Michigan Republican Attorney General Michael Cox is running in the Michigan GOP primary for Governor.
What’s his storyline?
"I’m a Marine."
The fact is that U.S. Marine Corps has changed a lot since Cox was a short timer, one enlistment, non-rate, brawling leatherneck. The question is now; does Mike Cox have the character and core values of today’s Marine? This analysis takes a look at Marine Corps Values and Mike Cox, his history, background and personal potential as Michigan’s next "Marine" governor.
OK, Private. Shit-hot and square? Chinese field day time.
Dump ruck, junk on bunk. Urah?
In other words... Mr. Cox, if that’s the premise; let’s explore what that might mean, for you, your campaign, and for the citizens of Michigan.
Analysis and AAR below fold...
Crossposted to MichiganLiberal.com.
Candidate Mike Cox on July 13, 2010:
"I will be a strong leader. I will emphasize the things I learned in the Marine Corps as a young man.... If you wanna fight the hill of over spending and taxation, get a Marine to charge that hill. I’m that Marine."
Today, the U.S. Marine Corps is looked upon as a source of leaders; leaders with uncompromising character. Famous Marines across our Nation lead our armies, our enterprises, our civil organizations and public institutions with pride and distinction.
General Charles C. Krulak, Thirty-first Commandant of the U.S. Marine Corps, who tells us why, puts it this way:
The process of building a Marine leader begins with building a Marine. Marines are forged, one hammer blow are a time, in a combat-proven process conceived to instill within the heart of each a burning appreciation for our core values. The rigor of recruit and officer candidate training is capable of transforming an American youth and preparing him or her for the challenges of service to country.
The hallmark of this fertile environment for personal and professional development is pervasive, clearly defined, and universally respected standards of conduct. These standards stress personal accountability, and our faithful adherence to them as distinguished the Corps for more than two centuries.
Their influence is inescapable and shapes our every action. The product of this priceless admixture of quality people, rigorous training, and fairly enforced, traditional standards is exceptionally capable Marines of resolute character.
(break)
Leadership, even within the military, is a social contract in the purest sense of the expression, predicated equally on the leader’s desire to lead and on the consent of those led. It is grounded in the subordinate’s trust in the leader and the institution. The leader, therefore, must clearly demonstrate the true underpinning of his moral authority - his unquestionable character.
General Charles C. Krulak
Thirty-first Commandant
U.S. Marine Corps
The "Values" GOP Candidate for Governor
Cox: I got Marine Values, and they are Corps Values
Mike Cox is now running as the "values" candidate in the Republican Primary for Governorship of Michigan with endorsements from groups like the Citizens for Traditional Values, family values stalwart Mike Huckabee as well as very well publicized "rumors" of a de facto "endorsement" from Michigan Right to Life, which turned out to be true.
Admiring a man because he is mean and unprincipled is very different from respecting a solider or statesman who fights battles with honor and determination. GOP National Committeeman Saul Anuzis, who said, "Mike (Cox) is a street fighter...."
Saul and MI GOP leaders along with the Michigan State Chamber of Commerce have a lot of responsibility for suggesting Mike Cox as a proper candidate for Michigan’s next governor, especially in these very terrible economic and loss of manufacturing jobs/unemployment times. Michigan’s current generation of leaders face new challenging economic conditions unseen since the Great Depression.
Michigan is a very volatile state in these turbulent economic times, and electing a "street fighter" to run it with a 2011 "greenpea" Michigan State House and Senate (Fifty brand- new, neophyte House members, and 30 new State Senators) that is likely to be somewhat clueless, is a very different jawbone stew than that which John Engler bullied and blustered through during his tenure.
Is another-in-your-face and down-your-throat pugilist as governor what Michigan needs in times like these? Cox really is the pillar of personal Marine Corps ethics? Let’s explore that.
What are the Marine Corps’ Values?
Yesterday’s Corps is not Today’s Corps
Old Corps, is not the way of the New Corps. An old urban legend description of a US Marine, as seen by headquarters, attributed to a Gunnery Sergeant Steven Miller:
"A drunken brawling, HMMWV stealing, women corrupting liar, with a star sapphire ring, Seiko watch, unauthorized K-Bar, and a f---ed up cover."
