OUT OF STEP, OUT OF TIME? For the second time in the last three weeks, Mark Esper’s efforts to squeeze savings from the Pentagon’s $740 million budget have been overruled unceremoniously by a tweet from his boss.

In both cases, the moves — considerations of a $2.2 billion cut from the military health system and shuttering the venerable Stars and Stripes newspaper — were criticized as taking benefits away from troops and drew a quick Twitter rebuke from President Trump.