Lt. Dan Choi paid a visit to CNN’s Early Start today to discuss whether the uniformed soldier who recently spoke out on behalf of Ron Paul at a rally for the presidential hopeful will have to face any sort of consequence for his actions.

As we enter the new year, the most important question on people’s mind is whether or not the world will officially end as we know it by next December. But let’s face it, if 2012 is really going to bring about end times (because we should clearly be basing our plans for the end on the Mayan calendar), it’s going to have a tough act to follow. Many people are writing up 2011 as the year of this or the year of that, but let’s keep things in perspective here: 2011 was the year that the world descended into random chaos.

On Fox News Sunday today, Chris Wallace asked presidential candidate Rick Santorum about the now-infamous Fox News debate where a gay soldier was booed by several members of the crowd and questioned Santorum’s response to the soldier’s question about the controversial “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy. During the debate, Santorum had stated that the military is not a place for sexual activity, and claimed ending “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” was the government “trying to inject social policy into the military.

Like many who woke up this morning to the news that Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell was history, Jon Stewart spent some time celebrating the aftermath of the repeal. Calling the policy “ridiculous,” Stewart turned to Jason Jones for his military analysis, who, regaled in short-shorts and drinking a fancy pink cocktail, tried to make the news exciting but couldn’t find a way to make it seem particularly eventful, other than the poignant coming out moments today has produced.

In order for the nation-building operation in Afghanistan to be successful, most of those involved in the operation can agree that American soldiers on the ground need to express the maximum possible respect for the people and culture of the land, as Taliban sympathizers argue the U.S. forces are occupying without being welcome. This seems to be a bit of a stretch of that philosophy, however: Marines there have been told not to “fart audibly” in front of Afghans.

We’ve just learned that there is website called Welcome Home Blog that has daily videos of military homecomings. This is, of course, wonderful for anyone who wants to be reduced to a sobbing pile of tears on a daily basis but is tired of watching the end of Toy Story 3 over and over. Anyway, today’s video is pretty wonderful. Sure, it’s probably impossible to have a military homecoming video that isn’t wonderful, but this one’s a little different. In it, the returning soldier is greeted by his enormous dog who welcomes him with all the excitement one would normally expect from the more human members of the family.

This afternoon, President Barack Obama joined Defense Secretary Leon Panetta and Admiral Mike Mullen to formally end the controversial ban on openly gay individuals serving in the U.S. military. The President signed and sent a notice to Congress certifying that repealing “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” will not have an adverse impact on military readiness. As such, the repeal will be put into effect in 60 days’ time, on September 20th

The original “Culture Warrior” Bill O’Reilly began his program last night with a lengthy discussion on how pop culture is destroying America with Laura Ingraham. Ke$ha, Rihanna, tattoos, and “prosti-tots,” Ingraham railed, were besieging the youth psyche in such a way that parents must unite to save the nation’s future. It was standard fare for the Factor, but made it all the more surreal when, at the end of the program, he unveiled the day’s “Patriot”: Mila Kunis, star of a film about two best friends having sex with each other to avoid actual relationships.

Now after a few weeks passed since President Obama successfully ordered the killing of Osama bin Laden, Chris Matthews wondered how much the act improved Obama’s relationship with the military. Elisabeth Bumiller from the New York Times admitted it was a boost, but warned that Obama’s proposed budget cuts to the military could jeopardize the warm feelings. Joe Klein, however, viewed the relationship as being in much better condition.

General Jeffrey Colt introduced President Obama, who shook hands with several of the troops before making his way to the podium. The President made sure to mention the nation’s debt of gratitude to our wounded soldiers, adding that these men and women merit the best care for the sacrifices they’ve made. He also spoke optimistically of our mission abroad. “Because of your service, because of your sacrifice,” he said, “we are making progress in Afghanistan.”

So far Donald Trump has been creating buzz surrounding whether or not he’ll run for president in 2012 by making looking into Barack Obama‘s past – specifically demanding to see his birth certificate and college transcripts – his major focal points. But perhaps people in glass luxury hotels shouldn’t throw stones. Trump’s financial records and tax returns have already been a topic of discussion among those in the media, and Rand Paul recently demanded that Trump show his “original long-form certificate of Republican registration.

Among the many questions surrounded America’s new coalition venture into Libya– besides what America’s objective is, how long troops will remain there, and how many troops will go there– is how this will affect America’s national debt. This concern comes as a surprise to Rachel Maddow who, as an avowed liberal, had always been skeptical of defense spending, but hearing her concerns voiced by Speaker John Boehner, she explains, is quite the bizarre experience.

