If you thought that the arguments opposing the repeal of Don’t Ask Don’t Tell weren’t desperate enough, many on the Right are now suggesting that the ban on gays and lesbians from serving openly in the military should be kept in place because the alleged Wikileaks-leaker is gay. A New York Times profile on intelligence analyst Bradley Manning’s “desperation for acceptance — or delusions of grandeur” found that much of his “social life was defined by the need to conceal his sexuality under Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell and he wasted brainpower fetching coffee for officers.” The Times went on to report that “even as he professed a perhaps inflated sense of purpose, he called himself ‘emotionally fractured’ and a ‘wreck’ and said he was ‘self-medicating like crazy.’”
For the right wing media, the story wasn’t that Manning had a history of being victimized and excluded because of his sexual orientation, but that as a result of his sexual orientation he became a traitor. Ann Coulter suggests that Manning was a “narcissistic hothouse flower” and the “poster boy for Don’t Ask Don’t Tell”:
With any luck, Bradley’s court-martial will be gayer than a Liza Minelli wedding. It could be the first court-martial in U.S. history to feature ice sculptures and a “Wizard of Oz”-themed gazebo. “Are you going to Bradley’s court-martial? I hear Patti LaBelle is going to sing!”
Maybe there’s a reason gays have traditionally been kept out of the intelligence services, apart from the fact that closeted gay men are easy to blackmail. Gays have always been suspicious of that rationale and perhaps they’re right.
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Bradley’s friends told the Times they suspected “his desperation for acceptance — or delusions of grandeur” may have prompted his document dump.
Let’s check our “Gay Profile at a Glance” and … let’s see … desperate for acceptance … delusions of grandeur … yep, they’re both on the gay subset list!
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Look at the disaster one gay created under our punishing “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy. What else awaits America with the overturning of a policy that was probably put there for a reason (apart from being the only thing Bill Clinton ever did that I agreed with)?
Liberals don’t care. Their approach is to rip out society’s foundations without asking if they serve any purpose.
The Family Research Council has also jumped in, commenting:
Now that the enemy has access to American intelligence, our mission in the Middle East may be irreparably harmed–all because President Obama is less concerned with winning the war than he is with winning the far-Left’s approval. Unfortunately for all of us, Manning’s betrayal painfully confirms what groups like FRC have argued all along: the instability of the homosexual lifestyle is a detriment to military readiness. By foisting this agenda on our soldiers, the White House is not only jeopardizing the future of national security but compromising its present.
WorldNetDaily’s Joseph Farah said that “the system of moral blindness and the disconnect from common sense,” which allowed Manning to serve as a closeted gay man in the first place, “made [the leak] inevitable.” Cliff Kincaid of the conservative Accuracy In Media blasted news outlets for not covering Manning’s sexual orientation enough for his liking, and claims that Manning’s sexuality and support for gay rights show that Don’t Ask Don’t Tell doesn’t go far enough and should become more stringent. Kincaid writes:
Now, because of the obvious mishandling of this homosexual ticking time bomb, it appears that the United States, its soldiers, and relations with countries in the region will pay the price. Lives-and a war on terrorism in Afghanistan-could be lost.
The revelations of Manning’s openly pro-homosexual conduct suggest that a more liberal Department of Defense policy, in deference to the wishes of the Commander-in-Chief, had already been in effect and has now backfired in a big way.
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The dramatic revelations about Manning’s circle of friends and associates suggest that, rather than repeal the homosexual exclusion policy, as Obama is demanding, the prohibition on homosexuals should have been more strictly enforced and that it should be strengthened today.
As the Right tries to score political points by saying that due to Manning’s individual problems and turmoil, all gay and lesbian servicemembers should be viewed as disgruntled, treacherous, unstable, and disloyal people. And, the say, rather than dismantle Don’t Ask Don’t Tell, which produces extreme and troubling pressures on closeted soldiers, the policy should become more severe and oppressive.
