A reader writes:
The irony in a hack like Bill Kristol spewing such unfounded idiocy about gays in the military is that his views are so eerily parallel to the very nations and societies he is so hell-belt on going to war against. The contrast between our nation and other countries that don't allow gays to serve in the military is so stark: Cuba, China, Egypt, Sudan, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Venezuela, the United States. It's like a basic "which one of these is not like the other" exercise from Sesame Street. Kristol's zeal in committing America to fighting these societies - in large part due to their hateful and disturbing treatment of minorities and "the other" - apparently does not extend to those cultures treatment of homosexuals. It's so inconsistent and phony, it makes me ill.
You mentioned Israel. Can Kristol make the argument that the Israeli army is somehow burdened by gay Israelis tearing shit up all over the Middle East?
You discuss Kristol as a Christianist here. But I think what's clearer is not that he harbors any actual sincere views - what is revealed is what a partisan hack he is, so beholden to the party line. There are "Christianists" in Israel - ultra-Orthodox Jews, who have no love for the gay community. But from what I know, the religious community in Israel has not made much of a stink about gay service in the Israeli army because they take their national security seriously. Whatever the religious right might think about gays parading through Jerusalem, they don't extend their religious objection to the shit that really matters - Israeli security. They know that when it comes down to defusing a bomb on a bus, or taking out some Hamas maniac sniper-style, a soldier's sexual preference is just irrelevant.
Kristol knows the same is true of our men and women in Baghdad and Kabul, but he doesn't actually care about national security, what's fair and just, what makes the most sense - just what promotes the Fox News Nation. Shameful.