Thoughts on Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell

So, the military’s Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell policy (wherein they kick people out of the armed services if they find out they’re gay) has been in the news lately. Well, it’s been in the liberal news lately, because President Obama has failed to repeal the policy like he promised to in the campaign. Not exactly the first broken promise that has the left in an uproar, but you won’t hear about any of them on Fox News. It might interfere with their “he’s a rotten commie socialist that’s ruining the country” theory if their viewers were to somehow notice that ideologically the guy seems to fall somewhere between Richard Nixon and Gerald Ford.

But anyway, all the coverage has got me thinking.

For instance, why is it that so many of the people kicked out have been Arabic translators? That’s where this new round of outrage originated. Apparently a whole shitload of Arabic-speaking interpreters have been kicked out of the military (for being gay, please try to keep up) just when we really need them to read those intercepted messages to us. Now I agree that that’s a pretty boneheaded thing to do, but I just can’t figure out what the connection is between gayness and speaking Arabic. Was it some crazy trend that swept through the gay community in the early 90′s? Were all the gay clubs having wacky Arabian theme nights or something? Or is it just that gay native speakers tend to get the fuck out of the backwards little theocracies they were born into? Probably a wise move if they did. Maybe I figured this one out.

But interpreters aside, isn’t this an incredibly easy way to get out of the Army/Air Force/Marines/Navy (OK, maybe not the Navy)? I mean suppose you’re about to go on your 4th tour in Iraq or Afghanistan, and you’re really fucking sick of of shitty food, sand in your asscrack, and being shot at. Can’t you just go to your commanding officer and say, “Sorry, but I’m not gonna be able to ship out. See, turns out I’m gay.”

And what if you do do that? Do they start processing the paperwork to throw you out right away? And what if they don’t believe you? I figure the conversation goes something like this:

Soldier: Sir, I’m not going to be able to ship out. You see, I’m gay.

CO: Aw bullshit, you just don’t want to do another tour. You’re always bitching about the shitty food, sand in your asscrack and being shot at.

Soldier: No sir, I love the Army. But not as much as I love cock.

CO: You have a wife and kids at home!

Soldier: I was in denial, sir. I didn’t realize I was hopelessly gay until showering with the other guys in the barracks.

CO: Mr. Crawford, get in here!

(A man in civilian clothes enters the room and drops his pants.)

CO: Alright, if you’re so gay, suck this man’s dick.

So what do you do if you’re a straight guy trying to get out of the military? Do you suck Mr. Crawford’s dick? I’m guessing you do. Sucking one dick to get out of the army doesn’t make you gay, it makes you a fucking pragmatist.

Thing is, Mr. Crawford has to be a civilian contractor, or else he’d get thrown out of the army too, because last time I checked getting blown by a dude was pretty gay. Maybe that’s why we’re spending so much money on contractors, because we have to keep a guy on every base willing to have his dick sucked by soldiers of questionable homosexuality. Waste of money if you ask me. I’m sure there’s guys at KBR who would do the job for free.

Now on the other side of this already convoluted coin (I’m not sure what that means either) we have the gay soldiers who want nothing more than to serve their country in the military. In a time when most people don’t want to be in the army, they’re upset about being forced out.

But here’s the catch: Christians and right-wingers (redundant, I know) think that gayness can be cured. Some of them have even said, “Being gay is a choice.” This makes me wonder if they came to this conclusion because they want to fuck members of their own sex but choose not to. That would explain a lot about most of them.

So if you’re a member of the armed services and somehow it comes out (pardon the expression) that you’re gay, couldn’t you just say you’re not gay anymore? I figure it would go like this:

CO: Sorry soldier, it says here you’re gay. I’m afraid you’re being discharged.

Soldier: No sir, that was last week. I’m straight now.

CO: What are you talking about?

Soldier: I was reading The Bible, I asked Jesus to make me not gay, and he did.

CO: Miss Conway, get in here!

Now of course we wonder does the gay man wolf down the pussy to get out of the army? But the gay man has an advantage here. Just because Jesus made him not gay doesn’t mean Jesus made him straight. Jesus could have made him asexual, and that should be fine with the US Army. Far as I know they don’t have any rules that say you have to be a heterosexual, only that you can’t be a homosexual.

So there you go. You want out of the army? Say you’re gay. You’re gay and want to stay in the army? Jesus made you asexual. What could be simpler?

What Really Happened to John McCain?

Those of us who didn’t just surface from a subterranean fallout shelter know that there are two John McCains. The circa 2000 John McCain was the “Maverick” John McCain (because apparently he was the legend of the west). While technically a republican, most republicans bitched about him and democrats considered him to be one of the few tolerable ones.

Then, ’round about 2005 or so, John McCain changed. Right when he should have been distancing himself from Bush, he started laboriously tonguing his ass crack. Religious nuts Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell, who he had previously criticized, suddenly became his pals. The Bush tax cuts he voted against were suddenly a good idea.

There were many theories as to why this sudden change occurred. Some thought it was just pandering to the party base for his inevitable 2008 presidential run. Others thought a specific deal had actually been struck, i.e. Karl Rove as his campaign strategist in exchange for continuous public blow-jobs given to Bush.

But I think I’ve finally figured out what happened, as evidenced by the following picture.

This post was inspired by this thread on democraticunderground.com. The McCain picture used was supplied by user Chulanowa.

Republican Talking Points Bingo

How to Play

• Make some friends
• Buy some beer (optional)
• Gather them
• Enter the number of players in the box over there and press the button
• Print the page that pops up
• Give one sheet to each player
• Turn on Fox News
• Mark off each talking point as you hear it
• The first player to mark an entire row (up, down, or diagonally) should call out “Clinton’s fault!” and be declared the winner
• Repeat until nauseated

Additional Rules

• Talking points inside quotation marks should only be marked if the words are spoken more or less exactly. There is play in this though. Obviously “Weapons of Mass Destruction” can be marked off if they say “WMD’s” and “Al Qaeda wants to kill your children” should count for “Terrorists want to kill your family”. You get the idea. It doesn’t have to be exact, but pretty darn close.
• Items not in quotes (which are also incidentally in italics) are more along the lines of talking themes. Obviously, any type of gay bashing will count for the Gay Bashing category. It’s not like they’re going to say “Let’s get back to the gay bashing for a moment, Sean”. Well, not often anyway.
• Any game-related disputes should be settled by voting with verifiable paper ballots. If paper ballots are not available, the strongest player should seize control in a (possibly bloodless) revolution.

I am not the first person to have this idea (see here and here), but as far as I can tell I am the first person to actually make the game. If anyone knows of prior art, I will gladly acknowlege and link to it.

The talking points I used are a set currently being used in the right-wing media. Over time they will grow stale. If this turns out to be popular, I will do my best to keep them updated.

The randomness of the game cards would improve with more talking points. Mrs. FatDave and I were only able to come up with 31. If you have suggestions, please leave them in the comments, and I will add my favorites to the program.

This was inspired by the Right Wing World segment of The Stephanie Miller Show