Just to clarify, it was a close friend with whom I was talking to and the conversation was pretty unremarkable content-wise -- details of our personal lives, a date I went on, this guy's cute, that sort of thing. The policy doesn't neccessarily need a specific admission of an act, "I'm gay" is enough. The law comflates a statement of identify with actions. Regardless, I don't dispute that it was a mistake to use the government computers, but the discplinary action for that was done with for nearly a month when they told me they were going to kick me out. Note that the other 68 heterosexual servicemembers are still serving.

I also don't blame the military, as it has been noted they were following the law. Some commanders do ignore the law and turn a blind eye to gay servicemembers, the Navy didn't in my case and many others. It does need to be Congress that enacts repeal, specifically Ike Skelton needs to allow hearings on the bill he's holding up in the Armed Services comittee.

It's been more than 12 years since Congress has talked about this, and now more than ever it's critically important that the country gets the best and brightest in the military. Don't get me wrong, I'm not asking to turn military bases into gay pride parades, I just want to live my life and be judged on my merits. I want the witchhunts to stop.

Regarding Clinton, my recollection was that he made a big deal about gays in the military almost immediately upon entering office and the general public's reaction was WTF? My memory could certainly be wrong, he may have been set up, similar to Bush with the "arsenic in drinking water" nonsense.

Interesting. And, yes, blackmail was always the rationale. Of course, if one is open, then it's not an issue. But, if one is openly homosexual, one is ineligible to join to begin with. The classic Catch-22.

I've been told that, understandably, the higher you go on the clearance ladder the deeper they delve into that issue.

An excellent question. In the old days, absolutely. They would have had to lied to get their clearance, since there were an absurd number of questions about homosexuality (at least for the SCI I got in 1988).

If the "Don't Ask" applies to security questionnaires, though, that's presumably no longer an issue.

FIGHTING THE REAL MENACE....The military is still busily firing gay Arabic linguists in its continuing quest to keep America safer. I would personally prefer it if they spent more time keeping us safer from Arabic-speaking jihadists who are trying to.....

'Cause if not, someone ought to set up a private intelligence consulting firm, hire these guys at twice their military salary, offer domestic partner benefits, and start working with the DoD, CIA, NSF and FBI as an outsourced Arabic document translation firm.

One can be both. A substantial number of deployed soldiers work in what amounts to an office setting -- sitting behind a laptop in an air conditioned GP Large or command center vehicle. That doesn't make them less soldierly but it changes the nature of their experience.

Well, Clinton was the Commander Guy. But, yes, the brass were opposed to dropping the ban on gays completely. Then again, the culture has moved a lot since 1992. Today's generals were then captains and majors.