BHO and officials on DADT - and an UNofficial response

From War on Terror News yesterday:

Obama Certifies Military Ready for ‘Don’t Ask’ Repeal

By Jim Garamone
American Forces Press Service

WASHINGTON, July 22, 2011 – Based on recommendations from military leaders, President Barack Obama has certified to Congress that the U.S. armed forces are prepared for repeal of the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” law.

There is a 60-day waiting period before the repeal goes into effect, so the law will officially come off the books Sept. 20. After that date, gay service members can be open about their sexual orientation.

The president signed the certification and delivered it to Congress today.

Congress passed the repeal law in December. The legislation gave the military time to prepare the force and said repeal would happen only after the president, the defense secretary and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff certified the force as ready for repeal.

The Defense Department chartered a repeal implementation team to coordinate the necessary changes to policy and regulations, and to provide education and training to service members....

At WOTN here, you'll find the rest of the official responses, including Adm. Mike Mullen's Statement and Secretary Panetta’s Statement.

What you will not find is a public response from any of the boots on the ground; you know, the troops that will be most affected by any policy change. However, I was given permission to share with you what a US Military Senior NCO has to say. Unofficially, of course! Read on:

DADT Repeal "Certified"

The greatest lie perpetrated on the American people and our troops was presented to Congress today.

"The President, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and I have certified that the implementation of repeal of 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell' is consistent with the standards of military readiness, military effectiveness, unit cohesion, and recruiting and retention of the armed forces. This certification decision was carefully made after receiving input from the service chiefs, service secretaries and from all the combatant commanders, who stated their views that the force is prepared for this change," said newly appointed Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta today in a statement.

President Obama released a statement saying the certification removes a policy "that undermines our military readiness and violates American principles of fairness and equality."

Funny that we had no problem winning all the nation's wars BEFORE the repeal. I fail to see how the policy undermined anything, especially readiness. If the President were so concerned with "fairness and equality" he'd allow males and females to room together. If he were so concerned with "fairness and equality" he wouldn't be targeting rich people to bail him out of his extremist spending.

In speaking about us, he said "Today’s action follows extensive training of our military personnel and certification by Secretary Panetta and Admiral Mullen that our military is ready for repeal."

I'm sorry. WHAT EXTENSIVE TRAINING? We haven't been "trained" on anything. The military and civilian leadership was supposed to certify that repeal of DADT would ensure " military readiness, military effectiveness, unit cohesion, and recruiting and retention of the armed forces." Not one iota of this "training" focused on ANY of that. As a matter of fact, the training wasn't training at all, but a briefing on what the law means. There was never even an attempt to ascertain how the troops would be affected. There was no discussion on how to handle issues. It was a "the law has changed, shut up and suck it up" briefing.

Anyone that says the military has been "trained" is misleading the American people on what the "training" entailed. I'm not afraid to call out the Undersecretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness when he says "training was being well-received, and there were no issues or barriers arising." Either he was lied to or is lying to the American people. The reason no "issues or barriers" arose was because they didn't permit any to arise. NO DISCUSSION WAS ALLOWED DURING THIS "TRAINING!!"

During a question an answer session earlier today, the following took place:

Q: OK. The other question was, at the time that you guys did the survey, the big concern was unit cohesion, disruption of unit cohesion. In the process of training, which we've heard has gone swimmingly and had no problems, has there been any indication that -- you know, separate or different from what you thought coming out of that survey, once we get past training, and we get past the repeal and this really starts and open service is allowed that there will be unit cohesion going all the way down to the combat units, it's a big worry that everyone has.

GEN. HUMMER: The -- as the service chiefs have received information from their leadership, their chains of command, to include combat areas over the last six months, there have been no distractions from unit cohesion that have been reported. So it's been very, very positive, the information that's come from them, through the leadership in this building.

Again, keep in mind that Soldiers aren't allowed to express their disagreement or the "distractions" that repeal will cause. The briefing was very specific in that it was a one-way conversation. So, naturally, no distractions would be reported when we aren't allowed to report any! Leadership is NOT stifling opinions and just forcing people to accept immoral behavior. Regardless of our disagreements, most Soldiers will always treat everyone with respect regardless of feelings on any particular topic. So the assumption that we need special training to be professional or respectful is a strawman.

Yes, in a statement that goes unquestioned by our fawning pro-gay agenda media, Gen Hummer even says what I've been trying to get people to understand for months:

Q: OK. Thank you. For those of us not familiar with the training, I was told it was anywhere from 45 minutes to an hour and 15 minutes in groups of 50 to 250. Is that accurate?

GEN. HUMMER: That's pretty accurate. The training was made up -- and I think most people know of a -- kind of a one-way presentation, like a PowerPoint presentation --

Q: Was that in every case, the PowerPoint --

GEN. HUMMER: I'd -- yes. I'd say yes.

Now, my natural follow question would be, "wait a minute. You just said the training was a one-way presentation, but that no distractions were reported. How can Soldiers express what the distractions would be if the training was only one-way?" I mean, that's what I would ask! Instead, Gen Hummer goes on to spout more inaccuracies:

And then as part of that were the frequently asked questions and the vignettes, and that's where you get the dialogue going. So it depends on the leadership how they're going to present, what level is being prepared or being trained or educated, and how long those discussions go.

Perhaps we didn't get the correct training, but there was no dialogue during our "training." Soldiers at other bases I've spoken with relayed the same frustrations.

This briefing also gave us a look into what was to come. Not only is it just about allowing gays to serve. Once the repeal is confirmed and finalized, the next phases of legitimizing homosexual activity will be initiated, including overturning DOMA and obtaining benefits for same sex couples not married.

MS. PENROD: When we looked at the plan for implementation of the law, our priority was to develop the training and ensure that the force is trained. And looking at that priority, we realized the benefits, although very important -- that we would wait until repeal before we decided to look in the benefits; which we will do upon repeal.

Finally, I want to leave with this little interesting tidbit that the media also didn't follow up on. My question is obvious, so I'll just end it with this.

Q: And could you just fine tune that statement that was made earlier about how there was unanimous support?

MR. WILSON: There was unanimous support for implementation of repeal at this time, that the conditions had been met.

Well, yeah! That's why Gates had to go!