I was both surprised and dumbfounded by the news in this morning’s Los Angeles Times that another domino has fallen in the war against reality. “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell” has been dealt another significant blow, certainly equal to the House of Representatives’ vote to repeal the idiotic 1993 law. You can [1] read the decision here.

The “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell” Act, signed by President Clinton, was supposed to stop the witch-hunts in the U.S. Armed Forces by saying, basically, if you keep your mouth shut about your private life we will ignore your sexuality. The problem was the homophobic witch hunters are still homophobic, and DADT simply gave them a slicker way to guarantee the expulsion of “openly” gay/lesbian service members—who were “open” often only because they were pried out of their closets by the homophobic witch hunters. Since 1994, according to some sources, more than 13,000 personnel have been discharged.

Did anybody mention that the falling dominos also represent “circular reasoning”? The bottom line is that DADT didn’t “work” for anybody, and Judge Virginia Phillips’ decision yesterday illustrates this very well. Not only does the law treat gay/lesbian service members unfairly by denying them equal protection of the laws of this nation, it doesn’t work. It doesn’t protect our national security or combat readiness or unit cohesion or anything.

Judge Phillips, [2] according to ABC News, will issue a permanent injunction against enforcing DADT in about two weeks.

The decision, from yet another California-based federal court, sounds amazingly like Judge Walker’s decision in the [3] Perry v. Schwarzeneggar federal suit against California’s Proposition 8. Maybe it’s because it is attacking the same circularly-reasoned homophobic point of view of the original framers of DADT.

The government’s attorney, Paul G. Freeborne, apparently argued (in court?) that the whole issue is a political one that should be decided in Congress. The House already voted to repeal it. And now the court has said that matters of civil rights are not to be left to the political winds. [4] According to the Times, we can thank backward-thinking Senator John McCain (R-Arizona) for blocking the Senate from debating DADT.

There is another parallel. The U.S. Justice Department mounted a pathetically weak defense in the lawsuit (because the law is nearly indefensible). In the Perry Propo 8 case, the defense called only two witnesses to speak on behalf of Prop 8, one of whom sort of caved in under cross-examination. In this case, Freeborne called none.  So while the public chatter about why we need to keep homosexuals out of the military—or at least why we need to stall making any big shocking changes within our military—went on and on among the homophobic conservatives, they could not actually produce witnesses to demonstrate, show or prove how exactly the presence of a gay or lesbian person who wants to serve his or her country in uniform was causing the downfall of our armed services.

Maybe they could have called [5] Rev. Fred Phelps as a witness. He has tons of experience running around the country and telling everyone with his megaphone that God has damned America because we tolerate homosexuals, and that’s why our troops are being killed in two simultaneous wars. Hey, I didn’t say he would be a credible witness, but at least he has his testimony all prepped!

Seriously, this is the moment for the Obama administration to prove it wants to dump DADT. Could not Mr. Obama, for example, instruct the Department of Justice not to appeal the federal court ruling? According to [6] 365Gay.com, attorney Freeborne has not commented on his loss in court. And [7] according to Associated Press, the DOJ is “reviewing” the decision before it says what it will do next. We must wait and see whether the Department of Justice wants to press on with its official homophobia.

And timing is everything. [8] According to the Washington Post Robert M. Gates, Obama’s Secretary of Defense (and the official defendant in this case in his official capacity for the United States of America), has wanted to wait for the Pentagon itself to complete its internal review of whether it could get by without DADT. But their report is not due until December, and that’s long after the November elections, in which it is possible that the Democrats will lose their grip on Congress. Hey, I have an idea: repeal it now, or don’t appeal the ruling at all, and let the law die for its own sins.

I said I was also dumfounded by the news, and that’s because the Log Cabin Republicans, a gay political organization [oxymoron not withstanding] was the plaintiff in the lawsuit. Like many so-called activists, I have long disregarded the Log Cabin Club as a powerless bunch of privileged/moneyed oppressees who cannot bring themselves to admit that they are feeding the mouth that bites them. Maybe now, after a six year lawsuit, some of the oxymoronic homosexuals will clearly see how hard it is to stop the homophobes when you have already gotten into bed with them.

But attorney Emma Ruby-Sachs, writing for the invariably liberal Huffington Post, doesn’t think that this win can save the Log Cabin Republicans. “They support a party that doesn’t support their equal treatment under the law. Despite claims to work within the party for socially progressive change, lending any support to Republicans in this day and age simply undermines equal rights and constitutional protections in this country.” In fact, Ruby-Sachs is pretty withering in her criticism, and she has some interesting factlets about the case itself.  And you can read LCR’s own comments about its victory [9] here.

— Dan Hooper