| | Former Special Forces commander denied government job over sex change
 According to MSNBC's Keith Olbermann, a former Army special forces commander has sued the Library of Congress after being offered a job as a terrorism research analyst in 2004 and then having the offer rescinded when he revealed he was in the process of undergoing a sex change operation.
Former Colonel David Schroer, now Diane Schroer, says she explained her situation frankly to her future supervisor and presented photos of herself in female dress to make it clear she would not stand out or distract her fellow workers. The next day, the supervisor called and said that "after a long and sleepless night, she decided I was not a good fit for the Library."
"I served 16 years in Special Forces including tours as a detachment commander, company commander, and battalion commander, accumulating 450 parachute jumps," Schorer writes at her ACLU blog. "Following the attacks on 9/11, I was selected to organize and direct a classified 120-person interagency organization responsible for all Department of Defense operations against the country’s most significant terrorist threats and all long-term planning for the Global War on Terrorism. ... Since my retirement, I have been intimately involved in Homeland Security, Critical Infrastructure Protection, and Maritime High-Risk Counterterrorism Operations."
The ACLU filed suit on Schroer's behalf in June 2005. The Library of Congress has claimed in its defense that it was concerned Schroer would lose her credibility, her clearance, or her contacts with former colleagues as a result of her transgender status.
In presenting this story, Olbermann was outraged not so much by the transgender issue as by what the flimsiness of the excuses reveals about the Bush administration.
"If there is a true need for an all-consuming war on terror, you should be asking anybody with the slightest qualifications to help," Olbermann stated. "The best candidate should get the job." And he concluded by asking, "Does the administration itself really believe we need an all-consuming war on terror -- or are its internal assessments of the threats a lot less serious than it lets on?"
This video is from MSNBC's Countdown, broadcast August 20, 2008.
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