You're correct the president can, if it's in the national interest. Which goes back to my point; there's not a single qualified 4 star general, so we had to pull a 3 star out of retirement?
Again, is this merit or because the President met the guy? Why is second guessing his qualifications somehow different that CQ Brown?
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I wanna make it clear that I'm not trying to argue Caine is or is not qualified. Much to my point earlier about consistent, I'm willing to look at people who don't traditionally meet all "prefered requirements". It's a broader discussion about how we apply "meritocracy", and where the boundaries are for that.