*** President Obama puts a chokehold on the scornful military to bring them into line.
Prez Obama on Air Force One last year when he disciplined McChrystal the first time
From Denny: Well, it took long enough but at long last President Obama has a choke hold on his Pentagon junkyard dogs - at least for the moment. Forcing them to issue this statement is only the first step at putting a huge hat pin in the bloated egos of the scornful military.
Their mocking of civilian government is legendary and has existed for decades. This wrong culture will not evolve and change over night. It's the very reason for the rapes of women cadets at America's military academies that continues to appear in the news for two generations now. This is a systemic attitude tolerated far too long and it's time to dismantle it.
It's also time to do a Pentagon Joint Chiefs shuffle, starting with Admiral Mullen. He tolerated and encouraged this crappy attitude of disrespecting their civilian authority. He is also a Bush leftover and we can't count on him to be loyal to the President.
If there is one thing that greatly concerns me is the lesson of history. President Kennedy tolerated and ignored his Pentagon junkyard dogs, leaving them in places of authority. Kennedy dismissed President Eisenhower's warnings about what the Pentagon, the military-industrial establishment, was capable of plotting. They used that authority and networks to assassinate Kennedy in the end. I'm not eager to see an historical repeat for this President. Remove them all now, Mr. President and take no chances. You get enough death threats as it is.
What the public - and this current president - may not realize is that the very reason our intelligence communities cannot work together effectively or share intelligence wisely is because of this loose cannon cowboy culture. While there is that segment of the public that worships at the altar of the military there are certain facts and history of which they are unaware.
The reality is the Pentagon is the birth place of this scornful mocking attitude toward civilian authority. The reality is that when military members leave official military service they often join up with other alphabet soup agencies like the CIA, the DEA, the NSA and the FBI. They take their prejudices and contentious combative attitudes with them into the next job, continuing to foul up cooperation, sharing of intelligence and just plain getting the job done right. Their bloated prideful egos get in the way of everything practical and common sense.
Stand down the military and Big Business. Only then will the President and the American people finally get their lives back - and our country.
Watch the Pentagon back pedaling from these Republicans - Sec. Gates and Adm. Mullen:
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