I saw military audiences with Bush and Reagan. I saw military audiences with Clinton and Obama. My brother was in the Air Force during Bush I and Clinton, and made his own observations. I spend a lot of time on military blogs, from all sides of the political spectrum.

I'm not drawing conclusions from just one television speech last night.

The hard fact is that the current Democratic Party is under the control of its leftist faction at all levels of its leadership, and one characteristic of the Left is an attitude that, at best, reflects a deep discomfort with all things military, and at worst, a deep hostility. I personally see Obama in the "discomfort" category, which is better than hostility, but it's obvious enough that the military understands where they really stand on the priority list. Have you noticed that only military spending seems to raise the "deficit hawks" on the Democratic side?

There were Democratic presidents in past years who would have gotten standing ovations. It isn't about being a Democrat. It's about certain views of the military.

The deadline in the speech was not as bad as I feared - he at least has Bush's "conditions-based" caveat - but it's bad enough.