When's The Wedding, General?

I suppose this is what they mean when they say you have to play politics to reach the top ranks of the military:

The top US general defended the leadership of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, saying it is inspired by God.

"He leads in a way that the good Lord tells him is best for our country," said Marine General Peter Pace, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

Both the Bush administration and Al Qaida extremists like to claim God is on their side. One of those claims has to be wrong, and since it is a matter of faith which has no chance of objective proof this side of heaven I wish they would both just shut the f**k up about it.

But worse was still to come:

Rumsfeld is "a man whose patriotism focus, energy, drive, is exceeded by no one else I know ... quite simply, he works harder than anybody else in our building," Pace said at a ceremony at the Southern Command (Southcom) in Miami.

Now maybe its a cultural thing but back in the U.K. you wouldn't say this about your immediate boss in public even if you thought it was true and said so privately. It comes across as simple wholehearted brown-nosing - both inherently insincere and, somehow, unmanly.