Our 21st-century world is an incredibly dangerous one. Between brutal civil wars, violent extremism, spreading autocracy, rising inequality, territorial expansionism, election interference, and nuclear proliferation, our policymakers have their hands full.
Look, it's no longer about capacity, how many ships, how many air wings, how many battalions. It's about capability. If we dominate cyber space and know and can read the other guy's mail, and with a very accurate laser-guided munitions put it in this window or that window, it's not how much, it's knowing exactly where to pinpoint a target.
In the face of a rising China, along with authoritarian regimes from Brazil to the Philippines to Turkey to Russia, and the constant presence of belligerent non-state actors, we need to reform our military to deal with asymmetrical threats.
For far too long we have continued to mark our military prowess by the size of our forces: believing that numbers of ships, planes, and brigades is what most matters - just like during the Cold War.
Those who are in our military and now have retired or they left the service actually respect candor. And they respect those that speak without trying to politicize who they are.
The career politicians down in Washington don't want to be held accountable.
Nobody under 40 carries a comb.
Before the CFPB, there was no single agency or entity within the federal government tasked with protecting Americans from predatory or negligent practices of banks, credit card companies, mortgage lenders, payday lenders, credit rating agencies and other financial service businesses.
Our enlisted are the backbone of our service, are exceptionally a bright group of men women.
I understand the challenge with student loans. But what about the labor force, the enlisted men and women, so to speak, of ships. Those who work with their hands and their minds. We need to do what we do in the military, is we train and retrain.
A President can obstruct justice and Congress has the full right to hold a President accountable for such law-breaking through impeachment. After a President leaves office, I believe they may be held accountable through the courts as well.
We were rugged individualists in the Navy, but we all had health care.
For a public option, I voted for that when I was in Congress, and the Senate couldn't stand up to the health insurance industry and took it out.
If you lease a part of your soul in a campaign, Washington, D.C., and the establishment... will think they have an option to buy.
I have seen how payday lenders and check cashing outfits set up in towns around military bases to take advantage of young service members, whose starting salaries are barely over $20,000 per year.
We need to transform our military forces by focusing on force posture, not force structure.
Launching a ground war against Iran would require hundreds of thousands of troops for a 'regime change followed by nation-building' operation, as we attempted in Iraq. Iran has a much more modern military, more than double Iraq's population, and almost four times the landmass.
I believe we should be investing in the potential of nuclear technology based on thorium, to end the use of plutonium and lead to much safer nuclear power plants, less toxic nuclear waste, and less opportunities for nuclear weapons proliferation.
I favor every worker having access to a retirement savings account, and there are various options for doing this. I do support states implementing their own plans, and I expect them to play an important role in increasing retirement savings for young professionals especially.
The greatest brotherhood, sisterhood that I was ever a part of are veterans.
