“Family Readiness” is the New “Military Readiness”
Although news that the Pentagon was going to be surveying the spouses — opposite-sex only — of current members of the military regarding the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy had been previously reported, this week’s news is that the surveys are going out on Friday.
From The Hill‘s Elise Viebeck:
The Pentagon plans to survey approximately 150,000 military spouses about the military’s “Don’t ask, don’t tell” policy.
In a statement, Department of Defense spokeswoman Cynthia Smith said the surveys “will help the military leadership assess the impacts, if any, a change in the law … might have on family readiness and military community life.”
“Family readiness.”
This leads me to thoughts of properly packed picnic lunches, but I don’t think that’s what Smith meant.
The Hill report notes that “[t]he mailers will be sent on Aug. 20. Spouses are requested to complete them by Sept. 27 ….”
On July 8, Metro Weekly asked Smith, regarding the planned spousal survey: “What does [the Department of Defense/Pentagon Working Group] plan to do to reach out to spouses/partners of gay, lesbian and bisexual servicemembers? If it does not plan to reach out to them, why not?”
No response was forthcoming, and Metro Weekly again asked Smith today for an answer to this question.
[UPDATE: The Pentagon response to Metro Weekly‘s inquiry came shortly after this post. Here’s the resulting story — “Spousal Surveys and Partner Input.”]
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