policy, a policy that actually puts our nation’s security at risk, contrary to what its supporters claim.


"Stephanopoulos represents a certain class of Clintonite Democrat: still so spooked by the 1990s that they cannot move forward. He also promoted Clinton's anti-gay policy initiatives as a wedge against the Republicans. Alas, many tired Democratic pros are encouraged in their cravenness by the conviction-free HRC and big gay donors, many of whom are also old, and have come to believe their own permament defensive crouch is political realism. George Will remains the class of the conservative punditocracy. Over the last few years, he has put the rest of us to shame.
The truth is: anyone who is serious about winning this war will not be throwing good soldiers on the scrap-heap to cater to fear. It seems to me we should cede anti-gay bigotry to our Islamist enemies. We're better than them. Or aren't we?"

There's a ton of very good reasons by DADT should be tossed out for an all inclusive policy, and the debate, like the debate about Segregation and Slavery, can be tossed around forever. If there's any thing that Bush should have taught us is the strength of bullishness. He's been absolutely wrong about everything, but his manner of being wrong, and ignoring criticism is a lesson that the Democrats should memorize. This is one of those issues that the Dems shouldn't have to, excuse the irony, hide in the closet about. Getting rid of DADT makes a stronger military and creates a more just society. Standing up to it, and remaining bullish about it, can only add credibility to a candidate.