gays troops could serve openly without hurting

The Pentagon abstraction that argues that gay troops could serve aboveboard after affliction the military's adeptness to action is accepted to re-ignite agitation this ages on Capitol Hill over repealing the 17-year-old "don't ask, don't tell" policy.

Officials accustomed with the 10-month study's after-effects acquire said a bright majority of respondents don't affliction if gays serve openly, with 70 percent admiration that appropriation the ban would acquire positive, alloyed or no results. The admiral batten on action of anonymity because the allegation hadn't been released.

Defense Secretary Robert Gates and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Adm. Mike Mullen, who acquire both said they abutment repealing the law, were appointed to altercate the allegation with Congress Tuesday morning and with reporters Tuesday afternoon.

Republicans, led by Sen. John McCain of Arizona, acquire mostly against repealing the law because they say efforts to do so are politically apprenticed and alarming at a time of two wars.

"This was a political swear fabricated by an amateur admiral or applicant for admiral of the United States," McCain told CNN's "State of the Union" aftermost weekend.

"The aggressive is at its accomplished point in application and assimilation and professionalism and capability, so to somehow adduce that this action has been damaging the aggressive is artlessly false," McCain said.

Democrats and gay rights groups adverse that the abstraction assuredly proves what they've accepted anecdotally for years: Most troops would acquire an aboveboard gay being in their units.

"It's what we expected. The atmosphere in the active-duty has changed," said a gay Air Force administrator and co-founder of the advancement accumulation OutServe. The administrator uses the pseudonym "JD Smith" to assure his identity.