If denials were spuds, the brass on the E Ring could be making potato chips instead of politically correct airmen, sailors, and soldiers.
The Department of Defense and the military branches are now taking fire from all quarters for straying into the political and cultural mine fields now so much a part of the national conversation. Neither Congress, nor the Press, nor the public are taking DOD denials seriously. Abject skepticism is justified if you look at the history of Defense sponsored research on controversial social memes; fads that pander to, if not proselytize for, the progressive political left.