The fact is that the Corps of the today is one of the highest qualified and motivated force of volunteers that the USMC has seen in it’s history, and just as in the times of Julius Caesar at the core of the Marine Corps is discipline and leadership, and at it’s center the individual warrior character both in battle and in everyday life.
In the words of General Carl Epting Mundy, Jr., Thirtieth Commandant of the US Marine Corps concerning a Marine’s character:
We are not born with character, it is developed by the experiences and decisions that guide our lives neither can we borrow the character or reputation of another. Each individual creates, develops, and nurtures their own. That is why each of us must learn to make good moral decisions in our lives. When the right course of action is unclear, only the habit of doing the right thing, as practiced everyday in all areas of our lives can be counted upon.
General Carl Epting Mundy, Jr
Thirtieth Commandant
U.S. Marine Corps
Cox’s Life Decisions: Canoe U? Page 11? Or EAS?
Smack Center in the Cold War, Cox Skates on Service to Country
Some of you might remember back to 1980-1983 during the Cold War, and what we as a nation were facing back then. Just a few of the events that were occurring:
1980
Iranian hostage crisis and DoD plans to protect Iranian oil fields from possible Soviet expansion - Boycott of the 1980 Summer Olympics in Moscow due the the Soviet Union’s invasion of Afghanistan - Strikes across Poland and rumors of a Soviet military crack down like Hungary or Czechoslovakia
1981
Iran-contra dealings begin under the Reagan Administration - Martial Law declared in Poland - US fighters clash with Libyan aircraft after the Gulf of Sidra Incident
1982
Reagan announces the "Caribbean Basin Initiative" in response to increased Cuban and Soviet activities
1983
Reagan announces the "Strategic Defense Initiative" (Star Wars) - Korean commercial airliner shot down by Soviet fighters - Invasion of Grenada by US and Caribbean Allies - Computer ‘glich’ and Operation Able Archer narrowly escape causing a global nuclear war ...
... And on October 23, 1983 - The bombing of a US Marine Corps barracks in Beirut kills 299 (241 US personnel including 220 US Marines; 49 French Paratroopers)
At this very time, Mike Cox was making his decisions about whether or not to remain on active service in the Marine Corps or attempt to get accepted to the US Naval Academy (USNA) at Annapolis. Up to that point, according to Cox, his assignments had been restricted to North Carolina, San Diego, Puerto Rico, Japan, and South Korea.
Cox tells the story of how he was ‘nominated’ to the Naval Academy in 1983, but turned it down to remain in Michigan to unsuccessfully ‘do some construction work’ and eventually attend the University of Michigan, instead.
Trouble is that ‘nominated’ is by no means the equivalent of ‘accepted’ by any of the US service academies - back then, or even now. The fact is that ‘nominations’ are first and easier part of the USNA admissions process, more difficult are the academic requirements, tests, background checks, and interviews with the selection boards across the country. Make it through that, you still have to make the final academy cut.
In the early 1980’s the acceptance rate of all the service academies was quite low, much lower in fact than in the 2011 plebes. West Point in 1980 desire to attend USMA was at an all time high and was only accepting 1 one of every 17 applicants, only 1 in 3 would then graduate. Just ask Blackwater's disgraced CEO Erik Prince about graduating, it’s not easy, he dropped out his second year as a Youngster at USNA. Prince, who’s sister is Michigan GOP starlet, Betsy DeVos and brother-in-law to failed gubernatorial candidate Dick DeVos, also avoids accurately explaining his reasons for leaving Annapolis, and often claims the moral high ground, despite all he has done.
Those Americans that made the then quite dangerous decision to join or remain in military service were making very tough decisions. A conflict either direct or in the form of additional ‘proxy’ conflicts with the Soviet Union or North Korea were inevitable back then.
What’s on Mike Cox’s Page Eleven?
The Marine Corps keeps negative items in disciplinary records in a Marine active duty personal 201 file, on what is called "Page 11".
