Anyone care to fill me in on what was in the Rolling Stone story about General McChrystal?

There was a bit of a buzz around the water cooler this morining, but I missed most of it.

He called the Ambassador of Afghanistan a big poopy head.

He openly violated military law by criticizing the President as Commander In Chief. He now has lost all trust the White House used to have in him as head commander in Afghanistan. He gave away information that was not to be public knowledge. He knew it was wrong to do it. I hope they court marshall him and strip him of his rank.

President Obama was not the only one mentioned in the article. McChrystal's aide also called another man a clown.

He's to see President Obama tomorrow. I would hope he would resign when he gets to the White House.

According to CNN he does NOT directly criticize the president.

"McChrystal does not directly criticize President Barack Obama in the article, but Hastings writes that the general and Obama "failed to connect" from the outset after the president took office. Sources familiar with the meeting said McChrystal thought Obama looked "uncomfortable and intimidated" by the room full of top military officials, according to the article."


Still he was inappropriate in his language and should be more professional.

I think we should wait until the article is available before passing judgment.

As you wish.....

http://www.rollingstone.c...390/119236

Kacey,

Court Marial? Really? A little strong don't you think? I would not be surprised though if he is asked to step down.

Heh, this "Outrage" against General McChrystal's criticism of Obama that's being displayed is rather amusing.

I guess it all depends on who's living in 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue at the time.

http://articles.sfgate.co...l-refusing

Military personnel are held to different standards than the average Joe when it comes to free speech. It doesn't matter to me who is POTUS at the time. But court martial seems a little harsh.

Having read the article in the link Denise posted, personally, I find nothing wrong with anything McChrystal said. It does display an amazing lack of judgement, though.

What I find most troubling is the divisions that appear among our country's military leaders in bringing the war in Afghanistan to an acceptable conclusion.

http://www.washingtonpost...id=topnews

Rather than sending Petraeus over their, I believe we ought to bring all of our fine troops home and redouble our efforts at securing our own homeland.

there not their.

I completely agree with you, Richard!

What we should have done was secure Afghanistan to start with and not invade Iraq in order to steal their oil. Maybe, once we had Afghanistan under control, THEN we could have invented reasons to invade Iraq and steal their oil.

I think we should stay in Afghanistan long enough to take "our" recently discovered mineral riches.

Interesting debate in the news on McChrystal. I find it strange that a General at his level would be hanging with a reporter for Rolling Stone.

Could it be his remarks were calculated?

I also find Obama's choice for his replacement interesting...and the smartest thing he could do. I do hope General Petraeus was able to negotiate better Rules of Engagement (RoE) than have existed up to this point.

And let's hope he has the authority and leadership to get us out of there soon. I believe he's got the leadership part down.

The interview was set up by the Pentagon. Whether that turns out to be good or bad depends on your point of view.

BTW, surely I am not the only person with a certain song running through their head every time they see this thread. Git my picture. . .

Oh, and was it Dr. Hook that played the Miles City fairgrounds around 1980-ish and they cut the show short because some drunk threw a full can of beer at one of the band members?

Hmmm. I think I saw Dr. Hook, it was in the late seventies, maybe at the fair? I don't remember a beer can incident though.

EMFair of 1979 or 80?

I remember Dr. Hook playing in Billings in the early 70's .. maybe 71?

The Dr. Hook posts are way off topic, and thus are in danger of incurring the wrath of self-appointed board monitor Kacey...

Yikes!

Duck and cover!

That is the trouble with Amorette's trains of thought. They have had me confused for 32 years now.

Amorette..how much oil do we steal, I mean import from Iraq? We get around 77.55% from Mexico and Canada.

I think the real question is what kind of beer was thrown at Dr. Hook?

Probably Coors as it is not worth drinking, so got to do something with it.

Only one comment

He openly violated military law by criticizing the President as Commander In Chief. He now has lost all trust the White House used to have in him as head commander in Afghanistan. He gave away information that was not to be public knowledge. He knew it was wrong to do it. I hope they court marshall him and strip him of his rank.

Shouldn't these words coming out of Kacey's mouth be accompanied by some Twilight Zone music or something?

What a difference a year (and a half) makes... 520 little daaayyyyys.

http://www.hnn.us/articles/128403.html
http://www.hnn.us/articles/128435.html

Great articles Hal. Thanks.

