Obama’s visit to the Pentagon Monday, his first in three years, is admittedly savvy political maneuvering by a president intent on securing his legacy before campaign season begins in earnest. Making a show of force before heading off on vacation, Obama ascended Olympus not as a supplicant, but rather Zeus overlooking his many, many ongoing operations abroad. The grandstanding, however, fell flat.

Appearing on Marc Maron’s podcast today, President Obama addressed what is perhaps one of the longest-living conspiracies in America: the existence of black helicopters. They’re real!

The Pentagon sucks at explaining anything sensitive to the American public and the true scope of Jade Helm, the military exercise scheduled for this summer, is being hidden behind happy talk from one side and mass hysteria from the other.

Who is the man that is going to lead America’s military?

I am watching the reaction to the unintended drone killing of civilian hostages American Warren Weinstein and Italian Giovanni Lo Porto and sensing a sea change. The kind that rocks Washington in inscrutable ways, the kind that puts an end to the he said/she said back and forth, the kind that unites both sides—all sides—in asking the tough questions that go beyond what went wrong and focus on what we are doing.