Mullin: Shut Your Mouths Troops About Politics

[SaveOurSovereignty]

Run time: 02:33 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ReAh6UEAR3c   Posted on YouTube: May 26, 2008 By YouTube Member: Views on YouTube: 0   Posted on DU: May 26, 2008 By DU Member: SaveOurSovereignty Views on DU: 2051

 

[Bicoastal]

1. Oh, and Happy Memorial Day.

:sarcasm:

[freeradicalm]

18. Nice!!!...

^^^^^^Emoticon!!!^^^^^^

[99th_Monkey]

2. It's not "politics" for the troops, it's their fucking lives at stake. ~nt~

[greiner3]

3. The more I hear about this, the more it reminds me of the movie;

Seven days in may. 1964 with Burt Lancaster as the renegade general out to deliver a coup and Kirk Douglas as his attache who blows the cover of the black ops all the way up to the president.

[theFrankFactor]

4. Look What Happened to Pat Tillman

It's more like, don't ask, don't tell.

[SaveOurSovereignty]

5. I dont know

it just screams unconstitutional to me

[goddess40]

6. That's why when I see an active soldier talking I discount what they say

if he/she are saying how wonderful things are going. They're just following orders and can't be trusted to be telling the truth - very sad but true.

[bjobotts]

7. Bullshit. Trying to gag the troops on the ground from telling the truth

[bjobotts]

8. Petraeus for years now has had a steady flow of legislators and pundits

coming through his green zone for partisan political briefings.

[bjobotts]

9. Generals have been spouting politics at every opportunity but when soldiers in the field

start telling what they think about what is happening they are now told to shut up. Okay then, from now on let us see if this applies to those in the leadership too.

[santamargarita]

19. Then Armed Forces Radio should ban the Fat, Greasy, Drug user!

[JoePhilly]

10. So they can't have the same freedom that they are fighting for ... makes sense ..

:sarcasm:

[bertman]

11. This is not a bad thing

IF it is applied across the board, meaning to the rank-and-file and the general-grade and flag officers too.

I don't know about the constitutional argument here, but I remember when I was in the service it was understood that you could have your own opinion about politics but you couldn't state it publicly as a member of the armed forces. That certainly didn't preclude any of us telling our friends and family exactly what we thought. But we could not campaign for anyone. Of course, once you're out you can say whatever you want or even get a sweetheart deal to do propaganda if you have the right connections. But that's another topic for a different thread.

Our country has always had a tradition that the military stayed out of politics. And for a very good reason. THE MILITARY IS SUPPOSED TO BE UNDER THE CONTROL OF THE CIVILIAN government. That's very hard to maintain when the armed forces types are getting involved in the political arm. Of course, as someone said, guys like Petraeus are always going to have sway over how various military options or strategies are interpreted to Congress and to the general public. That's been the case as long as I can remember and will probably never change. That often has more to do with how the Commander-in-Chief or, in this case, the Deserter-in-Chief uses his military types.

What would be scary is having military types go on the record advocating for one candidate or another or one policy or another. That's crossing the line whether it's a grunt, a corps commander or an admiral.

If you don't think this is a good policy just take a look at how many countries have military rulers who decided that they knew better than the civilians how things should be run.

Another very dangerous situtation is the influence of fundamentalist Christians in the higher levels of the officer corps. They actually have organizations where they openly advocate WHILE IN UNIFORM for strategic and policy issues based on their version of Christianity. I'd love to see someone put the clamps on that crap.

[dixiegrrrrl]

12. Good points

Well said...thank you, gives me another perspective.

[Gato Moteado]

13. everything was fine when they were pumping rush limbag and faux news into all the mess halls....

...but once the troops started waking up and thinking for themselves, that's when they want to clamp down on them

[Sam Ervin jret]

14. Political MOTIVES have no place in the cockpit or the military boardrooms.

A soldier has a right to his or her opinion. And he or she has every right to speak that opinion.

Political motives on the other hand have no place in combat, but come on. Are you kidding me? There was no political motive in "Mission Accomplished." Or the entire war for that matter?

This entire administration is ideology and politics driven. From the war room to the EPA all the way through the justice department the ideology of the far right, the "born agains" and George W have putrefied the processes we hold dear and on which we count.

That will be a lasting legacy of George W and company. How future administrations deal with how far we have fallen into the muck and mayhem of Bushian politics has yet to be seen.

[JeanGrey]

15. Why in the world should troops keep their mouths shut

about politics? What nerve.

[JAbuchan08]

16. military trumps civilian

in all ways shapes and forms.

[freeradicalm]

17. The Military--NON-Political???

Everybody who believes THAT--Stand on your Head!!!

[Alcibiades]

20. It's good to keep the military out of politics

There is a long tradition of keeping the military out of politics that the Republicans have violated. There was a time in this nation's history when active-duty military were not even allowed to vote.

It is not unconstitutional. (Of course, the whole military-industrial complex itself may be unconstitutional, as the founders didn't even envision a large standing army, but that's another matter.) There are very good reasons for keeping generals, and even the lower ranks, out of politics, reasons that the founders knew well. This is part of military discipline in a democracy, and, if you want to keep this country a democracy, we should support any and all attempts to enforce it, so long as this enforcement is not, itself, selective.

We need to get the military out of politics before it is too late, by which I mean that active-duty military need to not engage in politics in uniform, need to be prohibited from politics in the conduct of their duties, etc. Even retired military personnel, especially general officers, would be far, far more reticent about openly politicking than they have been. The whole "Mission Accomplished" photo op was wrong, the use of 9-11 politically inside the military is wrong, the trotting out of retired officers in a systematic way for propaganda by this administration is wrong.

I don't know why everyone is so quick to assume that this is a bad thing for us. I grew up in a military family, and this apolitical stance is part of traditional military culture. As is stands, many folks in the military have been targeted for indoctrination by the freaky-ass religious conservatives and others. Sure, keeping the military apolitical keeps many good Democrats out of politics, but it also keeps some of the worst kool-aid drinkers out, too. Mullen is saying they need to follow orders. As for the reservists, well, that line has already been blurred by treating them as active duty, so they probably should be covered by this as well.