#54 - Transgender Transgression

A funny thing happened after President Trump’s tweet on the morning of July 26, announcing his new policy on Transgender individuals in the military…

Nothing. Nothing. Nothing…..Nothing happened,

I don't mean to suggest there wasn’t any news or blow back on the topic. There was plenty of both.  First, everyone was trying to figure out what the clown in Oval Office was up too this time.   On top of that, the LGBTQ community now had the proof that many of them had warned about, that many of them had believed.  They could now shout out to the world that President Trump was a Class A Number One liar when he said he would be a better friend to them than anyone and certainly better than Hillary Clinton.

No, lots of activity emanated directly from that early morning tweet, but the funny thing was.….nothing was happening in the military.

The President’s tweet read “After consultation with my Generals and military experts, please be advised that the United States Government will not accept or allow......Transgender individuals to serve in any capacity in the U.S. Military. Our military must be focused on decisive and overwhelming.....victory and cannot be burdened with the tremendous medical costs and disruption that transgender in the military would entail. Thank you.”

The tweet was then followed by a press briefing later that day, where White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said that the White House and the Pentagon would work together to implement the policy, with the Defense Department taking "the lead."

The very next day, the nation's highest-ranking military officer said that the Defense Department was making "no modifications" to current policy regarding transgender service members until President Trump gives more direction.  "I know there are questions about yesterday's announcement on the transgender policy by the President," Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Gen. Joseph Dunford said in a statement. "There will be no modifications to the current policy until the President's direction has been received by the Secretary of Defense and the Secretary has issued implementation guidance”.

It was now clear that Trump’s tweet about consulting with “MY generals and military advisors”” was just another one of his everyday, bold-face lies.   

And sooooo… we have an interesting dynamic in play here.  The President announces his new policy, his new edict, some might say, then his press secretary says the Defense Department will take “the lead” on implementation, but, but, but, that's not how the Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman sees it.  Dunford says that there will be no modifications to the policy until the President's direction had been received.

Now both parties are pointing to the other, to take the lead.  I am no military expert, but this is not how I recall the military is supposed to act when they receive an order from their Commander-in-Chief. 

I am not saying they this is a mutiny by the military, because it doesn't come close to that standard,  but it appears to me, that Dunford’s quick response was meant to send an important message to the White House that “We are not your pawns sir, we will not permit you to include us in your vile decision to vilify one group, and we will not permit you to mess with heads of our service men and women for your own political, self-serving gains.  No sir, we will not permit it”.

Something similar occurred back in1993 when President Bill Clinton pushed to open the services to gays and lesbians. Colin Powell, then the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, pushed back, resulting in the implementation of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell’, which lasted until 2011 when Obama tanked it after a full review and with the full support of the Joint Chiefs

I could be accused of reading too much into it, but I do believe Dunford was, ever-so-politely, ever-so-subtly, delivering the message, that it took our armed forces 20+ years to morph into an open, and integrated organization, and we are not going backwards now.

It wasn’t quite a middle finger salute to the Commander in Chief, but I have to believe it's what Dunford was thinking.

 

The issue was in the news again today, when Republican Senator Lindsey Graham from South Carolina and a member of the Armed Services Committee in the Senate was asked about it, and he told CNN that "we're not going to change transgender policy based on a tweet."

Don't you just love it when (some of) the leaders of our country actually stand on principal and show a little backbone?  

It's like a breath of fresh air.