I’d want to follow the moneyWe know the “survey” is a waste of millions of TAXPAYER dollars (where are the deficit hysterics now?), but I’d like to know more about the vendor that got this absurd contract.
It would seem the contract would have some details in it.

Catching on, are we?Of course the deck is rigged — has anyone with half a brain ever doubted that would happen?
It’s true, a gay or lesbian servicemember risks exposure the minute [s]he logs on using a government-issued CAC card. Of course, any DoD assurances to the contrary, somebody of some rank at some time could get his hands on survey submissions.
And the questions? Does anyone think casual allies among straight troops will bother spending time on a long questionnaire? Not likely — but the homophobes in the ranks (and their families — don’t forget their probably like-minded families) will jump at an opportunity to bash gays and lesbians in the service.
The end result? Come December, DoD will reveal survey results to “prove” that we can’t possibly allow open service at this time because it would just plain be too disruptive to a large majority of servicemembers who completed the survey.
Harry Truman didn’t survey the racists in uniform before integrating the military. He, as commander in chief, gave an order. And it happened. It took a few years, yes, but it happened because a president had the honor and decency to give an order and not hide behind some rigged survey.
Shame on Obama, yes indeed — but shame on all Americans for letting things work out this way.

Oh, Pooh PahPam: “This is a survey that, btw, includes questions asking participants “how they would react if they had to share a room, bathrooms, and open-bay showers in a war zone with other service members believed to be gay or lesbian.”
Do you think this deck is now stacked against us?”
I was in the AF for 8 years after being graduated from the US Air Force Academy. I’m a decorated Vietnam combat pilot.
The purpose of this questionnaire and the survey in general is to discover what negative reactions might occur when DADT is repealed. This will allow the services to reassure these jittery straights beforehand, through education and training, that their fears are unfounded. This will allow the acceptance of gays in the military to proceed more smoothly.
There is no “deck stacked against us.” They are attempting to discover the extent of difficulties that may develop when DADT is repelled, so that they can take preemptive action to eliminate or lessen these effects when gays are allowed to serve openly.
Don’t discredit the military’s attempt to make this transition smoothly by your erroneous assumption.

Wrong.Unless they are going to make answering the survey mandatory for all serving members, they are going to skew this simply by who chooses to answer it. As has been pointed out, it is dangerous for LGBT servicemembers to answer, and unless compelled, most people who don’t care simply won’t care.
That means that the majority of answers if this is purely voluntary are going to skew toward the homophobes.
As to your military service: Do you remember ever getting polled on any topic, controversial or not? Did they poll you whether you thought the war you served in was a good idea, or where you thought they should build the bases?
Nope. Didn’t think so.
If this really was what you so sunnily think it is, then the questions, at very least, would certainly be phrased differently.
It would not all be about “how you would react if” open gay servicemembers were allowed, but rather things like “what problems do you foresee, and how would be mitigate them.” and “What is the tone of things in your unit” and other such things. These questions are absolutely geared toward having an excuse not to stop the policy.  

Exactly right, LymisI learned from experience long, long ago that HOW you ask a question (in this case, 100 of them) has a huge impact on what answer you get.
I am getting so incredibly fed up with those who will do anything they possibly can to prevent equal rights for all!
To paraphrase an old saying, “with a Fierce Advocate like Obama (whom I naively voted for), who needs enemies?”

Thank you for your service…
…but, with respect, it doesn’t negate all of the evidence to the contrary.
Don’t know how long ago you left the service, but after finally realizing they had been too lax with racism at every level for decades, culminating in several violent incidents, including a “race riot” at Travis Air Force base in California that lasted three days, resulting in numerous injuries, arson, the arrest of 135 airmen, and the Pentagon and White House in shock, they finally instituted a “zero tolerance” for racism policy. As all the services, including the academies, were integrated by women, zero tolerance for sexism was mandated, too.
Yes, there are various kinds of “training” to discourage it, to educate, but the bottomline is that it BEGINS with the message from the top down that racism and sexism are verboten.
THIS process is being done in reverse; it’s being built on a homophobic assumption which is not just morally wrong but amounts to formalizing self-fulfilling prophecy, SUGGESTING that there will be problems, and just stopping short of asking, “Are you afraid some gay guy will rape you in the shower or in your bunk?”
It’s entirely contrary to what gay rights pioneer Frank Kameny has said,

“Finally, when there was a problem with racism they didn’t throw out the blacks, they threw out the recalcitrant racists.”

