“Facebook Sergeant” denies he’s stirring up a “military coup,” but Marines want to boot him anyway. ACLU, Tea Party lawyers defend him.
Inside a hearing room on Camp Pendleton last week, Sgt. Gary Stein was stunned when the prosecution showed him a key piece evidence against him: a blown up campaign poster of President Barack Obama, the word “DICK” underneath his face.
There was an asterisk next to the word: “*ACCORDING TO MSNBC’S MARK HALPERIN,” the poster read.
It was a surreal moment in the history of military justice.
Stein, a 26 year old Marine Corps sergeant, is at the heart of controversy engulfing America’s Armed Forces during this hotly contested election year. At issue: just how much are our men and women in uniform allowed to say? A Marine Corps panel last week at Camp Pendleton, a base near San Diego, California, declared that Stein was violating “good order and discipline” for going beyond political activity allowed by the Pentagon, and sent a clear signal to the troops that it’s better to keep your mouth shut.
“A lot of this comes down to political correctness among the leadership,” Stein told BuzzFeed today in an exclusive interview. “They don’t want the President to think the Marine Corps is anti-Obama.”
The firestorm began in March after anti-Obama comments Stein wrote on a private Facebook discussion group were picked up by the media, including calling Obama a “traitor,” a “Domestic Enemy”, and questioning a possible military intervention in Syria.
“I hit some chords of the people higher up, [that made people think] I’m trying to start a military coup, a military uprising,” said Stein, who lives in nearby Temecula. “A lot of liberal bloggers and even conservative people have come out and said this is going to start a military coup. I don’t believe in violence. Violence only undermines the Tea Party movement.”
Via: facebook.com
