Actual Insubordination

So General McChrystal, who loyally carried out the president's Afghanistan policy, was fired for mocking the president a bit--but mostly mocking parts of the president's national security team. This has widely been called "insubordination." While President Obama certainly had grounds to fire McChrystal, and I do not question his right to fire a general for any or even no reason at all, this was not an issue of insubordination.

Rest assured, however, that this incident of public speaking will not be treated as insubordination and undermining President Obama's war strategy:

Vice President Joe Biden praised Afghanistan war critic Rep. Kurt Schrader (D-Ore.) Thursday for speaking his mind.

“I encourage you, old buddy, to speak out,” Biden said at a fundraiser for Schrader in Portland, Ore.

The freshman Democrat has emerged as a fierce critic of the war in Afghanistan.

“It’s a waste of resources, a waste of America’s best and brightest,” he recently told The Oregonian newspaper. “I’m for fighting a war on terrorism, not a war in Southwest Asia that Alexander the Great couldn’t win, the British Empire couldn’t win, the Soviet Union couldn’t win. That’s stupid. We need to be bringing these men home.”

Biden praised Schrader for being “independent.”

If I may be so bold, this is a big effing deal. The vice president has publicly encouraged an opponent of President Obama's war strategy to keep opposing the war. Yet Biden will remain on the job.
 
Yet another reason the words "President Biden" give me nightmares. If you think things couldn't be worse, contemplate that. And then there's third in line ...
 
Stay healthy, Mr. President. You might be the only person in your party leadership who wants to win the war in Afghanistan.