While I am much more liberal than most members of the military, I think the JAG Corps, on the whole, tends to be more moderate. I know part of the reason that I have gone so liberal is antipathy toward the Christian Right's takeover of the GOP and our government. Perhaps lawyers and paralegals tend to be less religiously motivated than other folx. In the offices I've been in, that's been the case. Many people go to church - even regularly - but they do not tend to be such fire-breathing evangelicals (like those at the Academy, for instance).
The moderate tone in JAG...
...makes military service much more palatable. I enjoy serving my country. I became a lawyer to help people and I think the military does help people. Or at least tries. Most of the time.
But what about the commissions or Abu Ghraib?...well, I'm on the volunteer list to act as defense counsel to the folx at Guantanamo. I think I can help the military (and our government) stop doing the wrong thing there by being an aggressive defense counsel for those guys - even if they're way guilty.
As for Abu Ghraib, I understand and agree with the need to prosecute the soldiers for doing what they did. But I also applaud all of the defense counsel trying to implicate the higher-ups. I've been in the military before and since 9/11. After that day and since the "war on terror" began, I can definitely feel how commanders can "turn a blind eye" or give a wink and a nod for their troops to do something which everyone otherwise knows is wrong. We had to do those courts, but my opinion is that the sentences were too harsh. A result of the black eye that the military got from the incidents. Some of those kids went to jail for a long time, got punitive discharges. Had their lives pretty much ruined, if you think about it. Doesn't make what they did ok, but...