Should the commander and chief of the military "President" have served in the military ( Archived) (33)

Checkers101: Since most other jobs require experience should the U.S. Presidency require that to be the commander of the military you need to have military experience. Or if a president is elected who does not have this experience should he have a military commander and chief who makes the decisions he is unqualified to make.

RayfromUSA: No!!!

There's entirely too much military influence in the government already.

Personally I think former military officers should be banned from holding any sort of political office.

Obstinance_Works: Does a leader have to be versed in the art of killing people? On principle I don't see why this has to be an essential.

Although, I do predict a Nationalist/military coup against the collapsing Liberal state when the debt/moral bubble bursts and millions upon millions are left either bankrupted or starving whilst the minorites, which have long been kept silent through welfare payments, turn into snakes when the host can't pay any more charity out and the civilised and productive men desperately turn to a charismatic strongman from the far-right to restore order to the chaos. These coups will be something I'll support through lack of a better alternative.

sophiasummer: It matters nothing,whether they do or don't, but what matters is the powers that put them in office.

Conrad73: so much for Rights under the Constitution,hmm?

RayfromUSA: Are you suggesting that the military are about preserving constitutional rights.

Remember Oliver North? Golden boy of the military?

Remember the guy from the joint chiefs of staff who essentially told Congress that they had nothing to say about the US involvement in Libya?

The military are all about force.
Not diplomacy, not consensus, not democracy.

The founding fathers didn't even want a standing military at all, just state militias that could be mobilized if the need arose.

You can bet they didn't want any sort of military government.

Checkers101: Since most other jobs require experience should the U.S. Presidency require that to be the commander of the military you need to have military experience.

whereforeartthou: If Lyndon Johnson had been a military man he might not have ordered a cover upon when Israel attacked USS Liberty;

"A private commission investigating the 1967 attack on the U.S. spy ship USS Liberty released the sworn testimony of one naval investigator that the Israelis knew the ship was American and intended to "murder its entire crew."

Israeli aircraft and torpedo boats attacked the USS Liberty on June 8, 1967, killing 34 U.S. sailors and injuring 172 others in one of the deadliest attacks suffered by a U.S. ship that remained afloat.

The private commission headed by a former chief of naval operations, retired Adm. Thomas H. Moorer, made public an affidavit by retired Capt. Ward Boston, formerly of the judge advocate general's office and one of two senior naval officials investigating the attack.

"The evidence was clear. Both Admiral (Isaac) Kidd and I believed with certainty that this attack, which killed 34 America sailors and injured 172 others, was a deliberate effort to sink an American ship and murder its entire crew. I am certain that the Israeli pilots that undertook the attack as well as their superiors who had ordered the attack, were aware the ship was American."