A proposal to make male and female Marines wear a unisex service cap — which some opponents call "girly" — is "absolutely outrageous," says former Rep. Pete Hoekstra of Michigan, who chaired the House Intelligence Committee.
"We need to be focusing on keeping America safe, enabling our military to do its job, and not make the military an experiment in social policy. [It's] absolutely outrageous," Hoekstra told "The Steve Malzberg Show" on Newsmax TV.
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"We had the best military, the best equipped, the most motivated men and women in the world working in our military, especially in the immediate aftermath of 9/11 … And this president is destroying the morale of the military by all of these kinds of actions, whether it's from a unisex cap to rules of engagement."
Hoekstra said the fear used to be about the "hollowing out" of the military under President Bill Clinton.
"Now, we're hollowing out not just the military, but the morale and we're driving out phenomenally bright, committed people," he said.
"This is not the military they signed up for. And guess what? They're leaving."
If the unisex design gets the go-ahead, it would be the first change in Marine head gear since 1922.
On the issue of the Affordable Care Act, now the subject of hearings on Capitol Hill over the difficulties of its sign-up process, Hoekstra believes the healthcare law is doomed.
"There's going to be all kinds of people that are going to try to sign up for this, they're going to find out that their premiums are going up, they're going to find out that they may not be able to even get into the system and register for the system," he said.
"Then you're hearing all the chaos that says even if you successfully navigate through the Obamacare website, the information that's transferring over to the insurance companies that are eventually going to have to handle this, that information is wrong.
"This program is going to collapse under its own weight . . . Republicans shouldn't spend their time fighting about strategies and calling other Republicans names, other conservative names ... Let's keep the focus on this president, his failed economy policy, his failed healthcare policy."
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