You may now die in the defense of old white men's property the same as anybody else.

That was essentially how George Carlin described war: the protection of the rulers' property by the ruled.   And while it's hard, if not impossible, to argue the logical sense in repealing "Don't Ask, Don't Tell", it begs the question to my mind of why it's always entry into the military that is the first breakthrough in civil rights struggles.

It's as though they're saying to gays, "We aren't going to let you marry one another, or enjoy spousal benefits, or teach our children, but you are free to go into a third world hellhole with an AR-15 and kick some doors in to preserve our freedom." (These are probably just the kinds of sentiments every pundit will fear: "Now what are they gonna want?  We let them join the Army, what else is there?")

I applaud the "courage" and "wisdom" of our leaders to open enrollment in their war machine to openly gay men and women - it was certainly the right thing to do.  The idea of having to meet certain non-mental or physical criteria to be in the military seems laughably stupid on the part of policy planners.  Maybe this "victory" for the gay movement is more about filling the open ranks in that all-volunteer force.  How stupid it was ever to deny them access in the first place.  But we live in a very cynical society when this kind of a victory is lauded as an ambitious stepping-stone toward equality: all they've earned is passage into some of the government's dirtiest business. 

It's a kind of psychology: deny someone access to a thing and make them want it all the more, even if it's not even in their best interest.  If I were gay during a time of conscription, I'd have donned the pinkest tank-top I could find, gelled my air, and stood outside every fort in the country touching a licked finger to my ass at my convenient "life choice" draft escape.  That's what homosexuals ought to have been saying all along: "You want me to serve?  You want me to go over there and fight in a war I don't believe in just so your kids won't have to?  Give me my marriage license."