Certainly, Cox’s page 11 was not all that clean, the knife fight with a fellow Marine while on deployment by it self alone, assuming that was the only Captain's Mast event, just might have one of any number of items that sunk any possibility of Cox being the next John Paul Jones out of Annapolis.
While presumably on training deployment in Puerto Rico, Mike Cox had a "knife fight" with a follow Marine, who was put in the brig. Cox came out of the brawl with 54 stitches. The story told by Cox is that while drinking heavily he had a disagreement with a fellow Marine, who at some point, "went back to the barracks to retrieve a knife" and then assaulted Cox, who was then slashed in the mayhem.
What Cox has to say about the knifing incident and getting out the US Marine Corps:
"It grew out of, you know, you’re 19 and you have a few words with someone and he went back and got a knife and came back and jumped me," Cox says, almost nonchalantly. "That was the Jimmy Carter armed forces, before they thinned a lot of people out..."
Brawling and "blanket parties", now a things of the past, in a vastly improved Marine Corps, were in the Old Corps a daily occurrence, one that has been often dramatized in movies, books and our public perception of the Corps. That is not the way Marines are expected to behave today. Those that step out and return D&D are thinned out.
One has to seriously consider what type of solider allows himself or herself to remain in a situation in which weapons are not only brandished, but used in brawling with a fellow service member. It’s s just this type of behavior and lack of discipline that gets Marine’s the Captain Mast, passed up for promotion, denied entry to a service academy, or removed from the service.
At precisely the time other Marines and Americans were reenlisting and signing up to fight out the Cold War under Ronald Reagan, Mike Cox opted out and took his End of Active Service (EAS).
Marines call this ‘skating’.
Messing with Another Man’s Susie Rottencrotch
Adultery is a Crime, Under USMJ and the Michigan Penal Code
The more recent enemy of good discipline within today’s Corps is no longer brawling in the barracks and wild drunken parities, by that of Sexual Harassment and other offenses that break up families and the Corps ‘good order and discipline’.
From MCO 100.9 MPE 8 June 1998 (Marine Corps Order on Sexual Harassment):
Leaders--officer, enlisted and civilian--are obligated to uphold and protect the dignity of all Marine Corps personnel. Accordingly, all Marine Corps personnel will conduct themselves with honor, courage, and commitment and, likewise, all Marine Corps personnel will be treated with dignity and respect.
Disruption to the ‘good conduct’ and ‘unit cohesion’, the chain of command through illicit affairs is not a joking matter, to be taken lightly, for today’s Marine leadership and troops. Mere toleration of such activities is punishable under Marine Corps Orders (guidance) and USMJ (the Uniform Code of Military Justice):
Such conduct has the purpose or effect of unreasonably interfering with an individual’s work performance or creates an intimidating, hostile, or offensive working environment. Workplace conduct, to be actionable as "abusive work environment" harassment, need not result in concrete psychological harm to the victim, but rather need only be so severe or pervasive that a reasonable person would perceive, and the victim does perceive, the work environment as hostile or abusive. Any person in a supervisory or command position who uses or condones any form of sexual behavior to control, influence, or affect the career, pay, or job of a military member or civilian employee is engaging in sexual harassment.
Adultery, to which Mike Cox, who was already divorced once already, has publicly admitted having committed in his current marriage is a serious offense under USMJ:
USMJ Article 134— Adultery - Elements of:
(1) That the accused wrongfully had sexual intercourse with a certain person;
(2) That, at the time, the accused or the other person was married to someone else; and
(3) That, under the circumstances, the conduct of the accused was to the prejudice of good order and discipline in the armed forces or was of a nature to bring discredit upon the armed forces.
Adultery is what is called a "collateral misconduct" offense that disrupts the morale and discipline of the Corps. According to Marine Corps Order (MCO) 1752.5A:
Collateral Misconduct. Commanders are charged with maintaining good order and discipline within their units, and have authority to determine how to best dispense with alleged collateral misconduct (e.g. underage drinking, out of bounds, off-limits establishment, fraternization, or adultery) by the victim.
