No military can function if the individuals in it are allowed to decide whether to follow valid and legal orders issued by their commanders based on their political beliefs about the POTUS.
To DrainBramage: Military personnel are NOT required to obey UNLAWFUL orders. Indeed, they can be punished severely if they obey an unlawful order. The government generally covers up such cases. In Colonel Lakin’s case they made an example of him for political reasons when Col. Lakin was not allowed to introduce birth certificate evidence. The UCMJ says this:
935. ART. 135. COURTS OF INQUIRY
c Any person subject to this chapter whose conduct is subject to inquiry shall be designated as a party. Any person subject to this chapter or employed by the Department of Defense who has a direct interest in the subject of inquiry has the right to be designated as a party upon request to the court. Any person designated as a party shall be given due notice and has the right to be present, to be represented by counsel, to cross- examine witnesses, and to introduce evidence.
(f) Witnesses may be summoned to appear and testify and be examined before courts of inquiry, as provided for courts-martial.
In short: The UCMJ means exactly what the government wants it to mean.
Lt. Col. Lakin (M.D.- Active Army) – first asked the Army to affirm that Obama was constitutionally eligible to serve as President, and when his chain of command refused, he then refused to deploy to Afghanistan until “eligibility” was established (to force the issue to a head). Lakin’s argument is simple and direct: a soldier must not be compelled to obey an “unlawful order”; an “ineligible person” cannot serve as President and Commander-in-Chief and, thus, cannot issue “lawful orders.” He has thereby laid his liberty and whole career on the line in order to honor his Oath to Support and Defend the Constitution (especially Article II, Section 1, Clause 5), which must not be violated!
In preparation for his court martial, scheduled for October, his defense counsel asked the Judge Advocate General (JAG) court to authorize “discovery” of Obama’s birth records in order to prove Lakin’s innocence. Col. Lind, Presiding JAG Judge, has recently ruled that LTC Lakin can’t depose (question under oath) the Hawaiian Custodian of Birth Records, nor view any of their documents. The judge claimed that birth records might contain “embarrassing information” about the putative President. The judge further ruled that it is “irrelevant” for the military to prove that Obama is constitutionally eligible to serve as Commander-in-Chief. She said that LTC Lakin’s deployment orders came from the Pentagon and, “on its face,” that’s all he needs to know. In other words, along with her Commanding General, Col. Lind has just decided that the chain of command originates at the Pentagon, and the President is NOT an integral part of it. Both Lind and her commanding general have now violated the Constitution’s clear specification that the “President is the Commander-in-Chief.
There is no place for junior officers refusing legal orders based on politics, no matter what side of the political aisle holds office.
To DrainBramage: Incidentally, the government’s prosecution and conviction of Michael New was purely political. He was punished by the Clintons for refusing to serve the United Nations. Nothing the Clintons did to the US military was reversed by Bush or Obama. President Trump makes a lot of noise about America First. He can prove it by defending this country against the United Nations with a full pardon for Michael New an enlisted man.
For years, I’ve posted messages about the raw deal Micheal New got. The travesty in New’s conviction was compounded because he was loyal to the United States while Obama gave pardons to traitors.
Please read the articles if you are not familiar with Michael New’s story:
"No man can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or else he will hold to the one, and despise the other."
So what master do U.S. servicemen serve: the U.S. Constitution or the United Nations Charter?
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What if New was right all along, and the order to don the U.N. emblems was unlawful, as he argued throughout his dispute with his commanding officers at his court-martial and throughout the appeals process?
It would mean that prosecutors in the Clinton administration withheld exculpatory evidence, deceived a judge in the case and misled defense counsel to stamp out what could have been a rebellion against illegal orders to serve under the banner of the international political group.
