{"id":700556,"date":"2010-03-25T10:11:33","date_gmt":"2010-03-25T14:11:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/washingtonindependent.com\/?p=80421"},"modified":"2010-03-25T10:11:33","modified_gmt":"2010-03-25T14:11:33","slug":"gates-says-%e2%80%98common-sense-common-decency%e2%80%99-should-guide-%e2%80%98don%e2%80%99t-ask-don%e2%80%99t-tell%e2%80%99","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/700556","title":{"rendered":"Gates Says \u2018Common Sense, Common Decency\u2019 Should Guide \u2018Don\u2019t Ask, Don\u2019t Tell\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/washingtonindependent.com\/80285\/gates-will-relax-dont-ask-dont-tell-enforcement-this-week\">As TWI reported yesterday<\/a>, Defense Secretary Robert Gates is changing &#8220;Don&#8217;t Ask, Don&#8217;t Tell&#8221; enforcement significantly, even before Congress passes any changes to the law. Gates said it was time to add &#8220;a greater measure of common sense and common decency&#8221; to the process of investigating servicemembers for their sexual orientation.<\/p>\n<p>Process-wise, Gates said that from now on, only an officer of lieutenant colonel or commander rank or higher is permitted to conduct a fact-finding inquiry, and only a general officer in the accused&#8217;s chain of command can discharge a servicemember for violating the ban on openly gay service. As we reported, the standards of evidence to be brought in such inquiries are now significantly raised: Nothing a servicemember tells a clergymember, shrink, official conducting a security-clearance investigation or medical professional is admissible. All information given by third parties must now be given under oath.&#8221;We will revise what constitutes a reliable person, upon whose word an inquiry could be initiated, with special scrutiny on third parties who may be motivated to harm the service member,&#8221; Gates said. <span id=\"more-80421\"><\/span><\/p>\n<p>The new rules now apply to &#8220;every case currently open,&#8221; Gates added.<\/p>\n<p>More soon.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>As TWI reported yesterday, Defense Secretary Robert Gates is changing &#8220;Don&#8217;t Ask, Don&#8217;t Tell&#8221; enforcement significantly, even before Congress passes any changes to the law. Gates said it was time to add &#8220;a greater measure of common sense and common decency&#8221; to the process of investigating servicemembers for their sexual orientation. Process-wise, Gates said that [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2762,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4821],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-700556","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p9NivD-2Wfi","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/700556","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2762"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=700556"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/700556\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=700556"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=700556"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=700556"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}