But Mike Cox wasn’t in the Marine Corps at the time he says he committed adultery, which some say was just before he took office as Michigan’s leading law enforcement official as Michigan Attorney General in 2003.
The fact is that Adultery is also a criminal offense in the State of Michigan:
THE MICHIGAN PENAL CODE Act 328 of 1931
750.29 Adultery; definition. Sec. 29.
Definition—Adultery is the sexual intercourse of 2 persons, either of whom is married to a third person.
And Adultery is actually a FELONY under Michigan Law:
THE MICHIGAN PENAL CODE Act 328 of 1931
750.30 Adultery; punishment. Sec. 30.
Punishment—Any person who shall commit adultery shall be guilty of a felony; and when the crime is committed between a married woman and a man who is unmarried, the man shall be guilty of adultery, and liable to the same punishment.
Cox himself has made adultery a major issue in Michigan, only two years after his own admission to adultery in 2005 as AG, when Cox made adultery a ‘first-degree criminal sexual misconduct’ in 2007:
Cox received nationwide press in 2007 when the Michigan Court of Appeals ruled that adultery could be prosecuted as first-degree criminal sexual conduct with a resulting life in prison sentence. This unanimous decision was reached as a result of an appeal sought by Cox's office on a drug case that touched in part on this strange loophole in the law.
From an article published at the time, entitled "Life sentence for adultery?":
In Michigan, adultery has long been a felony. But when a judge warned that unfaithful spouses technically could be sentenced to life in prison, an obscure and seldom-used provision of the state's criminal law became the subject of international scrutiny.
From the Washington Post on Adultery a felony in Michigan:
In a footnote to a ruling involving a drugs-for-sex case, a Michigan appeals court said that if state law were enforced as written, adulterers could be put away for life. The ruling has generated a little unwanted publicity for Michigan Attorney General Mike Cox, who acknowledged an extramarital affair in 2005.
What has Mike Cox got to say about all this?
"I don’t know what the issue would be — that I’m not perfect?" he says. "I don’t know how they would tie it to what’s going on in Michigan today...If you think about it, if my wife and I got divorced before Geoffrey Fieger came along, there would be no issue. I mean, it wasn’t an issue for John Engler, for Ronald Reagan. In an odd way, the fact that we’re still married gives it legs, in a way. If we got divorced, people would say, ‘Oh, that’s just life.’"
Right from Wrong - Republican Opponents Know the Score
Cox: So tough and clever, he does not have to keep the Laws of God, The Catholic Church or the State of Michigan
Pete Hoekstra was right to take up the "family values" issue with Cox concerning Mike’s divorce and remarriage, his pattern of infidelity/adultery. Cox’s character is key to predicting his behavior and mind-set as a potential Michigan governor.
The Cox camp has tried to get this morally damaging information out early, a standard PR practice, in order to move the primary voters beyond Mike’s major character flaws. Cox wants to hide behind Ronald Reagan’s divorce, and the well-known peccadilloes of one John Engler. Engler and first wife Colleen did secure a Roman Catholic annulment of their marriage and Colleen eventually canned her tell-all book "A Matter of Trust" rather than rat John Engler out.
Cox cannot hide behind these sexually compromised men to build or protect his own character. He was aware of their moral short comings well before his own, and yet the put himself above the law of God, his Catholic Church, and the laws of the State of Michigan.
The moralizers, who have backed Cox have a higher agenda then morals and character. The backing of the Michigan Chamber of Commerce would reveal more of the REAL reasons for a Cox endorsement than the "values voter" crowd. It’s all about money and power, and a calculated bet that Mike Cox is their strongest advocate for harsh and punishing agendas the Chamber leadership has been bucking for over the last two decades.
Bringing in Mike Huckabee to endorse Cox is the icing on the cow paddy. Huckabee, a Southern conservative Baptist minister and a moral prude, has been cuckolded by Cox and has sold out his claim to be a "family values" champion, throwing in with the power and money crowd,-hoping to advance his own future presidential plans.
