Pace says he refused to quit voluntarily

Yahoo ^

[silverleaf]

Pace says he refused to quit voluntarily


By ROBERT BURNS, AP Military Writer 11 minutes ago

In his first public comments on the Bush administration's surprise decision to replace him as chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Marine Gen. Peter Pace disclosed that he had turned down an offer to voluntarily retire rather than be forced out.

D'OH!

[Plains Drifter]

Yeah and laws like you’ve just mentioned allows cowards like Harry Reid to take verbal shots at people who can’t fight back. I’ll take Peter Pace any day over any of the Washington crowd especially the President I voted for twice.

[silverleaf]

Yep, Pace (Rummies choice) served two years of a two year tour and now will move on. Bush and Gates are real bastards, eh?

[pissant]

Sure, Tom.

[meandog]

Bush and Gates are real bastards, eh?

One of them is, IMHO, for sure...

[jesseam]

When President Bush gave his post 9-11 “If you are not with us, you are against us” speech I felt that that has got to be one of the greatest speeches ever delivered by a president to his people. My God, what has happened to him?? What has happened to our country??

[silverleaf]

There are plenty of things to bash Bush for- allowing SecDef Gates to exercise his prerogative to choose a new JCS rather than extending Rumsfelds’ man in the job-no matter how honorable the man- is not one of them. There are other good men for the job and Gates has the authority and deserves the opportunity to appoint one of his choice.

Bush has been loyal to a fault in allowing his subordinates to exercise their authority within the chain of command.

[Natural Law]

"Generals who make public comments in the press about their careers and their superiors by law- are the kind that should be fired."

You are thrice a dipshit:1) Pace wasn't fired and he had already announced his retirement

2) Pace did not criticize Bush or disclose any secret or confidential information. He stated the conditions for his resignation.

3) Being a General Officer does not require a waiver of your rights of citizenship.

[PISANO]

Oh GOOD!!

Another Bush Bashing thread!!

Can't wait to see how many different ways we can BASH Bush's character, his decision making and maybe even blame him for an upcoming Hurricane or two.

The GOP is annihilating itself and it is being led by the base.

[Natural Law]

"I suspect that those screaming the loudest about Bush are the same ones who decided to sit out the last election...

It looks like the whiney bitch wing of the GOP has finally gotten out of bed this morning.

[Plains Drifter]

If? what you say is true, that doesn’t deserve a pat on the back that is as it should be. When you have an outstanding employee then you should go the extra mile to keep that person especially an exemplary individual such as Peter Pace. I make this prediction one day the Red Chinese military will come to our shore to engage this country in war and we will fail and lose that war miserably because our politicians on both sides have ground up and crapped all over some of the world’s finest military leaders. I thought it was interesting that a politician like Harry Reid called a great general like Peter Pace inept. One, how would Harry Reid know he has never been a great leader. He’s a crook. Two, what are our leaders going to do in the military but fail when our politicians send our generals off to fight wars accompanied by lawyers to make sure that our war enemies rights do not get violated. Our generals are told to fight wars while handcuffed, not sufficiently funded, not sufficiently equipped and not sufficiently manned for the engagement they are tasked with.

[fr_freak]

Wait a minute - so your reasoning is that Pace should have been fired for saying publicly that he got fired? That logic doesn't seem a little circular to you?

I don't see anything in that article pointing to Pace giving out any details other than that he got fired rather than quitting. He neither talked about his superiors, nor did he talk about his career other than to say it was over.

[4woodenboats]

These people will not be appeased. Giving into them is stupid. There is no way to avert this fight.

Bush was a quick study when it came to realizing that about Islamic terrorists. Now 6 years of relentless, down in the sewer attacks against him, his family, his administration, the military, businesses, school children, the unborn...and he hasn't yet learned that appeasing the evil at home only feeds it and make it grow much, much larger?

I can only imagine the pit in Pace's belly as Gates described how he was going to take the pulse of his enemies to determine if he could stay. He would have known that second the decision had already been made.

I have no doubt this has to do with his comment about gays in the military....I wondered at the time how that came about, whether someone trying to set him up. Most probably so, but he was accurate in his assessment and should have been supported in it.

And this crap about contentious hearings being a distraction - that would have been a great time to publicly correct the sleazanators like Levin, Toon, and Kennedy. We needed an accurate assessment of both good and bad in Iraq. If Pace wasn't to get reconfirmed, he should have been allowed to go down fighting, and given a chance to expose the lies these senators spew about the war and the men and women serving in it. I used to get great enjoyment watching Rummy smack 'em around and expose their venom.

I pray General Pace does not hold his tongue during his final months, and continues to serve his country by engaging the same enemy that caused his ouster.

He also needs to repair some damage done by Murtha/Time's Political Explosive Device by clearing the embattled Marines of Kilo Company 3/1 and unmasking the treasonous pigs that started the mess and those in the DOD who are leaking classified docs and conspiring against our defenders. If Murtha feels he's still a Marine, then Pace should take this opportunity to put him in the brig - or Guantanamo.

[Suzy Quzy]

This would have NEVER happened under Rummy!! I miss Rummy...he is a great man. Bush is a very big disappointment.

[JamesP81]

General Pace is a true American Hero who would never abandon his men no matter the cost.

[E. Pluribus Unum]

God bless you, General Pace.

You have a lot more integrity than your Commander-in-Chief.

[JamesP81]

Never thought I’d say this: Bush is an asshole.

I know. He's really been a let down in his second term. I hate to speak ill of the man, but it is a mistake of monumental proportions to sideline a marine and a warrior of General Pace's skill. The man has moral clarity and is willing to do what needs to be done.

I never gave joining the armed forces much thought, but if I did, Gen Pace is the kind of man I would want to serve under.

[MNJohnnie]

At that point, Pace said, he assured Gates that he was willing to go through even a contentious confirmation process.

"I also told him that what he needed to do, in my opinion, was what was best for the institution, and whatever he and the president decided was going to be best for the institution was what Pete Pace was going to do," he said. "Oh and by the way, I can read the Constitution, which says the president gets to nominate and the Senate gets to confirm, or not, and neither one of those two things is going to happen, therefore I'm not staying."

Be nice if the 100%er purist crowd among the Dinocons had the same grasp of how the political system of the USA works that Gen Pace does. Meandog, that is some REALLY bizarre commentary coming from you who spent all last year actively campaigning for Jim Webb(D-VA) on the grounds "we can work with him, he is a patriot".

So tell me, you fight to the last political ditch and still the Democrat Senate committee refuses to "advise and consent" and you have spent months with the JC not having a chief.

So what have you accomplished? Other then looking like petulant fools to the 75% of Americans who are not die hard smash mouth "Conservatives".

Real easy to hang around the 'Net and talk all macho boy tough when you don't actually have to DO anything but talk.

[GretchenM]

_____________________

Good on Pace for his deeply principled stand.

[True Republican Patriot]

Yrs, if General pace would only move to PA and run against Spincter in 08!!!