#LatteSalute: A Silly 'Controversy' Exposed! (Obama Prefers Tea)

By John Dodge

CHICAGO (CBS) -- Some conservatives put Benghazi on the back-burner for a few hours on Wednesday to take President Obama to task for saluting the Marines with a coffee cup in hand as he left Marine One.

The Republican National Congressional Committee used video of the so-called "Latte Salute" (hashtag: LatteSalute) to urge the offended masses to donate in support of GOP candidates in November's elections.

"This might be the most absurd video of President Obama we've ever seen," the RNCC said on its website. "Watch below. Watch it again. Watch it 100 times."

Why watch it 100 times? Is there a hidden meaning somewhere?

Once is enough. Enough!

Not surprisingly, the hyperbole followed on Twitter.

Yes, Dore E. Frances, Ph.D, a better example for children would be the benevolent supreme leader of North Korea.

Here is are how they do it, when celebrating Kim Jong Il's birthday!

There is some history and context to consider when assessing the political damage of Obama's alleged gaffe.

Actually, sir, you earned the right to the salute. Because the President of the United States is a civilian, he (and someday she) doesn't have the right.

So, does that mean that it is actually disrespectful for a president to salute at all?

According to several accounts, including this one from Reuters in 2008, President Reagan started the practice and it has continued since.

Garry Wills, the author and Northwestern University professor, wrote in the New York Times in 2007. Wills argued that the salute is an example that show the gradual militarization of our country's top elected leader.

"The glorification of the president as a war leader is registered in numerous and substantial executive aggrandizements; but it is symbolized in other ways that, while small in themselves, dispose the citizenry to accept those aggrandizements," he wrote.

Since the president is essentially trivializing the military salute, here is an idea and one that would fit nicely with the commercialization of American society.

Why not include some product placement? The president with a Starbucks latte. Or maybe have a Coke and a salute?

Corporations would have to pay big money for that privilege, and proceeds could go to help veterans or another worthy cause.

However, lost in the manufactured dust-up over the #LatteSalute is a more important question.

Are the taxpayers footing the bill for a barista on board that helicopter? Or was the president nursing that beverage for the entire trip?

More than likely, it wasn't a coffee drink at all.

Mr. Obama is partial to drinking tea.