It seems like well-trained medics would be important during a war

If someone could explain the logic of this to me, I’d sure appreciate it.

Hundreds of officers and health care professionals have been discharged in the past 10 years under the Pentagon’s policy on gays, a loss that while relatively small in numbers involves troops who are expensive for the military to educate and train.

The 350 or so affected are a tiny fraction of the 1.4 million members of the uniformed services and about 3.5 percent of the more than 10,000 people discharged under the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy since its inception in 1994.

But many were military school graduates or service members who went to medical school at the taxpayers’ expense – troops not as easily replaced by a nation at war that is struggling to fill its enlistment quotas.

“You don’t just go out on the street tomorrow and pluck someone from the general population who has an Air Force education, someone trained as a physician, someone who bleeds Air Force blue, who is willing to serve, and that you can put in Iraq tomorrow,” said Beth Schissel, who graduated from the Air Force Academy in 1989 and went on to medical school.

Let me see if I understand this. We’re engaged in a war in which thousands of troops are seriously injured and need immediate medical attention. We have hundreds of qualified medics, which the military has trained at considerable expense, who are willing to volunteer for service in the Armed Forces at a time when military recruitment is struggling. The government has decided we’d rather throw these people out of the military, simply because they’re gay, than put their skills and qualifications to good use.

This is madness.

It’s worth noting, of course, that Rep. Marty Meehan (D-Mass.) has championed the Military Readiness Enhancement Act (H.R.1059), which would repeal the Pentagon’s “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy and allow these men and women in uniform to stay in the military. As of now, the bill is up to 107 co-sponsors, three of whom are Republican. It has no chance of even coming to the floor for a vote, but it’s way overdue.