Rep. Betty McCollum, a Democrat from Minnesota, opened up a writhing can of worms when she proposed cutting Pentagon funding for NASCAR teams in an effort to save taxpayers’ money. Several lawmakers from areas where NASCAR enjoys extraordinary popularity, however, argue that the money goes to great use, helping save many jobs at a time when the economy and job market are still lagging, as well as working to bolster military recruitment. The AP reports via The Fayetteville Observer that, currently, the National Guard spends roughly $20 million to sponsor racer Dale Earnhardt Jr., the Army spends $7.4 million to sponsor Ryan Newman, and the U.S. Air Force spends $1.6 million on AJ Allmendinger. The Army also spends an additional $8 million for NASCAR programs specifically meant to attract new recruits.

Who: Alec Baldwin, Jeffrey Toobin, Judy Gold, moderated by Andy Borowitz
What: “The Borowitz Report: Midterm Madness!”
Where: 92nd St. Y
When: October 20, 2010
Thumbs: Up

Republican Senator James Inhofe took some time at the Value Voters Summit this week to explain in greater detail his ongoing desire to see Don’t Ask Don’t Tell upheld. Arguing that “you don’t have a constitutional right to serve in the military,” he warned that voting for a repeal of Don’t Ask Don’t Tell would be the same as voting for “open gay activity” and “abortions in our hospitals.”

Capping off a night of extraordinary exclusive coverage live from Baghdad and featuring the network’s biggest stars, MSNBC was on the ground on the Kuwaiti border to see the last American combat soldier cross the border from Iraq. The video after the jump.

Finally, at least one of the dozens of mysteries surrounding South Carolina Democratic Senate candidate Alvin Greene has been solved: why he was discharged from military service. The short version: he was so incompetent he put sensitive military information in jeopardy.

What would you say if we told you former Democratic presidential candidate Mike Gravel actually won the 2008 election, and has been secretly running the country this whole time? “Haha, good joke!” maybe? Good, because that’s what the folks at Barely Political were hoping you would say when they hired Gravel to star in a “mockumentary-esque show called ‘I Like Mike: Our President.’”

The moral value of journalism always gets a little tricky when it involves uncovering military secrets. When it involves Fox News calling out the New York Times, it mixes in a bit of cultural backlash, as well. Last night on the O’Reilly Factor, Bill O’Reilly had military analyst Col. Ralph Peters on the program to evaluate the damage that a recent NYT story uncovering new covert operations in the Middle East had done to America, and what the Times‘ motive could be for publishing it.

President Barack Obama gave the commencement speech for the West Point Class of 2010 this morning, highlighting successes in Iraq and Afghanistan. He also gave the class heartfelt advice on how to continue forward through hard times, especially those that are deploying to the warfronts in Iraq and Afghanistan: when they find trouble, “think of West Point.”

Usually, when Megyn Kelly makes an appearance on the O’Reilly Factor, she spends her time raising Bill O’Reilly‘s blood pressure about Ruth Bader Ginsburg or some other theoretical legal issue. Tonight the pair were mostly at peace, agreeing that a soldier kicked out of the military for coming out as a lesbian should have to pay back $80,000 the military provided for her education because, as Kelly put it, “What part of ‘don’t tell’ don’t you understand?”

In one of the stranger and scarier segments in Rachel Maddow Show history, Rachel Maddow criticizes an Obama administration national security suggestion to reduce America’s nuclear arsenal– by making a nuclear intercontinental ballistic missile indistinguishable from a conventional weapon ICBM. Don’t get too excited about Maddow turning on Obama—the idea was Donald Rumsfeld’s.

A new poll by CBS News and the New York Times reports that the wording of the polling question has a lot to do with how Americans support the somewhat controversial issue. When asked if how one feels about “gays in the military” 51% answered “strongly favor.” When asked about “homosexuals in the military,” only 34% answered “strongly favor.” Oh America. What are we going to do with you?

Larry King hosted a military panel on his program last night to discuss the possible repeal of Don’t Ask Don’t Tell, which would have been a fairly routine discussion save not for the presence of Lt. Dan Choi, who came out as gay on The Rachel Maddow Show almost a year ago and is facing termination from his job despite being a West Point graduate, an Iraq War veteran, and an Arab linguist.