The Next Secretary of Defense: Will Obama Choose Change or Stability? By Chris Carroll of Stars and Stripes.
Officially, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta isn’t going anywhere.
The prevailing assumption in Washington, however, is that the 74-year old consummate D.C. insider, who deferred retirement to take over the Pentagon last year, will bow out early in President Barack Obama’s second term.
Whom the president chooses to fill Panetta’s shoes will likely signal whether the coming four years will be a time of transformation -- strategically and in terms of how the Defense Department does business -- or a time of orderly retrenchment in the face of oncoming budget difficulties...