Hoss,
He clearly stated that in 10 years' time, the F-16 will be a flying target and that the F-35 is the answer to that.
My understanding has always been that the F-35's key role was never intended to be CAS - it was intended to be a door kicker on Day1 in a denied, double-digit SAM environment. No other airframe in the Air Force inventory can do that (at least, not in the white world inventory), so isn't that really what the F-35 must excel at?
If the F-35 is 'as good as' existing MDSs at CAS (and I note your caveats about that), but will be able to operate in a highly-advanced threat environment a decade from now, and if the Air Force has decided that it doesn't have the cash to splash on single-mission aircraft, then what is the solution?