About a month ago, on route to a stint through Asia, Bush delivered a speech in Alaska at Elmendorf Air Force Base. It was the unofficial kick-off of the new White House offensive on Iraq, meant to put the president’s critics on the defensive. There were two predictable facets to the presidential address: a) it framed the war debate in deeply partisan tones; and b) it was delivered on a military base.
Combined, those two elements are problematic. The issue came up during yesterday’s White House press briefing.
Q: Scott, this is going back a little bit, but we’ve received some complaints from soldiers, both former and current, about the Tobyhanna speech and the Elmendorf, Alaska speech. They cite their own regulations that say U.S. soldiers cannot participate in partisan political activity. But when the President attacked Democrats, they are — they feel like they were put in the position where they’re supporting a democratic cause in uniform. Does the President feel —
McClellan: Who said that? I think the President was talking as Commander-in-Chief to our troops and talking to them about the war that we’re engaged in.
Q: Well, he was talking about Democrats, as well. “Some Democrats who voted to authorize use of force are now rewriting the past.” He said, “It is irresponsible Democrats —
McClellan: That’s true.
Q: — “claim we misled them.”
McClellan: Now, I notice — now, I notice they’re not making those same claims recently.
What an odd response. Troops are uncomfortable being put in the middle of a partisan food fight and McClellan notes that charges about manipulated pre-war intelligence have faded a bit. In other words, Bush showed those mean ol’ Democrats. Sure, the president used a military base for partisan purposes and put the troops in an awkward position, but as far as McClellan’s concerned, the end justifies the means if leads to fewer criticisms of the president.
Others aren’t nearly as cavalier about the issue.
The attacks against critics at military settings may have put troops in the awkward position of undermining their own regulations. A Department of Defense directive doesn’t allow service members in uniform to attend “partisan political events.”
Questions have been raised about the military’s attendance at events where Bush says something like “they spoke the truth then, they’re speaking politics now.” Several members of the military told FOX News that Bush is inviting the troops to take sides in a partisan debate in his speeches.
“This is a very bad sign,” said retired Marine Gen. Joseph Hoar, who led Central Command in the early 1990s and is an administration critic. “This is the sort of thing that you find in other countries where the military and political, certain political parties are aligned.” […]
“Where you have our uniformed members being put in a position where it looks like they’re rooting for one side or another is very disconcerting,” said Greg Noone, a former Navy lawyer.
Indeed, it is. But the military, it appears, is just another political prop for the Bush White House.
In response to the concerns, White House Communications Director Dan Bartlett said the troops “should be able to listen to the debate, they should be able to hear both sides.”
Does this mean Dems are going to get equal time for partisan diatribes every time Bush gives a political speech on a military base? Somehow, I doubt it.