State Department criticizes Pentagon over Manning detention

Regardless of which position one takes in the ongoing Bradley Manning saga, what the hell is the State Department thinking?

"Hillary Clinton‘s spokesman has launched a public attack on the Pentagon for the way it is treating military prisoner Bradley Manning, the US soldier suspected of handing the US embassy cables to WikiLeaks."

"PJ Crowley, the assistant secretary of state for public affairs at the US state department, has said Manning is being “mistreated” in the military brig at Quantico, Virginia. “What is being done to Bradley Manning is ridiculous and counterproductive and stupid on the part of the department of defence.”

BRADLEY MANNING: POSTER BOY FOR ‘DON’T ASK, DON’T TELL’
by Ann Coulter
December 1, 2010

The two biggest stories this week are WikiLeaks’ continued publication of classified government documents, which did untold damage to America’s national security interests, and the Democrats’ fanatical determination to repeal “don’t ask, don’t tell” and allow gays to serve openly in the military.

The mole who allegedly gave WikiLeaks the mountains of secret documents is Pfc. Bradley Manning, Army intelligence analyst and angry gay.

We’ve heard 1 billion times about the Army translator who just wanted to serve his country, but was cashiered because of whom he loved.

I’ll see your Army translator and raise you one Bradley Manning.

According to Bradley’s online chats, he was in “an awkward place” both “emotionally and psychologically.” So in a snit, he betrayed his country by orchestrating the greatest leak of classified intelligence in U.S. history.

Isn’t that in the Army Code of Conduct? You must follow orders at all times. Exceptions will be made for servicemen in an awkward place. Now, who wants a hug? Waitress! Three more apple-tinis!”

According to The New York Times, Bradley sought “moral support” from his “self-described drag queen” boyfriend. Alas, he still felt out of sorts. So why not sell out his country?

In an online chat with a computer hacker, Bradley said he lifted the hundreds of thousands of classified documents by pretending to be listening to a CD labeled “Lady Gaga.” Then he acted as if he were singing along with her hit song “Telephone” while frantically downloading classified documents.

I’m not a military man, but I think singing along to Lady Gaga would constitute “telling” under “don’t ask, don’t tell.”

Do you have to actually wear a dress to be captured by the Army’s “don’t ask, don’t tell” dragnet?

What constitutes being “openly” gay now? Bringing a spice rack to basic training? Attending morning drills decked out as a Cher impersonator? Following Anderson Cooper on Twitter?

Also, U.S. military, have you seen a picture of Bradley Manning? The photo I’ve seen is only from the waist up, but you get the feeling that he’s wearing butt-less chaps underneath. He looks like a guy in a soldier costume at the Greenwich Village Halloween parade.

With any luck, Bradley’s court-martial will be gayer than a Liza Minelli wedding. It could be the first court-martial in U.S. history to feature ice sculptures and a “Wizard of Oz”-themed gazebo. “Are you going to Bradley’s court-martial? I hear Patti LaBelle is going to sing!”

Maybe there’s a reason gays have traditionally been kept out of the intelligence services, apart from the fact that closeted gay men are easy to blackmail. Gays have always been suspicious of that rationale and perhaps they’re right.

The most damaging spies in British history were the Cambridge Five, also called “the “Magnificent Five”: Kim Philby, Guy Burgess, Anthony Blunt, Donald Maclean and John Cairncross. They were highly placed members of British intelligence, all secretly working for the KGB.

The only one who wasn’t gay was Philby. Burgess and Blunt were flamboyantly gay. Indeed, the Russians set Burgess up with a boyfriend as soon as he defected to the Soviet Union.

The Magnificent Five’s American compatriot Michael Straight was — ironically — bisexual, as was Whittaker Chambers, at least during the period that he was a spy. And of course, there’s David Brock.

So many Soviet spies were gay that, according to intelligence reporter Phillip Knightley, the Comintern was referred to as “the Homintern.” (I would have called it the “Gay G.B.”)

Bradley’s friends told the Times they suspected “his desperation for acceptance — or delusions of grandeur” may have prompted his document dump.

Let’s check our “Gay Profile at a Glance” and ... let’s see ... desperate for acceptance ... delusions of grandeur ... yep, they’re both on the gay subset list!

Obviously, the vast majority of gays are loyal Americans — and witty and stylish to boot! But a small percentage of gays are going to be narcissistic hothouse flowers like Bradley Manning.

Couldn’t they just work for JetBlue? America would be a lot safer right now if gays in an “awkward place” psychologically could do no more damage than grabbing a couple of beers and sliding down the emergency chute.

Look at the disaster one gay created under our punishing “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy. What else awaits America with the overturning of a policy that was probably put there for a reason (apart from being the only thing Bill Clinton ever did that I agreed with)?

Liberals don’t care. Their approach is to rip out society’s foundations without asking if they serve any purpose.

Why do we have immigration laws? What’s with these borders? Why do we have the institution of marriage, anyway? What do we need standardized tests for? Hey, I like Keith Richards — why not make heroin legal? Let’s take a sledgehammer to all these load-bearing walls and just see what happens!

For liberals, gays in the military is a win-win proposition. Either gays in the military works, or it wrecks the military, both of which outcomes they enthusiastically support.

But since you brought up gays in the military, liberals, let’s talk about Bradley Manning. He apparently released hundreds of thousands of classified government documents as a result of being a gay man in “an awkward place.”

Any discussion of “don’t ask, don’t tell” should begin with Bradley Manning. Live by the sad anecdote, die by the sad anecdote.

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