The study, no matter what they CLAIM, is built upon the premise….just as the ban both pre and post DADT has been…that, if there’s homophobia in the military, they throw out the gays.
Though there weren’t any such giant studies re racially integrating the forces, the parallels in attitudes are identical. Sharing sleeping quarters with blacks was an issue in the ’40s, too. Today we hear the Neanderthal Marine Commandant wetting his panties over his insulting belief that his tough straight Marines would be afraid of sharing two-person rooms with gays. Back then, the Marine Commandant said that they could not racially integrate because the Marines were too small a force then to “build SEPARATE barracks.” Etc., etc., ad infinitum, ad nauseum.
Four final facts to weigh against your belief in the objectivity of, in the final analysis, the Secretary of Defense who has taken credit for being the architect of this charade, er, study, and the President:
1. In 1993, even the highest ranking man in uniform in the US, Chair of the Joint Chiefs Gen. Colin Powell, who was also the most adamantly opposed to lifting the ban [and should have been fired for undermining his CIC] said that if the ban was lifted they would follow orders. There was no, “But we have to poll the forces first.”
2. More than a year ago, Pentagon spokesperson Geoff Morrell remarkably said something that Gay, Inc. SHOULD be rubbing in his boss’es face:

“[Secretary Gates] has not asked his service chiefs, his service secretaries, his combatant commanders-anything of that sort-to sort of start to do, you know, polling on that matter. I don’t think this is a question of polling anyway. I mean, this is a question of where the president wants to lead the country on this issue, and it’ll be a determination made by him as to if and when he wishes to pursue this matter with the United States Congress.”

3. Per no less than Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, the White House and Pentagon insisted at the end of May that the five-year old Military Readiness Enhancement Act, which would have guaranteed both an end to discharges and any other kind of discrimination against gays in the military [e.g., assignments] be trashed and replaced with an amendment that could repeal the law but still leave open the freedom of the the Pentagon to continue discharges and discrimination under their own pre-DADT policies.
WHY?
4. The plaintiffs in the constitutional challenge to DADT that the Obama DOJ has tried repeatedly and ruthlessly to kill but finally goes to trial next Tuesday offered to stop their suit if the government would stop discharges pending repeal. They refused.
WHY?

Interesting Tweet to ShareI’m not sure if anyone here is following General Carter Ham on Twitter (who’s overseeing this), but this was his tweet yesterday:

Just leaving Ft Benning after sessions there. NCO discussion was particularly lively. NCOs focused on how to maintain readiness & cohesion

(Apologies if someone already noted this and I’m repeating it.)
I found that pretty interesting.  It says to me that the NCOs recognize that there will be some issues here, and they are focused on solving that, not on whether DADT should be repealed.  And this is form Fort Benning, where they train the Infantry and Airborne, in addition to thousands of NCOs.
Maybe my read on that tweet is a little more hopeful than others, but it’s based on my experience with the NCOs who worked for me.  Tell them this is the change, and they’ll make it happen while keeping the units combat-ready.
I should note, relevant to the subject of this blog post, I’m opposed to this “survey” crap too.  But just wanted to share what I saw yesterday.

Exactly what Obama wantsThis is unfolding exactly as Obama wants. He has no intention of eliminating the ban. He has every intention of sabotaging repeal of the ban. Messina is carrying out that mission. Whether credit-claiming Stachelberg is a knowing collaborationist or just too damn stupid to know any better doesn’t matter.

You are breathtakingly naiveYou don’t need a “survey” to anticipate what kind of anti-gay attitudes exist. It’s not rocket science.
This is all about sabotaging repeal. Nothing more; nothing less.
As for not discrediting your precious military, have you heard a word uttered by military brass about queers over the last forty years? The military was irretrievably discredited on this subject the day Peter Pace admitted that gays should be banned because that’s what he thinks his evangelical god wants.

Thank you for that…
…hoewever much the interpretation is in the proverbial eye of the beholder, particularly given what’s come before.
1. Ham is the one who Gates said a year ago was telling him that there was no way to make DADT “more humane.” Not only was that bullshit on its face because any 12-yr. old with a dial-up connection could have found the text of DADT and seen where it gives the SECDEF huge automony in how it’s implemented, but recall that, this March, he and Ham suddenly FOUND ways to be “more humane.” In the interim, hundreds of gays were discharged. How many of them might have been saved [even tho SLDN reports that they're STILL using the old "rules" today]?
2. I saw some of Ham’s testimony to Congress and it “sounded” to me as if he was clearly against ending the ban.
Therefore, I’m led to submit what Ham might have Tweeted were more characters available:

NCOs focused on how to maintain readiness & cohesion and believe that allowing open service will destroy both.

Given that the “study” is based on lies I see no reason to trust its agents like Ham.

No argument RE: HamI can’t argue with you about Ham, Michael.  Frankly, I don’t trust any Flag officer to have an informed view.  Most of them are woefully out of touch with the social mores of their troops.  But it is interesting to follow the (infrequent) tweets from Ham to see what they might tell you.
That being said, I can really only offer my own opinion on the NCOs.  When one thinks about the make up of NCOs – especially in terms of the age demographic – it still makes me hopeful that they, at least, “get it” when it comes to open GLBT service, and that their will focus on discipline. A lot of them have come of age at a time when they know a lot more openly gay friends and family members.  I am hopeful that influences them in a positive way.

