Maybe public confidence in the military would go up if its leaders shut up

//Maybe public confidence in the military would go up if its leaders shut up

OPINION

Jon Gabriel, Opinion contributor
Published 5:00 a.m. ET March 27, 2021

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Fox News Host Tucker Carlson got slammed in a new ad by a prominent veterans political action committee. Veuer’s Maria Mercedes Galuppo has the story.

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Military chiefs blasted Fox News’ Tucker Carlson for his comments about uniforms and hairstyles of women service members. That’s a dumb move.

American institutions are in decline. If you have any doubts, just ask Americans.

Gallup surveys the nation’s Confidence in Institutions each year, most recently in 2020. As usual, the numbers weren’t great. The perennial stinker, Congress, bottomed out the list at 13%. Above it were 12 other institutions that couldn’t make it to the midway point.

Only three garnered a positive rating. In a year of pandemic, the medical system jumped 15 points up to hit 51%. The military, 72%. But for the first time in decades, our armed forces didn’t top the list. Small business surged past them with 75%.

Coming in second is still pretty good. But that might be wavering.

Trust in the military is dropping

The Ronald Reagan Institute’s latest National Defense Survey was shows trust in the military has dropped 14 percentage points over the past three years. The numbers fell in every demographic — old and young, male and female, Democrat and Republican.

Since the 1980s, our military has been immune from growing public distrust. But two decades of fruitless wars in the Middle East and no plan to leave has frustrated citizens. That makes the military’s behavior of the past week all the more concerning.

After Joe Biden said he was upgrading our military by “tailoring combat uniforms for women, creating maternity flight suits (and) updating requirements for their hairstyles,” Tucker Carlson blasted him. The Fox News host said our singular focus should be winning wars.

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Prime-time cable news has always flung red meat, sometimes at the Pentagon. Remember MSNBC during the Iraq War? The difference this time is that the military blasted Carlson right back.

Pentagon ‘smites’ Tucker Carlson? Really?

The top enlisted leader at U.S. Space Command reminded his troops that “those opinions were made by an individual who has never served a day in his life.” An Army general said women service members “prove Carlson wrong” while the sergeant major of the Army called Carlson’s words “divisive.”

Pentagon spokesperson John Kirby held a press briefing to say “what we absolutely won’t do is take personnel advice from a talk show host.” He added that the Secretary of Defense “shares the revulsion” of other leaders who dumped on Carlson.

Kirby’s announcement was featured on the official Defense Department site with the headline “Press Secretary Smites Host That Dissed Diversity in U.S. Military.” Maybe BuzzFeed writers are enlisting these days.

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As a person who has served in the military, perhaps the brass will allow me to state my humble, nonpartisan advice: Please shut up.

Even one week into Navy boot camp, I knew better than to offer political commentary in my official capacity — not that anyone was asking. A long-serving Pentagon official should know to avoid even the appearance of partisan rhetoric.

Stay out of politics, stick to defense

It is not the military’s job to “smite” American civilians, especially those exercising freedom of the press. If I had stayed in long enough to make admiral, all civilians would still outrank me. Even cable news hosts.

Just imagine the Pentagon attacking CNN’s Chris Cuomo in March 2019. The Columbia School of Journalism would offer a seminar titled “The Day Trump Killed Democracy” for the next decade.

The military holds high esteem because it’s stayed above the grubby world of partisan politics and click-bait headlines. If it wanders into that muck, taxpayers will soon lose that hard-won respect. Then they’ll wonder what they’re getting from the Pentagon’s nearly trillion-dollar budget.

That’s one question the military doesn’t want asked.

Capitol Hill bean counters could start with the F-35 fighter jet program, which has an estimated lifetime cost of $1.6 trillion. That’s a lot of coin for a plane less agile than the F-16 it’s replacing.

Our military leaders, men and women alike, should leave the media criticism to schlubs like me. Your focus is needed on much more important issues.

Jon Gabriel, a Mesa resident, is editor-in-chief of Ricochet.com and a contributor to The Republic and azcentral.com, where this column originally appeared. On Twitter: @exjon.

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