Once again . . . everything Old is New again ; -)

I hate to defend Kacey, but do you have an example of her spirited defense of a military officer who said mean things about Bush?

Or are you just pulling stuff out of your ass and calling it reality?

I feel McChrystal should have kept his mouth shut.
I also find myself agreeing, (although this is rather simplistic), with Richard Bonine.
Perhaps I am the one who should keep my mouth shut.

Rick is very well-versed in pulling stuff out of his ass and calling it reality.

The real entertaining part of this deal is the right wing insisting on telling the public that he was fired. He offered his resignation, and it was excepted. Big difference. Although if he had not offered to quit, I would have fired his dumb ass anyway. How far would any of us get saying stupid things about our boss in a well respected national magazine? You dance with the bull and you will get the horns. Personally, I think if that is the kind of judgment he is capable of displaying, then I would not want the moron anywhere near the battlefield. Or making decisions that affect what happens there.
Now he can collect his military pension, and get paid by Fox news. I would put the odds at 1 - 1 that he will be a paid military consultant for Fox within a few weeks. As long as he toes the company line and rips O'Bama at every turn, they will be happy to pay him.

Did he resign from the military or just from this particular assignment?

Good question, Wendy. I've wondered that myself.

"There is a role for the military in our society, and that role is that you not only obey civilian leadership, but you respect civilian leadership. And if you don't, then you resign." - Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz.

http://www.armytimes.com/...re_062810/

General McChrystal says he will retire. I've linked the Army Times story.

I hate to defend Kacey, but do you have an example of her spirited defense of a military officer who said mean things about Bush?

First you'd have to find an example of someone on the attack, calling for Military scalps over criticism of the President. Then you might have something in looking for her defense.

The defense generally follows the attack. This is new territory as far as I'm aware.

But to avoid all the tapdancing, let's get people on record for future reference...

Active Duty Criticism of the President... automatic court martial material?

Release of (arguably) 'confidential' information... automatic court martial material?

Seems like we could find some other people to apply these newfound standards to.

That's not to defend the general in this case. He showed poor judgement, and the President was within his rights to remove him. Then again, removal is always within his rights. He is the Commander in Chief. But court martial or stripping of rank would be ridiculous, and fortunately the powers that be understood the difference.

As usual, Rick offers nothing to defend his earlier post, which demonstrates once again that he is a complete partisan horse's ass.

I do not think the Montana Republican Party is getting their money's worth with this guy.

It's like arguing with a Moebius strip...

That's what I luv about you guys. All aspersion, no meat.

Come on, out with it...

A General criticizing a president... court martial worthy?

A General sharing military info with the press... court martial???

If you can't say yes, I can't see how you can defend Kacey's stand, other than in a "RAH RAH, GOOOOOO D's!!!" kinda way.

Matt, I don't see the General working for Fox anytime soon

http://www.huffingtonpost...23884.html

Apparently he was somewhat of an Obama fan before having the experience of working for him.

But see... (and I really don't know why I'm trying this) if you look at your initial post, it would appear to the untrained observer that you are refering to something that's happened in the past and that Kacey wanted it to fall out the other way:

moebius wrote:

What a difference a year (and a half) makes... 520 little daaayyyyys.

And I asked you to back that statement up. And now we're discussing the "new standard" (which again, implies an "old standard") and so on and so forth, all of which makes me wonder if you've started sniffing glue in addition to eating all of the paste you can get your hands on...

It's kinda like getting Shinseki'd. Only with possible prison time instead of quiet retirement at your end of term.

http://www.tnr.com/blog/t...w-shinseki

That's how it'd be painted if this were 2008, anyway.

Of course, we can't prove it because none of us proposed it at the time, as Kacey just did.

But I'm interested in what you have to say...

Court Martial? Really?

[This message has been edited by Rick Kuchynka (6/28/2010)]

Well wasn't Douglas McArthur fired back in the day?? For virtually the same sort of stuff (defying the commander in chief Truman)...

So today General Petraeus goes before the Senate Armed Forces Commitee for a "Confirmation Hearing"....even though he is, in effect, being demoted. Like....WTF?

Did General Eisenhower have to sit through a "Confirmation Hearing" after FDR appointed him to command all European forces? It seems a bit silly.