There are no reasonable critics in the professional right

Time was, you could at least get the think-tankers at certain rightist organs to give honest, reasonable criticism. Not so much today, I guess. Here's what the former Air Force Secretary is saying about a Republican Secretary of Defense, and incidentally the dude who fired him:

Future estimates of demographics indicate that the energy-rich north Asian landmass currently owned by Russia will dramatically lose population; On the other hand as China’s energy appetite accelerates the region’s population is increasingly Chinese nationals. Consensus on peace may well be the talk of the society; but there are near-term indicators that this might not be acceptable to rogue leaders who are more concerned with strengthening their hold on power than achieving international good will. ... In other words, I see this not as a single action stopping the F-22 well below the recommended military level; but as a broader action by a weary Defense Department to limit our sovereign options in the foggy future, by postulating ‘Peace in our Time’.

Nice. Accusing a GOP head of the Pentagon of being a mushy pacifist takes a bit of work, but hey, the former Secretary of the Air Force is a hard-working guy who just wanted to spend billions on a stealth fighter fueled by liquid coal. And he's got a totally legit criticism considering what Gates said:

My hope is that as we wind down in Iraq – and whatever the level of commitment in Afghanistan – that we not forget the basic nature of humankind has not changed.

Oh. So Gates explicitly said the exact opposite of what Wynne accused him of.

So either Gates -- old-school non-batshit GOP -- is lying, or Wynne is. Both men are Bush appointees, but Wynne was fired for incompetence. To repeat: he was so incompetent he was fired from the Bush Administration, the White House that let an American city be destroyed because it had too many blacks Democrats leaky dikes in it.

I call it for Gates.