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Don’t rush ‘don’t ask’

As a candidate, President Barack Obama suggested he would work to overturn the law governing homosexuals in the military as well as the Pentagon policy that spun out of the law, known as “don’t ask, don’t tell.”

The law states that homosexual conduct or credible claims of homosexuality are grounds for separation. “Don’t ask” speaks to what the law leaves unsaid: Gay service members who remain celibate and keep their sexual orientation private may serve, and commanders are prohibited from asking anyone about his or her sexual orientation.

The policy was born of compromise early in President Bill Clinton’s tenure, when he tried to lift the ban on open service by homosexuals. His move drew bitter resentment from the Joint Chiefs — and even talk of possible resignations in protest — but it was Congress, which balked at the new president’s plans, that carried the day.

Some 16 years later, a new president and a new group of chiefs are wrestling with the question still. But the rancor is less. And it should stay that way.

Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs, says he has discussed “don’t ask, don’t tell” with Obama, Defense Secretary Robert Gates and his fellow chiefs. And while he’s customarily guarded about the nature of those talks, he is to be applauded for pursuing a thoughtful approach.

In a May 27 interview with Military Times, Mullen said he has urged Obama and Gates to proceed “in a measured and deliberate” way and avoid an emotionally heated partisan fight that would pit liberals against conservatives, with service members caught in the middle.

His counsel is that now is not the time for such distractions — not in the midst of two wars, an economic crisis, and wrenching budgetary and cultural changes in the military.

That’s advice worth listening to.