Dr. James Dobson has been making robo calls to Republicans endorsing Pete Hoekstra over Cox- this over and against other religious right operatives and groups endorsing Cox. Dobson is making no bones about Hoekstra’s long and steady record on "family values"-of which Dr. Dobson is the high priest.
Turn the Other Cheek - Transgressions Forgiven by Religious Right
The Citizens for Traditional Values Endorsed Mike Cox. What were they thinking?
It seems that groups that have hectored and been "scolds" in matters of character and moral high ground all endorses of Cox: James Muffett’s Citizens for Traditional Values ("Now, more than ever, Lansing needs a consistent voice representing traditional and family values"), Michigan Right to Life, the Dick DeVos’s and outsiders well-known for self-proclaimed "family values" have other important reasons to back Mike Cox even, with Cox’s glaring moral failures and indiscretions. "Family values" are in the ash heap, truth and honor are tossed aside.
Michigan’s Citizens for Traditional Values array of "Family Values" includes traditional marriage, marital fidelity, belief in God, and the Genesis / biblical account of Creation.
These and other "principles" are critical to CTV’s endorsement of a candidate:
"CTV-PAC has been involved in Michigan politics since 1991 laboring to advance our guiding principles of Faith and Family, Sanctity of Life, Limited Government and Excellence in Education."
CTV’s impact upon the Republican Party is major and controlling. The "principles" it espouses are strict and used as a litmus test, especially in culling potential candidates for public office based on religious ideology.
The membership of Citizens for Traditional Values and Foundation for Traditional Values which calls themselves - "a voice for your values"- go to great lengths and expense to train young people for involvement in politics and government from a high moral standard. The distribution of voter guides via cooperating churches is a vital tactic to get their message based on their endorsement and recommendations out to the faithful (See also Tithes That Bind the Christian Right).
It is entirely out of character and a surprising compromise that CTV would bend its principles and alter its call to "higher moral ground" when it endorses GOP Mike Cox-as a candidate for Michigan’s governorship.
Cox has publicly admitted to committing adultery against his wife. Even though he’s tearfully and publicly confessed, that moral lapse is a serious character flaw, a grievous violation of CTV’s highest values.
The American Military Leader
Leadership by Bluster, Brash Behavior, Mistreatment of Subordinates and Scandals - Not Acceptable
At the core of the American military leadership tradition is that of leading through example and personal action, not by "harsh or tyrannical treatment", but through persuasion, compassion and, yes dare one say it, consensus.
Mike Cox would like voters to think that his personal demeanor, nature and reputation as a brawler and hothead are just part of his Irish heritage, like his grand father in Ireland, nothing to be concerned about. Well, should it be?
Can Michigan afford another governor who does make it through their term of office due to some embarrassing scandal? Like any of these?
1.) Governor McGreevey D New Jersey who had an elicit homosexual affair, gave his lover special treatment and a state job, and had menage-a-trois with his wife, and his driver boyfriend? He resigned.
2.) Governor Elliot Spitzer D New York who traveled across state lines to have sex with a prostitute on multiple occasions over a period of six years spending in excess of $80,000. All the while being the NY Attorney General and Governor and going after illegal prostitute rings like the one he used the services of many times. He resigned.
3.) Governor Paterson D New York who took over when Governor Spitzer resigned. The day after he was sworn in Governor Paterson admitted to multiple extra-marital relationships while married to his beautiful wife. In some cases he met in hotels with his girlfriends using state funds. He is still in office.
4.) When San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom was up for reelection in 2007 he won without any serious challengers, racking up 72% of the vote. Earlier that year, Newsom took part in a very messy love triangle which was revealed.
5.) Former Virginia Senator Chuck Robb: Robb admitted in 1991 that while he was governor of Virginia (1982-86) he had been alone in a hotel room with 1983 Miss Virginia Tai Collins. Collins adds a confession the two had a carried on an 18-month full-contact sexual affair while governor.
6.) Mark Sanford R, South Carolina, Governor: "I've been unfaithful to my wife I developed a relationship with what started as a dear, dear friend from Argentina" he said to explain running off to a Tango affair with an Argentinian.