AIRBORNE!I went to Airborne training, summer of 1963. Took off in a C-119 Flying Boxcar 5 times, didn’t land in one once. Took the third jump when I saw the tail of the aircraft disappear over my head to realize that my eyes must have been shut for the first two jumps.
Yes, what these NCO’s are learning, as well as everyone else above them in the chain of command is what problems may come up when, not if, DADT is repealed.
That’s the purpose of the questionnaire, to identify difficulties before they arise so they can be prepared when repeal comes into full effect. The questions are designed to stir up the most bias responses on purpose so they find out the worst they can expect.

SurveyLymis: “Unless they are going to make answering the survey mandatory for all serving members, they are going to skew this simply by who chooses to answer it.”
Exactly right, but that’s the whole point, to get the most bias responses possible so they can prepare for the worst.
The survey is about when not if.

SuburbanHomo is simply being optimistic…
…you’re just exposing the track marks on your arm from mainlining the Kool Aid.

AssumptionsOf course the process is built on homophobic assumptions. Are you saying that these shouldn’t be ferreted out by this survey and other means so that they can be preemptively addressed?
They are trying to avoid some of the problems you described when blacks were suddenly thrust into an integrated mix. That’s what the survey and overall process are all about.
If Obama had to agree to this survey to gain Gates and Mullins full support, then that’s the way it is. I know this is all taking longer than anyone here wanted, but it took longer to get health care reform passed too, yet Obama came though on his promise and signed the reform bill in the end.
We need to be cheering the man on, not nailing him to a cross each time we become impatient in what it takes to get DADT off the books.

I hope you are right, BillWare, butI’ve also been in the military, & I’ve worked for large & small companies, & learned the hard way that when a person or an organization has a history of claiming to support something but then acting in ways contrary to that, do NOT blindly trust that THIS time they are being open & honest about their intentions and will make good on their promises.
Our civilian & military leaders have too often made claims of how they are on our side, & want to do the right thing, but when it’s time to actually DO something, suddenly there are “really good reasons” why the timing is wrong, or they “just don’t have the authority/votes/whatever” they thought they would have.
“Fool me once, shame on you.  Fool me twice, shame on me.”

Look, ObamaZombie!
You’ve finally revealed your real motivation for defending the indefensible study…defending Your Lord & Savior Obama Christ.
Well, fuck that bullshit!
He’s the goddamn Commander-in-Chief….he doesn’t have to agree to anything his SECDEF of CJCS say or want. Of course, he has CHOSEN to, proving that McChrystal was right about him being “intimidated” by the military.
They don’t need to spend $4 let alone $4 MILLION to “ferret out” homophobia. A second-grader could tell them it already exists.
There is already a GIGANTIC “equal opportunity/diversity appreciation” apparatus in the DOD, lead by the Defense Equal Opportunity Management Institute with its own building at Patrick Air Force base in Florida. All they need do is add “sexual orientation” to all their programs along with race, gender, ethnic origin, religion, and political affiliation.”
If fact THEY ALREADY HAVE for the management training they provide to the civilian employee arm of the DOD.
Over 70 professional researchers worked on the multimillion dollar 500+ page RAND study the Pentagon commissioned in 1993 then ignored, just as they have gay-positive studies for over half a century, because the bigots didn’t like what they were told. In short, it came down to this:
“ATTENTION! Now hear this: yesterday we banned open service of gays. Today we don’t. Noncompliance will not be tolerated. Paperwork to follow. DISMISSED!”

SurveyOh, my. A successful leader is one who gets all persons involved working together to achieve the goal. This is often a slower process, of course, but all involved consider themselves winners when the goal is reached.
I learned about leadership styles at the Academy, from the authoritarian to the laissez-faire. Obama’s style produces results that are both more satisfying to all and longer lasting, even though these results take longer to produce.  

I share your concernYet when former Sen Kennedy’s seat was lost to Republican Brown, and others said Alas, Alas, All is lost, Obama was not deterred. He got with congressional leaders. The House passed an identical bill as the Senate had, so no further vote would be needed in the Senate to have the bill signed into law. At he same time, House and Senate members got together and agreed to pass the same reconciliation bill which doesn’t require 60 Senate votes to pass.
Gathering the votes from Democrats who often have divergent views to get this done was masterful work on everyone’s part. Obama held fast when others were ready to give up.
Obama is a member of a minority group, so he knows first hand what this is like. I believe he is sincere in wanting liberty, equality and justice for all, which includes members of the LGBT family, of course.
Results may be slow in coming, yet his efforts to bend the arc of history toward justice are unflagging as far as LGBT rights are concerned. This is no time to waver and quake. We need to support him now more than ever. That’s what friends do.

The Big Three say it’s “if”.Obama, Gates and Mullen have all told us that repeal will only be implemented if they can be assured that there will be no negative effects or objections from straight troops or their families.  This survey has been manufactured to produce those objections and to support the claim that there will be negative effects, thus providing an excuse for any or all of the three to veto the implementation of repeal.