Buck McKeon

Mr. McKEON

Mr. McKEON. I yield 30 seconds to the Army colonel in the Reserve, Mr. Buyer from Indiana.

Mr. McKEON. I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. McKEON. May I inquire how much time I have remaining?

Mr. McKEON. I would just like to make a couple of points. The Secretary would first have to determine that BP was not a responsible source. If the Secretary determines that BP was not a responsible source, the Secretary would already be authorized to consider debarment. The Secretary is not obligated to debar BP or any of its subsidiaries in any circumstance. Having said that, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. McKEON. Mr. Chairman, I rise to take the time in opposition although I don't oppose the amendment.

Mr. McKEON. I will reserve my time.

Mr. McKEON. Mr. Chairman, I rise to seek the time in opposition although I am not opposed to the amendment.

Mr. McKEON. I yield the balance of my time to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Gohmert).

Mr. McKEON. Madam Chairwoman, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Connolly).

Mr. McKEON. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself the balance of my time. I have another letter to read, and I'd like to insert it into the Record. This is from General Carl E. Mundy, Jr., United States Marine Corps, Retired. He sent an identical letter, I believe, to the chairman. He says: ``I write to convey my appreciation for your strong stance relative to efforts to repeal the current law which exclude homosexuals from serving openly in the armed services. You and I both know that such action is not in the best interest of our Nation or its Armed Forces. While each member of the HASC has many constituencies to serve, some very vocal, it may be that your largest is the 2.8 million men and women in uniform, together with the family members who support them and who number at least that many. In sharp contrast to homosexual activists, these volunteers in uniform serve silently and obediently and rely on the reasoned judgment of their leaders and even more so, perhaps, of those empowered to `raise armies, provide and maintain a navy, and to make the rules for the governance thereof' to speak and to represent them. ``Secretary Gates has put into motion an effort to at least give this element of your constituents an opportunity to be heard relative to their concerns about implementation. The very large majority of servicemembers who are not homosexual, at least 97 percent or more, deserve to be heard before any peremptory, uninformed action is taken to impose the sexuality of a minority on them. I believe strongly that a moratorium on discharges being advocated by some in the Senate and on your committee as well could be tantamount to muzzling those most affected by such peremptory action. I appreciate the stand you have taken to prevent this.'' I would like to enter General Mundy's letter into the Record. Mr. Chairman, there have been comments made that perhaps the Chiefs support this action that will be taking place tonight on this vote, tonight or tomorrow, whenever we get to that amendment. But I must reiterate, I spoke to them on the phone and they followed up with a letter and, to a person, they all oppose us taking action before the recommended procedure that the Secretary has set in place. General Carl E. Mundy, Jr., United States Marine Corp (Ret.), May 19, 2010. Hon. ``Buck'' McKeon, Ranking Member, House Armed Services Committee, Rayburn House Office Building, Washington, DC. Dear Congressman McKeon: I write to convey my appreciation for your strong stance relative to efforts to repeal the current law which excludes homosexuals from serving openly in the Armed Services. You and I both know that such action is not in the best interests of our nation or its Armed Forces. While each member of the HASC has many constituencies to serve--some very vocal--it may be that your largest is the 2.8 million men and women in uniform together with the family members who support them and who number at least that many. In sharp contrast to homosexual activists, these volunteers in uniform serve silently and obediently and rely on the reasoned judgment of their leaders and even more so, perhaps, of those empowered to ``. . . raise armies, provide and maintain a navy, and to make the rules for the governance thereof' to speak for and to represent them. Secretary Gates has put into motion an effort to at least give this element of your constituents an opportunity to be heard relative to their concerns about implementation. The very large majority of servicemembers who are not homosexual--at least 97% or more--deserve to be heard before any peremptory, uninformed action is taken to impose the sexuality of a minority on them. I believe strongly that a moratorium on discharges being advocated by some in the Senate and on your Committee as well would be tantamount to muzzling those most affected by such peremptory action. I appreciate the stand you have taken to prevent this. Last year, my Service, the Marine Corps, discharged something over 32,400 men and women from active service. Seventy-eight of those were discharged for matters related to homosexuality--less than one-quarter of one percent. Within that small number, more than half were still in Entry Level Training with less than a year in service--young trainees still in the reality-shock of Boot Camp or the immediate months following--who can barely be considered qualified, much less skilled or even of a maturity old enough to drink alcohol. And within that small number, three were discharged without any active service at all while still in the Delayed Entry Program awaiting assignment to active duty. Claims of a hemorrhage of skills due to the injustice of the law are simply not supported by cases like these. And in my experience, if not by admission of homosexuality--factual, or not at their still emerging state of maturity--most of these young people--homesick, disillusioned, or stunned by the shock of Recruit Training--would seek another means of gaining discharge. As a final note, let me convey my concern that in counter- balance to whatever number of homosexual advocate voices you hear, the voices of the thousand retired military officers who gave their advice professionally and with dignity and respect to the President and members of Congress on this subject last year--together with the 160 more who have lent their names since--should not be ignored. This is the largest number of officers to have collectively conveyed their views and recommendations in the history of our nation. And in spite of the efforts of activists to impugn the character and legitimacy of these officers as out of touch, a number of those offering their advice commanded Divisions in combat or held other significant command or staff positions as recently as the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. This body of professional advice matters, since the signers base our judgments on experience, and have no special interest agenda other than the effectiveness of our Armed Forces. I want to again offer my admiration for your courageous and principled stand on behalf of the men and women of our armed services on this issue. I hold the strongest hope that you will continue to allow the voices of those in uniform to be heard on this important subject, and will continue to oppose efforts to impose a moratorium on discharges, which is tantamount to de-facto repeal of a law that has, and does serve the armed forces well. Sincerely, Carl E. Mundy, Jr.

