False Advertising, Take 2, courtesy the Washington Post

CMR wrote the following Letter to the Editor of the Washington Post, to respond to a Post editorial on military recruitment ads appearing on a gay website. The letter was considered for publication, but ultimtately went unpublished. As we noted in an earlier post, the story was originally reported by USA Today.

The October 26 editorial titled "Don't Ask," which trumpeted the disingenuous PR campaign for gays in the military, missed the point. Defense Department advertising should be directed toward potential recruits who are eligible to serve in the military. Under the law passed by Congress in 1993, which is almost always mislabeled "Don't Ask, Don't Tell," persons who engage in homosexual conduct are ineligible.

Agencies that misspent defense dollars by placing ads on gay professional networking websites should be required to reimburse the military. According to the USA Today report that the editorial cited, the Army National Guard alone will invest $6.5 million in internet recruiting this year. Comparable expenditures are probably true of the other services. The armed forces are due a refund.

"Don't Ask, Don't Tell" (DADT) is constantly confused with the law that Congress actually passed, technically known as "Section 654, Title 10." DADT describes a set of inconsistent enforcement regulations imposed by Bill Clinton as a "transitional policy" toward open homosexuality in the military. To reduce confusion, and the number of homosexual discharges to near zero, the administration should drop Bill Clinton's "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy, and fully enforce the law.

Tommy Sears
Executive Director, CMR