Yahoo! News - Military Has Discharged 26 Gay Linguists
SAN FRANCISCO - The number of Arabic linguists discharged from the military for violating its "don't ask, don't tell" policy is higher than previously reported, according to records obtained by a research group.

The group contends the records show that the military — at a time when it and U.S. intelligence agencies don't have enough Arabic speakers — is putting its anti-gay stance ahead of national security.

"The military is placing homophobia well ahead of national security," said Steve Ralls, spokesman for the Servicemembers Legal Defense Network, a nonprofit group that advocates for the rights of gay military members. "It's rather appalling that in the weeks leading up to 9/11 messages were coming in, waiting to be translated ... and at the same time they were firing people who could've done that job."

But others, like Elaine Donnelly of the Center for Military Readiness, a conservative advocacy group that opposes gays serving in the military, said the discharged linguists never should have been accepted at the elite Defense Language Institute in Monterey in the first place.

"Resources unfortunately were used to train young people who were not eligible to be in the military," she said.

I'm not sure how one answers raging stupidity such as this, except to point it out and pray that those messages that are piling up (FBI story link- their hiring policy claims it does not discriminate, but gays apparently can't get security clearance) doesn't translate into the loss of NYC or Washington DC.