Last night I reinstalled the transmission dip stick. I'm betting that the reason it was flopping around so much is that it wasn't fully seated. While it's not as firm as the engine oil dip stick it's certainly much better than it was. Whomever worked on the Jeep before was pretty sloppy. I'd still like to know if it's supposed to have some sort of bracket. It looks like something might have been spot welded on.