During his remarks at the Pentagon’s celebration of LGBT Pride Month on Tuesday, Brig. Gen. Randy S. Taylor, who has served in the Army for 27 years, introduced his husband to attendees. Predictably, Taylor’s remarks and other speeches by LGBT service members did not go over well with the far-right, including talk show host Michael Savage, who on Tuesday blasted the Pride event and even managed to draw a connection to ISIS.
“So this is the world we’re living in,” Savage sighed. “This is what Obama has done to America, this is what he has done to the military. A man, a general now, introduces his husband at an event like this. Do you have any idea why ISIS is insane as they are? Do you have any idea that you are looking at two sides of a coin here? You see a ninth-century view of the world from a point of view of ISIS, and you see a view of the world that is so warped and so accepted in America as the norm, that most people’s heads are spinning around the world not understanding how a super power became a ‘stupid power’ in one generation.”
Cliff Kincaid of Accuracy In Media was similarly enraged, taking to BarbWire to castigate “Obama’s Orwellian Armed Forces”:
Indeed, the “wife” or “husband” of a top U.S. general was on display during the Pentagon gay pride ceremony on Tuesday, as reported by Rowan Scarborough of The Washington Times. He noted that Brigadier General Randy S. Taylor introduced his husband, Lucas, at a Pentagon event on Tuesday. Another top Pentagon official, Air Force General Counsel Gordon O. Tanner, also has a husband.
In Obama’s Orwellian Armed Forces, two men make a marriage, even if one takes the title of “wife” and the other “husband.” Or, perhaps, both are husbands. Who knows? I may have to consult the National Lesbian & Gay Journalists Association for the latest instructions on the correct terminology.
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It appears that over the past several years, Obama has been acting as a seamstress, weaving things into the fabric of America that didn’t exist until he took office.
Left behind in the wake of this exercise in building a new nation are the remnants of the old America—traditional values, a strong military, and a constitutional system based on free enterprise and limited government.
Family Research Council President Tony Perkins reacted to the event by asking members of his group to pray for the “good soldiers” who, he says, are facing discrimination because the Obama administration is “catering to” gay service members:
Back during the congressional debate over DADT, the military's service chiefs were promised that the Equal Opportunity guidelines would not change -- which, like many other assurances, has turned out to be a bold-faced lie that greased the wheels of repeal. As we've witnessed in the four years since, once the camel's nose was under the tent, the dominos started to fall. Under an affirmative action-type system, what troops do in the bedroom will transcend what they do in battle when it comes to key personnel decisions. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to understand that the military will start catering to gays, lesbians, and transgenders at the expense of good soldiers, sailors, airmen, and marines. As they have with every incremental change, activists will leverage this new standing as a way to demand access and force affirmation.
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Faith and military service have been an inseparable piece of the American fabric for centuries. And to watch that fabric unravel at the hands of a radical few is painful -- but not irreparable. Courage, the same kind that led the great men and women of this country to put on their uniform, is needed more now than ever. Pray for our troops -- not only that they would have the fortitude to fight the enemies abroad, but the agenda within. (emphasis added)
WorldNetDaily, a far-right outlet, spoke about the event with conservative writer Paul Kengor, who said that it denigrated religion and lamented that same-sex relationships are no longer subject to discrimination in the military:
He told WND: “What you’re seeing here is the Left’s and Obama’s fundamental transformation of the military. This is the cultural revolution and long march through America’s most cherished institutions that the radical left, particularly the cultural Marxists, have long sought. This is a takedown.
“They were very shrewd. They understood that once you captured culture via education, media, and Hollywood, the rest would fall in due course. And as Americans become increasingly secular and individualistic and relativistic, they’ve been fairly easy prey. The left took the public schools, the universities, media and social media, Hollywood, and now the Boy Scouts and even the military.”
As evidence of this deliberate campaign, Kengor cited the media’s celebration of Bruce Jenner’s transformation to “Caitlyn” and the recent spate of television shows targeted at children and young people celebrating transgenders.
Kengor observes: “I must say that I’m tempted to congratulate them. They’ve worked long and hard and patiently at this. Unfortunately, it’s just such a shame because they’re ruining what was once a great country. The left laughed at Ronald Reagan’s description of America as a Shining City Upon a Hill. Well, they can take comfort in the fact that it ain’t no Shining City no more.”
Kengor believes military culture is simply following the same cultural trends as the rest of society. He notes homosexuality and other sexually deviant behavior was once seen as a reason to deny a security clearance. However, as public morality has shifted, Kengor argues it is impossible to expect the military to remain permanently aloof from society.
“As for military men openly acknowledging gay ‘husbands’ – hey, why not? Once upon a time in America, such a spousal arrangement would have been a huge security risk inviting instant possibility of blackmail,” he said.
“But that’s no longer the case in a culture and country where behavior like this is celebrated as a joyous expression of liberation and self-expression. In the new fundamentally transformed America, these two soldiers are no longer security risks; they’re cultural icons. They’re the new heroes. They are the new G.I. Joes.”
Kengor warns Americans the new sexually progressive military is unlikely to produce the kinds of legendary military heroes prior generations of Americans once idolized. Indeed, Kengor says many heroic Americans would find no place in the armed services of today.
“I guess I’ll be the one to ask the politically incorrect but obvious question: What would George Patton think of this? Of course, we all know that he was a mere hate-filled homophobe whose abiding anti-marriage-equality bigotry should have forever disqualified him from disserving our military.”
More importantly, said Kengor, the transformation of the military into a pro-homosexual and pro-transgender force is only a step toward what he sees as the left’s final goal of driving religion entirely out of public life.
“Marriage is within their grasp. What’s next? The greatest foe of all: God and religion. A victory there would be the secular left’s ideological apotheosis.” (emphasis added)
