As reported by the Associated Press, via the WSJ:

Mr. Obama said this country cannot afford to cut from the military's ranks people with needed skills for fighting. He made the comments to thousands of gays and lesbians at a fundraising dinner Saturday night for the Human Rights Campaign, the nation's largest gay-rights group.

The line: "We should not be punishing patriotic Americans who have stepped forward to serve the country. We should be celebrating their willingness to step forward and show such courage, especially when we are fighting two wars. I appreciate that many of you don't believe progress has come fast enough. Do not doubt the direction we are heading and the destination we will reach."

He's also asking congress to repeal the Defense of Marriage act, as well as a call for laws enforcing equal benefits being granted to domestic partners. And even Politico enjoyed the Lady Gaga line:

"Despite the real gains that we've made, there are still laws to change and still hearts to open," and says discrimination needs to end, "whether in the office or the battlefield...Do not doubt the path we are on or the destination we will reach," POTUS does not offer any timeline for just when that destination will be reached. On a lighter note, the line of the night may have been the opener: "It is a privilege to be here tonight to open for Lady Gaga," the president told the crowd. "I've made it."

Again: no timeline. But pretty strong words. Stating the obvious: President Obama's taken hits for not being able to fulfill campaign promises. The Human Rights Committee is the largest gay and lesbian rights group in Washington. The National Equality March on Washington is tomorrow.

Part 1 of the speech. The Lady Gaga joke comes at the beginning:

Part 2:

Part 3:

These photos were provided to us by the Project on Government Oversight, which has just written a letter to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton detailing its investigation into the "Lord of the Flies environment" that has overtaken the private contractors who guard State Department employees in Kabul, Afghanistan. According to POGO, employees of ArmorGroup North America—a unit of contracting giant Wackenhut—get their jollies off by "deviant hazing [that] has created a climate of fear and coercion, with those who declined to participate often ridiculed, humiliated, demoted, or even fired."

What sort of hazing? The traditional desperately homoerotic frat boy kind, mostly involving eating and drinking things off of other men's butts. Also some nipple-biting, as you can see below. One POGO whistle blower described it thusly [PDF link]: "They have a group of sexual predators, deviants running rampant over there. No, they are not jamming guys in the ass per say [sic], but they are showing poor judgenment [sic]." Most of it appears to have been voluntary, but those who didn't really want to drink vodka shots out of the clenched butt-cheeks of their male co-workers were penalized and reported barricading themselves in their rooms. And sometimes the behavior extended to the locals:

An Afghan national employed as a food service worker at the guard corps' base at Camp Sullivan submitted a signed statement dated August 16, 2009, attesting that a guard force supervisor and four others entered a dining facility on August 1, 2009, wearing only short underwear and brandishing bottles of alcohol. Upon leaving the facility, the guard force supervisor allegedly grabbed the Afghan national by the face and began abusing him with foul language, saying, "You are very good for fXXXing." The Afghan national reported that he "was too afraid of them I could not tell them any thing."

So anyway, these are the people who are guarding our national security in Afghanistan, being paid vast multiples of what soldiers, sailors, and marines get with your tax dollars. Are these guys asking, or telling?

[Via Mother Jones.]

Per the Australian Herald-Sun:

One film source from the set said that each crew member had signed agreements saying they would not ask the superstar about her religion, Scientology. The couple, who have braved chilly weather to explore the city and have happily chatted to locals, are notoriously private when it comes to questions or discussions about their religion.

So, the same old tricks, it would appear, though it's of note that this is different from the "Don't Ask About The Dimensional Space Hierarchy" agreement, the "Don't Ask About Arthur Miller" agreement, and the "Don't Ask About The Series Finale Of Dawson's Creek Agreement (Breach Punishable By Kevin Williamson-imposed Scream-like Death)." Still: Australians everywhere remain tight-lipped and terrified, especially since her husband is totally capable of doing shit like this to their homeland:

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No one has any idea! Obama retained Gates as Defense Secretary, which is bad news for the repeal of Don't Ask Don't Tell, and the president has also thus far been completely unwilling to stop discharging gay servicemen and women, which he could do with one simple executive order. So the news that his new Secretary of the Army is John McHugh, a Republican congressman, is initially disheartening.

One of the problems with appointing token Republicans to semi-important positions in the name of "bipartisanship" is that some of us, when voting for Democrats, wish to then be governed be Democrats. And even a token Republican can cause quite a headache for a Democratic president, because of the fundamentally incompatible ideologies of the major parties. I.e., Republicans believe that Government is Bad and Evil except when it directly, monetarily benefits their friends, and Democrats have a definition of "friends" that includes poor people and minorities. (But not, really, gay people.)

So yes, this upstate Republican, who is the head of the House Armed Services Committee and who represents a district including Fort Drum, is pretty well-respected. The National Security guy from the liberal Center for American Progress says "McHugh has the skills to be a very effective secretary of the Army." But if it turns out that the dude does not support letting gay people serve in the military, a lot of Obama supporters are going to wonder why the President couldn't find a single qualified man or woman for the post who does.

And if McHugh, as he said in response to question from Ana Marie Cox, actually does "agree that DADT policy doesn't work and changing it is a priority," and it turns out he just needed to be freed from the Congressional GOP to come out with it, than we'll all say "kudos, brilliant pick, nice job." But that is a big if!