Mr. McKEON. May I inquire again of the time remaining?

Mr. McKEON. Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Putnam), who is the author of one of the amendments.

Mr. McKEON. Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Gohmert).

Mr. McKEON. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Again, if we had been given the time to discuss Don't Ask, Don't Tell, we could have spent more time talking about all of the good things in the bill. But only having 5 minutes to discuss that, we have to use whatever time we can to explain to people what is going on. When I talked to members of the Joint Chiefs a couple of days ago, one of them said one of the reasons that he opposes doing anything right now in opposition to the plan that was set up earlier this year was because, he says, I am here. I understand the innuendoes around the Hill. I understand the process of the amendment, and I understand that it doesn't really kick in until later. But, he said, the people in the field, the service people that we promised to hear from before we take action, don't understand that. And he said, the headline will read, Don't Ask, Don't Tell Repealed. Well, they don't even have to wait for us. The Senate already did it. The breaking news alert on Fox News is: ``The Senate Armed Services Committee votes to repeal military's Don't Ask, Don't Tell policy on gays.'' And then if we follow through and do the same thing tonight with the Murphy amendment, that will be the headline. So the young men and women in Afghanistan, when they're watching on Fox News, that's what they're seeing right now. So then when we do get around to this company that we hired to make this survey to reach out to 350,000 of our servicepeople and their families, when they hear the question they're going to say, what, you're asking us now, after the decision? What kind of respect is that to show to our young men and women who are out there laying their life on the line? They signed a contract. They joined the military. They're an all- volunteer force. And they signed under certain circumstances, and now those are going to be changed without any input from them. Oh, yeah. We're going to follow through with the charade. We will have the survey, it will be turned in in December, but the die is already cast if that amendment passes tonight. And I don't think that is the way that we should be treating our military, especially the people on this committee. Our responsibility is to look out for those young men and young women that are out there defending us and defending freedom around the world. And the lack of respect to give them the opportunity to have input on this very important issue, one that we've lived with now for 17 years, that has to be changed now, just doesn't make sense. A Member earlier this evening talked about common sense and the lack of it that we see around here. And one of the reasons why we're given an 18 percent vote of approval from the American people, because we show a lack of common sense, we show a lack of respect. This amendment will show a lack of respect to the young men and young women in uniform and their families. Again, let me read from Admiral Roughead's letter, the admiral, he's the Chief of Naval Operations. He says, I share the view of Secretary Gates that the best approach would be to complete the Department of Defense review before there is any legislation to change the law. My concern is that legislation changes at this point, regardless of the precise language used in this--and this amendment was written very carefully--may cause confusion on the status of the law in the fleet and disrupt the review process itself by leading sailors to question whether their input matters. And he is right on target. Obtaining the views and opinions of the force and assessing them in the light of the issues involved will be complicated by a shifting legislative backdrop and its associated debate. I plead with you to give the time necessary to have the evaluation, to follow the process that's been set. What are we afraid of? Is something going to happen that you think is going to change this process? Why not let them have their input? Why not follow through with the process that was set by the Secretary? The company that's been hired to go out and reach out to these 350,000 of our 2.5 million serving, let's follow through with the process; let's respect our young men and women in uniform and follow through with the process that has been determined. Mr. Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. McKEON. Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. McKEON. Mr. Chairman, I yield 1 minute to my friend and colleague, the gentlewoman from Maryland (Ms. Edwards).

