Trump shook the liberals in their boots again when he tweeted his idea for a transgender military ban. The left was predictably ruffled and their responses within expectation, but this brings up an important point that has been ignored for too long. How does being transgender impact military service? We’ll look at the raw numbers, and then we’ll address the leading liberal complaints.
Cost
Most notions that come from President Trump will originate with cost analysis. This is no exception. The left argues that transgender troops represent an insignificant burden on the military budget. A study done by RAND shows otherwise. Despite the fact that the study and its presentation are ridiculous in their bias, we’ll assume the numbers are accurate for the sake of argument. RAND showed that there are somewhere between 1,300 and 6,600 transgender troops in the military right now (out of 1.3 million total men and women in service). Of those, roughly two percent are likely to undergo gender transition. In total, that is expected to cost somewhere around $8 million a year. The left loves to point out that this would only account for 0.017 percent of all Defense health spending.
They’re overlooking something important. Transitioning troops only account for 0.002 percent of all service members. This means that on merits of transition alone, transgender troops are 8.5 times costlier than their counterparts. In a budget that is strapped for cash and regularly pushes Congress to the brink of shutting down, pushing for cost-effective troops is inarguable.
Combat Readiness
The other major component to this whole argument is combat readiness. Our military’s job is to be effective in combat. The end. Now, not all troops who consider themselves transgender are physically or mentally unfit to serve. Troops in the process of transitioning are a whole different story. The transition process takes a huge toll on the body and often pushes patients to physical and mental extremes. Comparable treatments automatically disqualify cis service members from staying in the military. For some reason, we are currently making exceptions for this one case. In the name of PC culture, we are allowing individuals to enter into combat situations when their physical and mental aptitude are being made unpredictable by medical intervention.
This attempt to be nice puts everyone in danger — even the innocent civilians in those combat zones. Morally speaking, there is no room for argument. It is our responsibility as a nation to keep our armed forces precise and efficient to avoid unnecessary loss of life.
Points of Contention
Despite the indisputable impact that transgender troops have on combat readiness and military costs, the left still has astounding objections. Let’s break them down.
The Right to Serve
There seems to be this notion that denying service positions to transgenders is an act of inflammatory discrimination and an infringement on their rights. This argument forgets that service isn’t a right and can often be an obligation. More to the point, medical disqualifications have existed for over a century, and there is no reason transgender persons should be exempt.
Viagra Spending
This non sequitur is another favorite among liberals. They like to point out that the military already spends $84 million on erectile dysfunction (ED) medications. Besides the fact that this is entirely unrelated to the issue at hand, they seem to forget that all ED medications are primarily cardiovascular treatments. The ED stuff is just a side-effect and is rarely covered by health plans. But, even if the prescriptions were to treat ED, this would be health spending on issues caused by service as opposed to conditions that prohibit service.
There can be no question that transgenderism affects service. It inflates per-person spending and has undeniable consequences for combat readiness. Denying people or groups membership in the military is not a violation of any fundamental rights, and it is more important for the military to be effective than inclusive. All of this is beside the point. There has been no official policy change regarding transgenders. This whole media storm was just in response to a single Tweet.
As effective as Trump has been with his Twitter account, his presidency is still bound by the same laws as any before him. Twitter accounts do not bypass the legal process. Still, if you wanted to know if the President’s idea had any merit, you can trust that he was right once again.
~ American Liberty Report
