Name the greater risk to national security: patriotic military translators who happen to be homosexual or anti-American Islamofascist terrorists who happen to be homicidal. If you picked the latter, thanks for putting U.S. safety first. Alas, the Pentagon disagrees.
According to new Defense Department data, between fiscal years 1998 and 2003, 20 Arabic- and six Farsi-language experts were booted from the military under President Bill Clinton’s 1993 “don’t ask/don’t tell” policy. These GIs trained at the elite Defense Language Institute in Monterey, Calif. Had they graduated _ assuming 40-hour workweeks and two-week vacations _ they could have dedicated 52,000 man-hours annually to interrogate Arab-speaking bomb builders, interpret intercepted enemy communications or transmit reassuring words to bewildered Baghdad residents.
Read the whole thing. As with Lincoln, I just don’t care where they put their wing-wangs. I wish the Army didn’t, either. (Via Evan Coyne Maloney).
UPDATE: Message to Andrew: After this post, I don’t want to hear any more complaints about “wing-wang.”