By John W. Lillpop
When President Obama announced that he was retaining the services of Robert Gates as his Defense Secretary, many on the right cheered modestly, while those on the left generally showed their teeth in disappointment.
Enthusiasm on the right was based on the assumption that Gates would be diligent in protecting the military and would help prevent Obama from plundering national defense in order to fund health care for illegal aliens, or some other equally wasteful liberal idiocy.
Alas, Secretary Gates appears to have supped of the Obama Kool-aid, which is designed to convert one from a patriotic American into an unarmed and uninformed world citizen in one foul gulp.
As reported at Breitbart.com, in part:
"Defense Secretary Robert Gates on Monday recommended halting production of the F-22 fighter jet and scrapping a new helicopter for the president as he outlined deep cuts to many of the military's biggest weapons programs.
Gates said his $534 billion budget proposal represents a "fundamental overhaul" in defense acquisition and reflects a shift in priorities from fighting conventional wars to the newer threats U.S. forces face from insurgents in places such as Afghanistan.
The department must ensure it has the right programs and money to "fight the wars we are in today and the scenarios we are most likely to face in the years to come, while at the same time providing a hedge against other risks," Gates said as he revealed details of his budget for the next fiscal year.
The promised emphasis on budget paring is a reversal from the Bush years, which included a doubling of the Pentagon's spending since 2001. Spending on tanks, fighter planes, ships, missiles and other weapons accounted for about a third of all defense spending last year."
Reversing the Bush years would not come as any great surprise had Maxine Waters, Dennis Kucinich, or other disengaged liberal been installed as boss at the Defense department.
But how does one explain such a dramatic retreat from the national defense by a major carryover from the Bush presidency?
