The San Francisco Board of Education voted 4-2 Tuesday to phase out its school system’s Junior Reserve Officer Training Corps program, reports Associated Press news service. The problem, the board says, is the Pentagon’s “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy, enacted during the Clinton Administration. AP reports that city by the bay Mayor Gavin Newsome called shelving JROTC a “bad idea” that puts people who want to participate in the “political peril of being in this ideological debate.” AP says San Francisco has some 1,600 students who participate in JROTC. The phase out would take place over 2007-08.
The use of a military counter-drone laser on the southwest border this week—which prompted the Federal Aviation Administration to abruptly close the airspace over El Paso, Texas—will be a “case study” on the complex web of authorities needed to employ such weapons near civilian areas and the consequences of agencies…

