In any case, decisions on troop levels in the American system of government are not made by any general or set of generals but by the civilian leadership of the war effort.

Barack Obama is not going to beat Hillary Clinton in a single Democratic primary. I’ll predict that right now.

I don't think you want political parties that are entirely driven by some extremely doctrinal ideology.

Mitt Romney has to convince the American public that they need to do something they're not usually inclined to do - replace a sitting president with a challenger. And unlike in 1980 and 1992, when the public was persuaded to do just that, the incumbent president has not been weakened by a primary opponent.

Frankly, if you're 26 years old and there's a war on women or there's not a war on women, you can get all wrapped up in it and get lots of traffic on your website and get into exchanges and scream and yell about it on MSNBC or Fox, and a week later no one can remember what that was about.

Bush is no conservative.

All defense secretaries in wartime have, needless to say, made misjudgments.