Don't Ask Don't Tell policy to be challenged in Tacoma Monday

Just days after a federal judge ruled the military's policy against gays and lesbians openly serving in the military is unconstitutional, a more significant case against "don't ask don't tell" opens in a federal court in Tacoma.

Maj. Margaret Witt, a veteran Air Force nurse with a distinguished service record, will appear to argue that the Air Force violated her rights and must reinstate her.

If she wins she would be the first woman allowed to serve openly as a lesbian since President Clinton's administration in 1993 created the DADT policy.

The law, however, would not apply to other members of the armed forces.

Her case begins just four days after a California case brought by the Log Cabin Republicans, a political group supporting equal rights for gays and lesbians, resulted in a federal judge's decision that the military's "don't ask don't tell policy" is unconstitutional.

Joel Connelly, staff writer for SeattlePI.com, recalls the case of Col. Margaret Cammermeyer 20 years ago, and writes that a forefather of modern Republican conservatism "Sen. Barry Goldwater, defined what our military's policy on sexual orientation ought to be: "You don't have to be straight to fight for your country. You just have to shoot straight."

The New York Times on Sunday reported that "Major Witt’s case has already set an important precedent. After a federal judge dismissed her lawsuit, the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit reinstated it, ruling in 2008 that the government had to meet a higher standard of scrutiny before intruding on her private life. The panel sent her case back to the district court for trial."

I covered her initial challenge in 2006 when I was a newspaper reporter covering the military for the now departed Seattle Post-Intelligencer newspaper.

Witt never violated Dont' Ask, Don't Tell herself, indeed she went out of her way not to be asked and not to tell.

Yet she was outed by the jilted husband of a woman she was seeing in 2004 who advised Air Force officials she was a lesbian. from which the Air Force launched the investigation that resulted in her dismissal.

This month's military history presentations at Museum of Flight

Seattle's Museum of Flight has two interesting public presentations this month regarding some little known units and planes in military aviation history:

39th Airlift Squadron Troop Carrier Squadron panel. One of the few WW II squadrons of any kind still active today. Sat., Sept. 12, 2 p.m - 3 p.m.

The 39th Troop Carrier Squadron has been moving everything from soldiers and celebrities to bodies and ammunition in and out of all sorts of places in every American conflict since World War II. Veteran airlift pilots and crew members share stories and photos from the Vietnam era to the present. Mission permitting, a 39th Airlift Squadron Lockheed C-130 will be open to the public for tours during Museum hours from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. on Saturday and Sunday.

Defying Gravity and the Odds: The Unlikely Story of the Boeing X-32B Joint Strike Fighter, Tue., Sept. 15, 6 p.m. Speaker Dennis O'Donoghue, currently Boeing Commercial Airlines' vice president, test and validation, recalls his first Boeing assignment in 1996 as lead test pilot of the X-32B STOVL Joint Strike Fighter Concept Demonstrator Aircraft program. Sponsored by the Royal Aeronautical Society Seattle Branch.

According to a museum press release, O'Donoghue during the summer of 2001 commanded the first flight and flew the first hovers and first vertical landings of the X-32B. After the JSF program, he was assigned as deputy project pilot for the Sonic Cruiser and the 7E7/787 programs.

O'Donoghue, a U.S. Naval Academy graduate, includes in his career experience as a NASA research test pilot at Lewis Research Center , Cleveland , Oh. He conducted exploratory flight tests, airborne science projects, and space support missions on a various aircraft platforms including the DC-9, DHC-6, G-159, Lear 25, OV-10, T-34, and YAV-8B Harrier.

O'Donoghue's military experience included 12 years of active duty as a U.S. Marine Corps fighter pilot and test pilot. He flew operational missions in the A-4M, AV-8A and AV-8B Harrier aircraft, and engineering flight tests on the AV-8B and F-14 Tomcat.