There was a lot of talk about "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" this week, mostly because the Obama administration's website seemed to indicate a change in policy. Although, thanks to Joe.My.God and John Aravosis, that's been fixed.
One of our readers, Timothy Beauchamp (cowboyneok), had to leave the military because he was gay back in the later 80s. Tim was a sailor on the nuclear sub USS Henry Clay at the end of the cold war. He's also a poet. Even after he was forced out of the military, the Smithsonian's Museum of American History included one of Tim's poems in an exhibit on subs and the cold war. The curator initially told Tim his poem was one of the best artifacts she had seen from a service member on the Cold War. But, she later made it seem like Tim had tricked her into publishing his poem because he had a secret political agenda about being gay and serving on submarines. Again, that was back in the late 80s/early 90s. We haven't progressed all that far in terms of military policy. Tim is why repealing "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" matters.
So, with that build up, this week's poem is Sub Sailor Tim's poem -- a true artifact of the cold war, which someday soon will hopefully be an artifact of "Don't Ask, Don't Tell":
Sub Sailor's Views on Glasnost
When rhetoric from both sides
Begins to offend
Opinions at home
Seem to change like the wind
Still we patrol
the ocean deep
We made a promise
we plan to keep
Its kind of ironic
We protect
Freedom at home
Through our isolation
But just to know
Freedom is protected
For me, at least,
is some consolation
Reagan and Gorbachev
Back and forth volley
While Nancy and Raisa
Put on their best
Capitalist - Communist
Political Folly!
What does it matter
Its East against West
Get rid of that bomb
Dismantle that one
That leaves you this many
And leaves us that
Wait one!
Hold on now!
What about Star Wars?
Take it or leave it
There’s the door
Here’s your hat
Opinion at home
Seems to be changing
Russia’s no longer the wicked beast
American stores - stocks rearranging
Communist t-shirts
Embracing the East
Would it be nice
To put away the war heads?
Let’s be friends and melt this Cold War?
Would it be nice
To change human nature?
It stays the same so what’s it all for?
They call how we’re living
Social Darwinism
Good luck to you
May the best man win
Seems to me Soviet Socialism
Favors the powerful
Politburo men
So what’s the difference
Between our two nations?
Is it a question of status quo?
Where can a poor man
Escape deprivation?
Can the Russian peasant
Put down his hoe?
I guess in a way
We have lots in common
Their Afghanistan War
And our Viet Nam
I guess in a way
We share the same lessons
From Afghan rebels and the Viet Cong
And when it comes
To loving our children
Both of our countries
They do pretty well
But do they have a future
In this cold world we live in?
Only God knows
And time will tell.
