Obama Losing Control at the Pentagon

Between "pentagon sources" and the press trumpeting Obama's proposed 8% increase in defense spending as a 10% decrease and Gates mutely standing by while Petraeus launches a PR blitz to override the sixteen month Iraq withdrawal timetable that Obama ran on, I've got to wonder about the supposed advantages of keeping Gates on as Secretary of Defense. Surely the PR hit Obama would take for sacking him can't be worse than the lack of authority he suffers by letting the pentagon run roughshod over him.