POOR STANLEY

Poor Stanley McChrystal. Here's a guy who somehow, with a career of brushes with authority to judge from reporting by the NYT and others, manages to reach the rank of 4 STAR GENERAL. Then he violates the Military Code of Conduct by criticizing civilian officials IN PUBLIC. For this, he should have been cashiered, or at least demoted and forced to retire. Instead, he and his wife were reported by visitors to be "crushed" by the turn of events, events, by the way, entirely of his own making. As a result, the General has "decided" to retire immediately. Now, instead of at least having to retire at the 3-Star rank, Obama is allowing him to retire at 4 Star rank.
The difference is this: As a 3-star, McChrystal would be "entitled" to an annual pension of a paltry $160, 068. But as a 4-star, he has to make do, in disgrace, on $181, 416. Now, this difference amounts to $21, 348. When Ned retired, gratefully, after 29 years of state service, his entire pension amounted to about $21,000, and, believe me, Ned was damn glad to get it.
One thinks of all the people whose retirement has been destroyed by the FDIC takeover of Washington Mutual, the Obama demonizing of BP, the exporting of hundreds of thousands of well-paying manufacturing jobs to desperate third-world countries, the loss of hundreds of thousands of state and local jobs through the Bush regime engineered Depression, and the "rightsizing" of payrolls at places like HP under Carly Fiorino and her successor, Mark Hurd (who took home about $24 million last year, one hears).
Ned's readers will perhaps understand if he has very little sympathy for General McChrystal. One senses he will land on his feet somehow, as opposed to the millions of average Joe's and average servicemen and women in this country who won't.