Mr. McKEON. Mr. Chairman, at this time, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Broun).

Mr. McKEON. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself the balance of my time. Mr. Chairman, I know we have differences of opinion on this, and we all have stories, as we just heard from my good friend Mr. Garamendi from my home State. We have stories on both sides of the issue. The problem is, those are one person here, one person here. Maybe we talk to 10. Maybe we talk to 20. But we have 2.5 million people serving, and all of them should have a chance to have input. That is what they were promised. That is what they were told. Now we are short-circuiting that process. So all I am saying is we should respect all of the people and their families that are serving now in the armed services and follow through with the things we said. When I talked the other day to Admiral Roughead, the Chief of Naval Operations, his concern was that if we take action now with the vote on this Murphy amendment tonight which repeals Don't Ask, Don't Tell, he said it is going to cause confusion in the force, because we just hired this company to go out and do the survey, to follow through on this process that has been started. They are going to be going out into the field asking questions. What he said is, this is going to cause confusion, because as one of the other Chiefs said, the headline, once this passes, if it passes, will be ``Don't Ask, Don't Tell is repealed.'' So when the survey goes out into the field, when they put together focus groups and the surveys and all the things they are doing in response to this process that has been started, it is moot.

Mr. McKEON. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself 1 minute. Mr. Chairman, let me read again, in case I inadequately expressed it before. This is the letter from Secretary Gates that he told Chairman Skelton two days ago that he still stands by strongly: Therefore, I strongly oppose any legislation that seeks to change this policy prior to the completion of this vital assessment process. This is a process that was set in place when the President made his comments at the State of the Union that he wanted the Don't Ask, Don't Tell policy repealed before the end of the year. The Secretary took him at his word and set up a process. The process would go out to all of the military and their spouses and give them a chance to respond. The military would then have a chance to go over that and give their best military advice to the President and to the Congress as to how we should move forward at that time. That report is due by the first of December.

Mr. McKEON

Mr. McKEON. Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Missouri (Mr. Akin), the ranking member of the Seapower Subcommittee.

Mr. McKEON. Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from South Carolina (Mr. Wilson), the ranking member on the Military Personnel Subcommittee.

Mr. McKEON. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself the balance of my time. I support this amendment; I think it's a good thing. I think that our whole country could use a little help in this area. Now, back to Don't Ask, Don't Tell. Again, I think it's very important that we do as Mr. Forbes said, a little common sense. When we tell the military we're going to get their viewpoint and then we say, never mind, we're going to move ahead, your viewpoint really doesn't matter, I think that that's a big mistake. I think this amendment is a good one, but I think only giving us 10 minutes to debate Don't Ask, Don't Tell is a mistake.

Mr. McKEON. I yield the gentleman 1 additional minute.

Mr. McKEON. Mr. Chairman, I rise to claim the time in opposition to the amendment, although I am not opposed to the amendment.

Mr. McKEON

Mr. McKEON. I continue to reserve.