7.) Arnold Schwarzenegger R, Governor, is alleged to have had sex with a 16 year old when he was 28. There are also numerous allegations of gropings, harassment, in California.
8.) Bill Janklow R, former South Dakota Governor and Congressman, arrested for multiple offenses including drunk driving, disorderly conduct, assaulting an officer, and indecent exposure in 1974.
9.) Jon Grunseth, Republican businessman and candidate for Minnesota governor, withdrew his candidacy after allegations surfaced that he went swimming in the nude with four underage girls, including his daughter, and tried to grope one. "I've made some mistakes" he said.
10.) Governor Jim Gibbons R, a nasty gubernatorial divorce following 23 years of a polished political marriage to Dawn Gibbons, a former state assemblywoman, the governor has filed for divorce citing incompatibility in what's became a very public war of the roses.
11.) Neil Goldschmidtb D, former Governor of Oregon, as mayor of Portland had a sexual relationship with a 14 year old babysitter. Revelation of his lengthy and illegal sexual relationship with a 14-year-old girl in the 1970s, and cover-up efforts spanning three decades, sharply curtailing his influence on Oregon policy.
Opening Negative Ad Salvo: "Shock and Awful"
Cox Applies the Bush Doctrine to MI Primary Politics; Pre-emptive Warfare
Right out of the gate, back in 2009 Mike Cox and the Cox Campaign were the first in the Republican Primary for Governor to go negative with a advertising "Blanket Party".
In "Wary of Ghosts Cox Seeks Live Foes" the Detroit Free Press says of Cox early on:
Michigan's gubernatorial race is barely under way, but if it included a Lady Byng Trophy for gentlemanly conduct, Mike Cox would probably be already out of the running.
Just what are these ‘ghosts’? They are the scandals surrounding the Moonigan Mansion investigation and Cox’s associated behavior to cover his actions relating to the sad episode, AND the Cox’s history of adultery and other episodes that are sure to come to light in the general campaign, which has been the talk of the town in Lansing for years.
There persists a set of allegations that Cox was at that infamous Kirkpatrick party at Detroit’s Manoogian Mansion. Mike Cox has labeled the party an "urban legend" –it never happened-and refuses have testimony pertaining to the alleged infamous event unsealed, this despite several media requests.
This "the alleged party involving Kwame Kilpatrick and murdered exotic dancer Tamara Greene. Sworn testimony from Retired Detroit Police officer Sandy Cardenas says officers responding to 911 calls told her that Mike Cox was actually at the party.
These damaging scandals and investigations are why Cox started his War of Choice and Preemptive Attacks on his Republicans peers.
In order to put those topics out early, Cox did a ‘reconnaissance by fire’ when he allowed several special interest groups to initiate contact with the opposition using negative issue ads attacking his opposition across a full front.
As early as February of 2010, Michigan Matters entered the Cox tunnel complex to flush out a rat, Cecil D. St. Pierre and his Michigan Civic Educational Fund:
...in Michigan, these sleazy tactics have already taken hold. A group called the Michigan Civic Educational Fund has been running radio ads, billboards, sleazy websites and possibly anonymous phone calls. It appears to be an effort to boost the gubernatorial candidacy of Attorney General Mike Cox by tearing down his opponents.
The Michigan Civic Educational Fund was incorporated late in 2009 by a man named Cecil D. St. Pierre, Jr., a large-dollar campaign contributor to both Mike Cox’s gubernatorial campaign and his 527 campaign fund.
Negative Issue Attacks against Cox’s opposition started out with Rick Snyder in February 2010, which led to immediate counter battery rounds from the Snyder Campaign:
The campaign of Ann Arbor businessman Rick Snyder has filed two complaints with the Secretary of State Terri Lynn Land and Attorney General Mike Cox alleging that groups behind a series of attack ads are violating Michigan’s Campaign Finance Law.
Snyder attorney Daniel Carlson filed the complaints Tuesday against Eagle Strategies and the Michigan Civic Education Fund. MCEF made headlines in February when it launched a series of billboard and internet advertisements attacking Oakland County Sheriff Mike Bouchard, who is also seeking the nomination for governor. Eagle Strategies made headlines when it ran a series of radio commercials on WJR radio targeting Congressman Pete Hoekstra (R-Holland) another GOP candidate for governor.
