The last rank that this particular former TJAG ACTUALLY served 'honorably' in was perhaps 0-4, and I am none too sure about that. He was well-known for his extra-marital AND harrassing proclivities by the time he was an 0-5. But everyone looked the other way. My NCO office manager related a story to me in 1999 about how this guy had a habit of squeezing her butt (and that of other females) as a greeting at office parties some years earlier. (He WAS clever to a point. If they ignored him, he didn't do it again, but we surmised it was his way of figuring out who was 'game'). I never met him, but I also served with an 0-4 and an 0-5 - both stellar officers - whose careers were sidelined by this fellow and by his long-term female JAG paramour, who retired as an 0-6 as a result of her servicing of this guy as he made his climb up the ranks. She was despised at every office she served in, ruined the careers of everyone whose OPR she ever signed, and was borderline incompetent, but got promoted anyway because he was her 'sponsor', and he was going places.
It was frankly quite a disgusting thing to see for an 0-3 JAG that I was back then.
And because the USAF JAG higher-ups kept turning a blind eye to it, he got to eventually royally embarrass the entire USAF as TJAG, when he was inevitably caught.
The other fellow you mentioned (who got disbarred as a civilian lawyer just BEFORE joining the USAF JAG) was a bit of a mystery to me. In my dealings with him, he seemed like a super competent, no-nonsense tough guy who was headed for TJAG - until the age of the Internet caught up with him. I am sure he wakes up at night asking himself why he didn't put in his retirement papers as an 0-6. Once you get a line number for a flag rank as he did, the background scrubs get tougher, and people who don't like you start evening scores .... what he did was obviously wrong, and the guy he was at the end obviously wasn't the same youngster who did something that foolish ... a shame his case ...
He does have the authority to dismiss any officer. The President’s powers to do so resides within Article II, Section II of the Constitution. This is why I voiced my strongest disapproval with how he handled this. You don’t publicly shame a service member and especially not an officer unless that officer has committed and been convicted of a crime. The President should have just dismissed the officers if he was not satisfied with their performance. It’s completely abysmal and a break down in the chain of command if the CinC must turn to public shaming of military members in order to institute the level of discipline he seeks. In addition it’s an impact to morale. If I were still an active duty Marine (Officer or not) I’d have been ticked to have read such comments. Don’t like the performance of certain officers? Fine.... then can them immediately. Don’t air dirty laundry to the public to gin up public support against member of the military not convicted of any crimes. That’s a disgrace.