U.S. House Armed Services Committee to Hold hearing on DADT Tomorrow

I suspect that Elaine Donnelly (pictured at left) is having ultra-frenzied hissy fits and convulsions over the pending U.S. House Armed Services Committee hearings tomorrow on the repeal of "Don't Ask, Don't Tell." Like so many of the professional gay-haters, Ms. Donnelly has associated herself with a Christianist organization with an official sounding name - the Center for Military Readiness - to serve as a platform for her efforts to forever condemn gays to less than full citizenship status. When not trashing gays, CMR also works to deny women equal treatment in the military, preferring apparently that women be kept in the home barefoot and pregnant. Would that Ms. Donnelly would stay in her home and keep her mouth shut. Here's what Ms. Donnelly, ever the martyr, is putting out about the hearings tomorrow:

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CMR has the facts, sound principle and common sense on its side, but faces large, well-funded activist groups that are devoted to one radical goal: repeal of the 1993 law, which is constantly mislabeled "Don't Ask, Don't Tell."

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Funny that the storyline being reported by USA Today differs significantly from Donnelly's whining. Here are a few highlights:

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Without this hearing, said former Joint Chiefs of Staff chairman John Shalikashvili, "you will never repeal the law. It's a great idea." He is among more than 50 retired generals and admirals who have said it is time to rethink the policy. The hearing comes as the volunteer armed forces struggle to retain troops to fight two wars. Changing attitudes are seen in polls such as one by The Washington Post, published Saturday, showing that 75% favor allowing gays to serve openly, up from 44% in 1993.

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The presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, Barack Obama, has said that if elected, he would work to repeal the bar on open service — and the "don't ask" compromise designed to work around it. His Republican rival, John McCain, wants no change.

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Gay-rights advocates say they are disappointed at the Pentagon's no-show. "At a time when the military is relaxing every possible standard to attract new recruits, and at the same time is losing mission-critical specialists such as Arabic linguists, medical professionals and others, one would hope and expect that Defense Department leaders would be first in line to call on Congress to repeal the law," says Steve Ralls of Parents, Families and Friends of Lesbians and Gays.

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I guess under Ms. Donnelly's thinking, us gays have somehow recruited former Joint Chiefs of Staff chairman John Shalikashvili and the more than 50 other retired generals and admirals who think DADT needs to go. Ms. Donnelly really needs to get a life and get her frigid nose out of the military's business.