“Leery about potential publicity”? Hardly.

LT Baldwin isn’t representing the U.S Navy, although that’s the spin the producers of the show wanted to present. He’s doing this on his own time — or rather — on what the Navy calls “permissive leave.”

His appearance on The Bachelor will hardly make most guys want to go for an officer’s commission, let alone head for the recruiter’s office to sign up.

It’s easy to fall in love with a young Naval medical officer who looks nice without a shirt, who is buying you all these presents and driving you around in sports cars owned by a TV network.

Let’s see what happens the first time he has to deploy (uh, a simple reminder: The U.S. Navy is a warfighting organization), and she has to move kids and a household across the country while dealing with TRICARE.

I agree with CBS’ Craig Ferguson’s assessment of him: “He’s a tool.”