Political Quotes

“Why is it nobody seems to think taking the commander out of the loop is going to help the problem? Because you cannot solve the problem in the military unless the commander buys in. I cannot think of any change in the military that is major and substantial that can happen without the chain of command being held accountable and buying in. I would like to say this. To those who believe our military is set up where a victim's case is never heard because you have some distant figure called the commander and they just put this stuff under the rug, O-6 commanders--the O-6 level are special court-martial convening authorities. General court-martial convening authorities are flag officers. It is not rampant in the military, folks, where a JAG will go in to the commander and say: This is a case that needs to be prosecuted, sir, madam; and the commander says: I don't want to fool with this. The opposite is true, where the JAG will say: Tough; and the commander says: Move forward. Well, what have we done here. We have said to the command that if your judge advocate recommends prosecution in the four areas in question--sexual assault--and the commander refuses to prosecute, that decision is appealed to the Secretary of the service. So if you are wondering about rogue commanders--and there are bad commanders--you are indicting the whole chain of command here, folks. That is why I am so emotional about this.…”