Cox then shifted the heavier guns onto Peter Hoekstra. As cover the Grand Rapids Press in May 2010:
The Hoekstra campaign Tuesday evening was preparing a response ad buttressing the nine-term congressman's conservative credentials. Truscott alleged that the Cox campaign is coordinating efforts with a group called Americans for Job Security, which apparently purchased $134,000 worth of ads in the Grand Rapids media market echoing similar anti-Hoekstra themes. The Cox campaign denied that.
The Cox Campaign found it hard to take the resulting counter fire from Rick Snyder’s Campaign, April 2010 from the Detroit Free Press:
Mike Cox’s gubernatorial campaign charged today a radio attack ad on the attorney general’s role in investigating an alleged party at the Manoogian Mansion was engineered by Ann Arbor businessman Rick Snyder, his rival in the governor’s race.
Snyder cleverly responded to the Cox funded attack campaigns with his famous "I’m a Nerd" ad, which repeats all the negatives about Hoekstra to prove his point.
The fighting continued as someone infiltrated the Cox Camp and reportedly ‘stole’ several of the as of yet unaired negative ads and other material.
Just as the Good Book tells us "through their actions, so shall they be known" the behavior to the Cox Campaign is the best indicator of how Mike Cox and his Team will governor Michigan.
By taking the Republican Primary into the muck of no man’s land, Cox has signaled what his tenure might be; a brawling, fist fighting slug fest, exactly what Michigan, particularly in these troubled times, does not need.
Conclusion
Again Gen. Charles Krulak:
In my opinion, one stands so far above the other that it isn't even funny, and that trait is character. You can be dynamic, you can be brilliant, you can be articulate, you can be charismatic, you can be physically courageous, morally courageous. You can be the greatest tactician in the world, but if you are not a man or woman of character, you will never truly be a successful leader.
All those traits: brilliance, articulateness, courage, physical strength, charisma, all of those are gifts from whatever God you believe in. Character is a choice. It's a choice you make day in and day out by making hard decisions. And if you are able to reach deep within yourself and draw upon what I call a source of inner strength built on a foundation of character, you will absolutely be successful.
General Charles C. Krulak
Thirty-first Commandant
U.S. Marine Corps
This behavior by Cox, brawling in his youth and womanizing in his adulthood, demonstrate repeated major lapses in conduct that reflect the man’s nature and the core of Cox’s moral foundations, character, and judgment.
Does Mike Cox really stand above those around him? Can a person’s character change over time? Or are they who they are by the time they are 18, 19 or 20? 46?
Michigan Republicans will decide that in the upcoming Primary, and it’s a decision that we all might just have to live with like it or not.
Fair warning: Street Brawler Cox could and will get us into deeper Tabasco than anyone who is ardently supporting him can currently imagine.
Whether or not Mike Cox has these Marine Corps Values is up to the public. Do his past actions and patterns of behavior mean anything to a man who is about to take the hardest job in the State? Does he have what it takes? Just what is Mike Cox’s character built upon? The Sands of Iwo Jima, or the hopeful lots caste on the beaches of Michigan, by the GOP elite?
Disclaimer: Service in the US Marine Corps, or any of our Nation’s military services, is to be admired and respected. The concept of the Citizen-Soldier and service to Country in our military, controlled by civil authority, is fundamental to the health, defense and preservation of our American Society. Just as active Marines serve us around the world and in two major active, hostile theaters of conflict, former Marines serve with great distinction across our Society. The authors of this piece in no way are seeking to disparage the Corps, or service by any former member of any Service, but are seeking to present the core elements of ‘Marine Core Values’ that have been a proud tradition in the USMC throughout it’s long history of self-sacrifice, dedication, valor and service since it’s inception in 1775. Members of the research team included former service members and veterans, service academy graduates, and at least one old Marine with plenty of hash and splash.
Semper Fi
R/S
The authors grant Full Permission to repost or use as you may see fit.