Robert Gates is making entirely too much sense these days.

Defense Secretary Robert Gates encouraged the graduating U.S. Naval Academy class of 2007 Friday to "remember the importance of two pillars of our freedom under the Constitution: the Congress and the press."

"Both surely try our patience from time to time, but they are the surest guarantees of the liberty of the American people," Gates told the 1,028 graduates during a sunny ceremony at the Navy-Marine Corps Stadium in Annapolis, Md.

Gates told the new Naval officers they will have the responsibility to inform people below them that the military "must be nonpolitical" and recognize the obligation to truthfully report to Congress, "especially when it involves admitting mistakes or problems."

"The same is true with the press, in my view a critically important guarantor of our freedom," he said.

Gates cited media reports of poor outpatient treatment at Walter Reed Army Medical Center as an example of the important role news organizations play in pointing out important problems.

"When it identifies a problem, as at Walter Reed, the response of senior leaders should be to find out if the allegations are true, as they were at Walter Reed, and if so, say so," Gates said. "And then act to remedy the problem. If untrue, then be able to document that fact."

Gates said the Founding Fathers wisely understood that the Congress, a free press and a nonpolitical military are needed in a free country.

"The press is not the enemy and to treat it as such is self-defeating," he said.

Gates obviously knows too much, and is speaking up. Wonder how much longer Bush will keep him around?

"Self-defeating." Hello! Did our friends among the self-defeated right hear this message from the administration? Sadly, they'll only get this news if it's run on Fox News Channel...