Military Gay Ban Must
Take a Backseat

Defense secretary Robert Gates said on Fox News Sunday that the Pentagon and the Obama administration can't multitask when it comes to eliminating the ban on gays serving openly in the military.

"I think the president and I feel like we've got a lot on our plates right now and let's push that one down the road a little bit," Gates said, referring to the reversal of the military's "don't ask, don't tell" policy.

Fox's Chris Wallace began the question by asking Secretary Gates why money had been included in the Pentagon's 2010 budget to continue enforcing the policy. "Well, it continues to be the law," Gates responded, "and any change in the policy would require a change in the law. We will follow the law, whatever it is."

The Government Accountability Office estimates that the total cost of discharging and replacing service members fired for being gay was at least $190.5 million from 1994 to 2003. However, a detailed study by the Palm Center, a University of California, Santa Barbara, think tank, put the price tag for the first 10 years at $363.8 million.

The Obama administration declined to comment on Gates's remarks.

The Servicemembers Legal Defense Network, a group that lobbies for repeal, immediately issued a statement Sunday. "Right now is the time -- while we're engaged in two wars -- we need the most qualified men and women serving," executive director Aubrey Sarvis said. "This is not the time to keep firing linguists and intelligence analysts because of their sexual orientation. The longer the president and Pentagon delay the issue, the fewer linguists and intelligence analysts the Pentagon will have to call on to fight terrorism in Pakistan and Afghanistan."aEUR"aEUR"Almost 13,000 military personnel have been discharged under the law since its inception and, according to a 2005 GAO estimate, about 800 of them have been "mission-critical service members" such as pilots, intelligence analysts, medics, and linguists.

White House press secretary Robert Gibbs said in January that President Obama would, in fact, overturn the policy, and Administration spokespeople have added that they are consulting with Secretary Gates and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Mike Mullen on the issue. But Gates said Sunday "that dialogue has not really progressed very far at this point in this Administration."

Gates is not the only one steering clear of a timeline for repeal. Earlier this month, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi stopped short of giving dates when asked if she would move to vote on "don't ask, don't tell" before the end of the year.

"We want to win on this," she said. "So we'll have to create an atmosphere, create an environment in which we will win."

A bill to repeal the law was introduced this month in the House by Rep. Ellen Tauscher, who subsequently announced that she would be leaving Congress to take a post at the State Department. A new sponsor has yet to be announced, and no one in the Senate has stepped forward to take the lead on the legislation.