Some interesting statistics from the New York Times (via Early Bird News):

The number of waivers granted to Army recruits with criminal backgrounds has grown about 65 percent in the last three years, increasing to 8,129 in 2006 from 4,918 in 2003, Department of Defense records show.

During that time, the Army has employed a variety of tactics to expand its diminishing pool of recruits. It has offered larger enlistment cash bonuses, allowed more high school dropouts and applicants with low scores on its aptitude test to join, and loosened weight and age restrictions.

It has also increased the number of so-called “moral waivers” to recruits with criminal pasts, even as the total number of recruits dropped slightly. The sharpest increase was in waivers for serious misdemeanors, which make up the bulk of all the Army’s moral waivers. These include aggravated assault, burglary, robbery and vehicular homicide.

The number of waivers for felony convictions also increased, to 11 percent of the 8,129 moral waivers granted in 2006, from 8 percent.

Fewer than 3 in 10 people ages 17 to 24 are fully qualified to join the Army. That means they have a high school diploma, have met aptitude test score requirements and fitness levels, and would not be barred for medical reasons, their sexual orientation or their criminal histories.

The Defense Department has also expanded its applicant pool by accepting soldiers with criminal backgrounds and medical problems like asthma, high blood pressure and attention deficit disorder, situations that require waivers. Medical waivers have increased 4 percent, totaling 12,313 in 2006. Without waivers, the soldiers would have been barred from service.

In the last three years, the percentage of moral waivers for all new enlistments in the four services combined has fallen 3 percent, with spikes in the Army and Air Force. In all, 125,525 such waivers have been issued since 2003. The Marine Corps issues far more moral waivers than the Army — 20,750 in 2006 — but only because it has a stricter policy on drug use. It requires waivers for one-time marijuana use while the other services do not. Rules on waivers vary by service.

Reading further into the article, we find this:

“By lowering standards, we are endangering the rest of our armed forces and sending the wrong message to potential recruits across the country,” Mr. Meehan said. “Our men and women in uniform represent the best and brightest in America, and we need to keep it that way.”

Aaron Belkin, director of the Michael D. Palm Center, a research institute at the University of California, Santa Barbara, that focuses on the military’s “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy regarding homosexuality, obtained the most recent data from the Department of Defense.

Mr. Belkin said the increases in moral waivers in the Army posed a problem only to the extent that the military failed to track these recruits or provide special integration training for them.

Since more than 125,000 service members with criminal histories have joined the military in the last three years, Mr. Belkin said, “you have a sizeable population that has been incarcerated and is not used to the same cultural norms as everybody else.”

There’s a huge pool of potential recruits who would gladly enlist, if they were permitted: homosexuals and bisexuals. Repeal DADT, and you eliminate the need to admit felons into our ranks. You eliminate the need to lower standards to meet recruiting goals, and you don’t pass problems onto other commanders. This article simply underscores the necessity of repealing 10 USC 654.

You can read the article in its entirety here: Army Giving More Waivers In Recruiting