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Monday, March 29. 2010
Shot in the Foot
Ever wonder why our government shoots itself in the foot — over and over and over again? This isn’t just a Republican thing, or a Democrat thing; it’s a bureaucracy thing. Often times, a prejudice thing, which is why the military was segregated until after World War II.Not to mention, not allowing gays to serve openly in the military. The policy of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” has been modified somewhat this past week, but still gays can be kicked out of the military if they are openly gay. Doesn’t make any sense because they serve anyway and have been since the beginning of our nation and military.
What really doesn’t make sense is that many of these gay men and women served in critical occupational specialties, like linguistics, in particular Arab and Farsi, two language skills that we are in critical need of with our troops in Iraq and Afghanistan. But apparently, it is more of a threat to national security for Jane to admit she’s a lesbian than not having Jane, who is fluent in Arabic, translating messages or questioning suspects or witnesses.
Some time ago I read that over 75 language experts, many of them fluent in critical languages, have been discharged for being gay between the years 1998 and 2004. Gotta wonder how many more since then? Another 75? A hundred?
With needed intelligence going uninvestigated due to a lack of qualified language experts, can the military, can our government, sustain that kind of loss? Rhetorical question really. The government knows it can’t continue this trend if we are going to fight Al Queda and other Islamic terrorists and that’s why Secretary of Defense Robert Gates altered the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy last week.
Now, a person can only be outed by him or herself, unless of course the gay service member tries “something funny” with another service member.
Every wonder if two gays make a straight? They don’t, sort of. Well they could actually, if a gay man hooked up with a gay woman and they produced children who grew up to be heterosexual.
This isn’t just a funny tangent. Saw on 60 Minutes one night some religious people who claimed they were turning gay people into heterosexual people, in accordance with God’s law!
Well, as it turns out, the gays aren’t really remade (or born again) into heterosexuals, they just go through a lifestyle that requires them to go to meetings, like members of Alcoholics Anonymous, to remind them being gay is a sin and they need to continue living a heterosexual lifestyle.
One gay-to-straight couple said they were happy, but they still had homosexual thoughts and desires. Apparently, the power of prayer ain’t that strong. Enough of that tangent.
Being gay isn’t the only reason there is a critical shortage of language experts in the military and government overall. No. Language experts can get paid a lot more in the private sector and most private companies could care less if you’re gay or straight, as long as you deliver the goods. “Let’s see … I don’t have to lie about my sexuality and I get paid three times as much as a captain in the Army? Time to leave the military!”
Then there is the strange case of Nada Nadim Prouty. She is a Lebanese immigrant who came to the United States at the age of 19 to get a college degree. She arranged to marry someone to become a U.S. citizen, and then went into the F.B.I. Later she was recruited out of the F.B.I. and into the C.I.A. where she excelled as not only a language expert, but as a spy and chief interrogator in Iraq.The government even had a special armored vest made to accommodate Prouty when she was pregnant and serving in Iraq. The woman was engaged in firefights while pregnant!
All well and good, She served our country with honor and distinction, according to all her colleagues, but when her first “green card” marriage was discovered during an investigation of her brother-in-law who was suspected of tax evasion, her life came crashing down around her.
Prouty was profiled on 60 Minutes this past Sunday (March 28, 2010).
Prouty was kicked out of the C.I.A., lost her citizenship and was fined just under a thousand dollars. Even the judge in the case said the prosecution had been over-zealous but his hands were tied because, to avoid the overwhelming costs of mounting a legal defense, Prouty pleaded guilty to defrauding the government (the “green card” marriage) and to illegally accessing F.B.I. files, a charge she now says is false. She just pleaded guilty to it to end the ordeal.
Both the F.B.I. and the C.I.A. have exonerated Prouty with their own investigations and the judge in the government’s fraud case blocked deportation because going back to Lebanon would be a death sentence for the woman. Good for him.
Unlike banning gays from serving openly in the military and segregated units, which were based on prejudice, Prouty’s situation is one in which the bureaucracy has run amok.
All of this took place before Barack Obama became president so it would be easy to say, “That damn Bush and his fellow Republicans!” But, did the Obama Justice Department rein in the case, undo the damage to Prouty’s reputation and stature in the C.I.A.? No. The current justice department wrote a brief defending its actions against the agent.
By everyone’s account, the woman served her country admirably — heroically — for nearly ten years. So she deserves better than having her citizenship revoked and made to look like a terrorist spy in the newspapers, which is what the Justice Department did when prosecuting Prouty. Reading the news accounts from those days, you’d think Prouty was in Al Queda’s hierarchy when in truth she was a key asset in the fight against terrorists.
And then there’s that awful booking photo the government used when distributing their leaks and information about the case. She looked like Richard Reid, the “Shoe Bomber,” the exact effect the Justice Department was hoping to create.The two prosecutors in charge of the case received medals for successfully prosecuting a “terrorism” case. Nada Prouty isn’t and never has been a terrorist or terrorist sympathizer.
To be fair, Nada Prouty broke the law when she arranged a Green Card marriage. There should be some consequences, although the statute of limitations had expired long before Prouty became a terror suspect.
Well, actually I am going to blame the Bush Administration. They were over zealous on all the wrong issues including Nada Prouty’s case. But the Obama Administration has to step up to the plate and do something to right this wrong, otherwise it’s just another case of Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose.
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