Whoops, I guess I shouldn't have used the phrase "gay ol' time" to mean "have a great retirement, General Pace!" I mean, yeah, the word "gay" can also mean "happy," but it's come to mean something that in General Pace's mind is far more insidious. Here's Pace, in his own wise and wonderful words:
I believe homosexual acts between two individuals are immoral and that [the U.S. military] should not condone immoral acts...I do not believe the United States is well served by a policy that says it is okay to be immoral in any way...As an individual, I would not want [acceptance of gay behavior] to be our policy.
So, alright, forget the "gay ol' time" bit. Anyway, good f***ing riddance bye to Peter Pace, of whom Thomas Ricks wrote in his book, Fiasco:
Inside the military, [Air Force Gen. Richard Myers] was widely regarded as the best kind of uniformed yes man - smart, hard working, but wary of independent thought. The vice chairman, Marine Gen. Peter Pace, was seen as even more pliable, especially by fellow Marines. "The most damaging sort of mistakes that Rumsfeld has made have been on senior officer selection," said one Bush Administration official involved in defense issues. "You wind up with smiling Peter Pace and smiling Richard Myers.""Smiling Peter Pace," huh? While 3,000+ American were being killed in Iraq? While we were engaged in one of the worst foreign policy blunders in U.S. history? While we created more terrorists than we killed by our occupation of Iraq? I'll tell you, if Peter Pace could smile through all that, maybe he WILL have a "gay ol' time" in retirement after all. Ha.