Professor Obama as Dutiful Commander in Chief

Professor Obama as Dutiful Commander in Chief

Every time I visit the White House, I am struck by its military environment.

Military guards are on duty, the staff has lunch in the White House mess and there's a helicopter pad for Marine One out on the lawn. You see nothing like this in any governor's office I have visited or in the offices of members of Congress, and certainly not in the headquarters of a political campaign or a community organizer.

This military atmosphere may have seemed congenial to a president who made a career in the military...