Secretary Gates left opponents of Don’t-Ask-Don’t-Tell repeal hardly any pegs on which to hang their hats. He also tried to goose the Senate into action this year with the threat of ‘judicial fiat’ of sudden repeal.

If Senate GOPs were to listen to the John McCain of 2006, they’d have no other way to vote but for repeal:

And I understand the opposition to it, and I‘ve had these debates and discussions, but the day that the leadership of the military comes to me and says, Senator, we ought to change the policy, then I think we ought to consider seriously changing it because those leaders in the military are the ones we give the responsibility to.

Of course, McCain today suggests “the policy is working” with no regard for the ruined lives left in its wake, and with no clear understanding of how the policy operates in the military today.

Greg Sargent details the crumbling battlements repeal opponents have to hide behind:

One of the key findings in the report is that a whopping 74 percent of spouses of military service-members say repeal of DADT would have no impact on their view of whether their husbands or wives should continue to serve. This number comes by way of a Congressional staffer who attended a private briefing that the report’s authors, Defense Department officials Jeh Johnson and Carter Ham, gave to Senate Armed Services Committee staffers this morning.

This finding is important, because it undercuts a key argument made by repeal opponents: That having service-members mingle with gay colleagues could worry their families.

Also, it seems like the Marines are actually coming around:

According to the source, while the report does find that concern runs high among Marines, it also finds that 84 percent of Marine combat corps combat arms units who said they thought they’d worked with homosexual service-members in the past found the experience either very good, good, or neutral.

Congressman Joe “You Lie!” Wilson thinks DADT repeal shouldn’t be rushed: that’s his excuse for punting it into the next (GOP-controlled) House of Representatives.

“Using the last days of a lame duck Congress to hastily repeal ‘Don’t Ask Don’t Tell’ would be highly irresponsible. Today’s Pentagon report must be thoroughly examined by the committees of jurisdiction to determine potential impacts on military recruitment, readiness, and morale. Lawmakers and military leaders need to have as much information as possible before any action is taken on such a significant military policy.”

Elaine Donnelly, in an almost comical appearance with MSNBC’s Tamron Hall this afternoon, seemed to attack the lack of definition in the Johnson-Ham report for two terms at the center of the debate for 18 years: “unit cohesion” and “readiness.”

It seems that, despite Secretary Gates description of delay as ‘irresponsible’ today in his press conference with Admiral Mullen, and despite the in-depth nature of the report and its accompanying analysis, opponents of DADT repeal have two things to hang their hat(e)s on:

1. The report is terribly flawed.

2. We need more time to study it in detail.

Does anyone else see tension between these two arguments?? I mean, if the report is flawed, why not simply vote against repeal and be done with it? Why take more time to study a flawed report?

Of course, these aren’t reasonable objections and, as such, shouldn’t be held up for examination for logical consistency. I just think repeal opponents have reached funny-papers status. They remind me of the kid who says, “This ice cream really sucks, can I have more please?”