Post office rate hike on mailings critical of homosexuals in the military overruled

Colorado Springs, Colo., Mar 21, 2010 / 10:34 am

National officials with the U.S. Postal Service have overruled a Colorado post office’s refusal to ship materials critical of homosexuals in the military at a reduced rate for non-profits. The local post office had claimed the material was “obscene” and incited resistance against the government.

The Family Research Institute (FRI) had produced a four-page newsletter with research and an interview with a female enlistee recalling her experiences with homosexuals in basic training. It also advertised that its latest statistical report about “rapes in the military” were available for $25.

While the organization claimed local Colorado Springs officials refused to mail out the newsletter, U.S. Postal Service community relations official Ron Perry said they did not refuse to mail it. According to KKTV.com, the office would not mail it at a reduced non-profit bulk rate because they believed it violated guidelines stated in the Domestic Mail Manual for obscene content.

“We have mailing standards that we have to uphold," Perry commented.

FRI Chairman Dr. Paul Cameron countered that the content was acceptable.

"We're Americans,” said FRI Chairman Dr. Paul Cameron. “Where does the post office get off enforcing Obama's rules and thinking, on us, because we disagree with them."

On Wednesday the U.S. Postal Service Pricing and Classifications Board ruled that the mailing did not violate guidelines. FRI will be allowed to mail out their newsletter at the non-profit rate three cents less than the standard mailing rate.

The newsletter itself reprints a letter from retired U.S. Navy Capt. Lawrence R. Jefferis to Admiral Michael G. Mullen, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Capt. Jefferis, who served 31 years on active duty, warned about problems of sexual favoritism and misconduct.

He recounted that when he was executive officer of the USS Catamount in 1967, five of the ship’s Radarmen were exposed as part of a male prostitution ring. They told investigators that their instructors had convinced them they could augment their military pay by providing sexual services to homosexuals in San Francisco.

Capt. Jefferis also noted other requirements for enlistment and behavior, such as the Uniform Code of Military Justice’s proscription of unlawful cohabitation, adultery and prostitution.

“Minor criminal records are a bar to enlistment. Visible tattoos and piercings are not permitted. Are these aberrations more damning than sodomy? Is it your contention that cohabitors, adulterers, prostitutes, young men and women with tattoos, those with only GEDs, or the obese cannot serve as well as homosexuals?

“If we get to pick and choose which laws we uphold, which laws are next on the line to ignore?”

By way of example, he speculated that a serviceman or woman who has carnal relations with a minor could perform duties “as well, if not better, than a homosexual.”

The debate on homosexuals in the military flared again nationally on Thursday when retired U.S. Marine Corps Gen. John Sheehan, a commander of Atlantic-based NATO forces in the 1990s, testified about the issue before the Senate Armed Services Committee.

He said that European armies were weakened by “social engineering” and homosexual soldiers were part of that effort. He reported that the Dutch told him their homosexual soldiers were “part of the problem” in Serbian forces’ domination of Dutch peacekeeping forces in Srebrenica in 1995, where thousands of Bosnian Muslim men were massacred.

According to the Navy Times, Gen. Sheehan also cited the problem of sexual assault. He recounted how a male-on-male foxhole sexual assault in his unit during the Vietnam War had a divisive impact.

The general also told the Senate committee that seven percent of the 3,230 recorded sexual assault incidents in the Pentagon’s fiscal 2009 report on sexual assault were male-on-male. The Navy Times said this figure was closer to five percent.