Politics At The Pentagon

I've been to the Pentagon three times. I have a Pentagon coffee cup and
a Pentagon raincoat that I bought at the Pentagon gift shop and I still
have the badge I was given while I was escorted through the building.
I'm guessing musicians don't often get invited to the Pentagon.

We never talked politics at our meetings. Looking back, our
conversations were mostly analysis. Once I was even shown a map and
asked to interpret it.

The organization MoveOn brings up an interesting point. If the Pentagon
is going to get involved in politics, shouldn't they be open to
political criticism? If I'm being updated on a war, I don't want the
politically correct assessment. I want the facts. I want to know, and
need to know, whats really going on. If I'm being briefed on Iraq, and
the facts are being presented in a way that doesn't reflect whats
really going on, then I'm being betrayed and the American people
(especially the voters and the soldiers) are being betrayed. I'm not
being betrayed by a general representing the military establishment,
I'm being betrayed by a general defending a political point of view.

A candidate running for President of the United States has to be free
to criticize the Pentagon. If the future Commander in Chief doesn't
agree with the way the our military is being used by the current
Commander in Chief, then he or she has to express those views and
differences without being taken to task on their patriotism. Agreeing
with, or trying to defend a failed policy doesn't equal patriotism. The
public needs to know when a candidate disagrees with policy. The public
needs to know what it's options are. For example; if Rudy Giuliani, the
tough guy, disagrees with Bush and actually wants to double our troop
levels in the Iraq region as a nod to the NRA, then we need to know
about it. By the same token if Hillary Clinton wants to depoliticize
the Pentagon, we need to know about that too.