military. don t ask don t tell was repealed in 2010. it took a year for the policy to be dropped. the u.s. armed services began welcoming openly gay service members in 2011. so a big question about this repeal, is this going to be a big legacy item for the president now that he s entering his final year? reporter: i think absolutely, ayman, from the white house perspective, they view this as part of what has been a huge cultural shift in our country that has also dealt with issues of gay marriage and the wide acceptance that has been taking place, from state by state, to the supreme court. really a moment in time which the white house can take some credit for, but it s a broader cultural change in how americans view the rights and place in society for those who are gay and lesbian. for the white house, while the
captive by the taliban four or five years until he was later then freed in a controversial prisoner swap. now the latest from ft. bragg, north carolina. good afternoon, ayman. it was a subdued and brief hearing for sergeant bowe bergdahl. he deferred entering a plea. he also deferred on making a decision whether to face a court-martial with a judge or a military jury. as we move forward, his lawyers may begin to push to have this case moved to texas. bergdahl has been on desk duty in san antonio ever since he was released by taliban forces following a prisoner exchange, with prisoners from guantanamo bay last year. his case is back in the spotlight obviously as the court case moves forward, but also because of the podcast in which bergdahl said he willingly walked off base as part of a protest to try to draw attention
there, officers allowed them to demonstrate for a while before telling them to disperse. this year, the mall tried harder to prevent the protests, but a judge has blocked most aspects of it. there were interesting issues to consider. first and foremost, whether the judge had jurisdiction over the group black lives matter, which officially registered with the secretary of state that would list specific members. in her ruling, she ruled that no she can t make a blanket ruling, preventing them from protesting there. there were other aspects that were requested on a temporary restraining order, such as asking the group to delete social media messages and post a message that the demonstration is going to be canceled. and the judge denied those requests as well. appreciate that update, lou. shifting now to texas where a major protest is planned in houston tonight, following a
to what he perceived was lacking leadership within his unit. we will be back in court next on january 12th. aym ayman, back to you. i want to bring in military analyst and medal of honor recipient colonel jack. i want to get your initial reaction to the charges. what do you make of the procedures that happened today? well, this is a standard article 39 hearing. there will be another one later on when he can express whether or not he wants to have what he wants the panel to look like, if he s going to take a court, or whether or not he wants to have the judge alone hear the case. so this is just preliminary, it s a standard procedure. what is interesting, however, is that he delayed making his decision. typically defendants will state right away what they want to do. obviously he hasn t decided yet and his attorneys have not yet
conflict. aym ayman, what do you think when you see seven men being executed after they have been obviously beaten quite well, standing there with their backs bare with all those welts, perhaps praying in this long, slow execution prosecution process we re see hearing by these so-called opposition leaders? well, there is definitely a lot of cop text behind looking at images like that there is no doubt about it. they are very disturbing. but the underlying issue in all of this is the fact that the syrian opposition by no means is respective of museum human rights or even necessarily a practitioner of universal human rights. what i would say is when you look at the opposition movement in general, and that is a very loose term, i don t have you to look at the political movement which is represented by the syrian national council. you to look at the free syrian army which is a group of various