(WSJ/Harris Poll) Gays Should Be Allowed to Serve Openly in Military, Poll Finds

[sabra]

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Gays Should Be Allowed to Serve Openly in Military, Poll Finds
The Wall Street Journal Online

A new poll from Harris Interactive found that 55% of Americans think gays and lesbians should be allowed to serve openly in the military.

By comparison, 19% of the 2,337 Americans polled said gays and lesbians should be allowed to serve "only if they keep their sexual orientation a secret," and 18% said they should "not be allowed to serve in the military at all."

[Wickerman]

1. Of course, "as long as its not my openly gay son or daughter"

Now that we are in an unpopular war that needs volunteers for the meat-grinder the general public can no longer afford the luxury of being actively prejudiced.

[saltpoint]

2. Among the traditional arguments in the U.S. against gays in the

military is that their presence would "threaten morale."

The Theban Band comes to mind.

I don't believe anybody would question the morale of the Theban Band.

And Alexander, who had male, female and eunuch lovers, seemed to me to do pretty well on the military trail. Darius could speak to the issue of morale in the Macedonian army.

[Ian David]

6. That may have been their argument, but it was NEVER the real reason.

Just as saying that black people had poor night vision was never the REAL reason to keep them out of the military.

The REAL reason they don't want gays in the military is the same reason they REALLY didn't want black peple in the miltary.

The REAL reason they don't want gays in the military is because they do not want gay people learning how to defend themselves.

[gratuitous]

3. We need to hit recruiting quotas somehow

And if that means letting the queers into the military, well, we can always shove them back in the closet after we win in Iraq.

They are getting muy desperate about now, aren't they? But as good a start as we had in the 2006 election, the real work is getting to us. The crooks who run the Bush administration aren't the "aw shucks, you caught us, we'll go quietly" types. No, these greedy, bloodthirsty motherfuckers are going to have to have their fingers snapped and broken to wrench their crooked hands off the levers of power, and they'll have to be dragged bodily out of the White House (metaphorically speaking, of course).

Roll up your sleeves, folks, and prepare for some truly nauseating times in the work ahead. We will have to go through a veritable Amazon River of bitter water to once again reach the sweet. I'm quite sure it will be worth it.

[Turbineguy]

4. In the past

Gay's were considered a security risk because they were vulnerable to blackmail. But obviously a secret loses it's power if it is no longer a secret. So it should be open and that's that.

[damntexdem]

5. But we need to be careful of that argument because:

being a Republican should be so embarrassing as to be kept secret and to make one vulnerable to blackmail. But we wouldn't want to validate Republicans' disinclination to enter the military. ;-)