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Home Front: Politix

Gavin Newsom Fumes as Congress Repeals California's EV Mandate

2025-05-24

[Breitbart] California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) was fuming Thursday as Congress passed a repeal of California’s electric vehicle (EV) mandate, which relied on a special waiver from the outgoing Biden administration in December.

“Make America Smoggy Again,” he announced, sarcastically. The Senate voted 51-44 to repeal the waiver, after a bipartisan majority in the House had done the same, as Breitbart News reported earlier this month.

The repeal relies on the Congressional Review Act, a Bill Clinton-era law that allows Congress to repeal regulations that are not presented to it for timely approval. Newsom says the waiver is exempt from review.

In a press statement, he vowed to sue:

Governor Gavin Newsom and Attorney General Rob Bonta announced today the state will file a lawsuit as Republicans in the U.S. Senate target California’s clean vehicles program – a move that will “Make America Smoggy Again.”

The Republican-controlled Senate is illegally using the Congressional Review Act (CRA) to attempt to revoke California’s Clean Air Act waivers, which authorize California’s clean cars and trucks program. This defies decades of precedent of these waivers not being subject to the CRA, and contradicts the non-partisan Government Accountability Office and Senate Parliamentarian, who both ruled that the CRA’s short-circuited process does not apply to the waivers.

However, as Ashley Zavala of Sacramento-era NBC affiliate KCRA reported, neither California voters nor American voters generally have ever voted to approve Newsom’s EV mandate.

Link

-Short Attention Span Theater-

Ex-Clinton aide reveals Hillary's appalling secrets

2025-05-20

[Daily Mail, where America gets its news] …and blames her for 'Schindler's List' atmosphere

A former Clinton administration staffer claimed that Hillary Clinton was so detested during her husband's time in the White House that she was known as a 'Nazi schoolmarm' who made aides run in fear.

Buzz Patterson, the former Air Force Aide to Bill Clinton who carried the 'nuclear football' wherever the president went, took to X to reveal intimate details of the former First Couple.

He said he primarily lived in the White House and was 'always in close proximity to both Bill and Hill', which made him quickly learn that the mood of the day 'depended solely on the presence or absence of Hillary.'

'We used to say that when Hillary was gone, it was a frat party. When she was home, it was Schindler's List,'' Patterson wrote in a scathing X post that has received over five million views.

Patterson served as Clinton's Senior Military Aide from 1996 to 1998, and his role saw him carry the 'Presidential Emergency Satchel' to allow the president to launch a nuclear strike from anywhere in the world.

He said in his X post that the day-to-day work for Clinton varied dramatically based on Hillary's whims, as he scathingly described her as 'evil, vindictive, profane' and 'a b****.'

'Among the military who served in the White House and the professional White House staff, the Clinton administration was infamously known for its lack of professionalism and courtesy, though few ever spoke about it,' he wrote.

'But when it came to rudeness, it was Hillary Clinton who was the most feared person in the administration. She set the tone.'

Patterson, an outspoken Donald Trump supporter, said he was warned from the get-go that Hillary Clinton was the most daunting figure in the White House, not her president husband.

'When I first arrived to work in the White House, my predecessor warned me: 'You can get away with pissing off Bill but if you make her mad, she’ll rip your heart out,'' he wrote.

'I heeded those words. I did make him mad a few times, but I never really pissed her off. I knew the ramifications.'

In a response to an X user asking what he did that 'pissed off' Clinton, Patterson said he once didn't let him go to a restaurant when he was hungry because the Secret Service hadn't swept it.

He said while these small issues could be brushed over by Bill, Patterson 'realized there were different rules for Hillary.'

'She instructed the senior staff, including me, that she didn’t want to be forced to encounter us,' he said, adding that staff were seen scrambling to avoid her 'no matter their position in the building.'

'Many a time, I’d see mature, professional adults, working in the most important building in the world, scurrying into office doorways to escape Hillary’s line of sight,' he wrote.

'She was the Nazi schoolmarm and the rest of us were expected to hide as though we were kids in trouble.'

Patterson served over 20 years in the Air Force and was deployed on tours to regions including Bosnia, Haiti, Rwanda and Somalia.

But he said reverence for military service was scant in the Clinton White House, and recalled a time ahead of the 1996 election when Hillary 'attempted to ban military uniforms in the White House.'

'She was trying to craft the narrative that the military was not a priority in the Clinton administration,' he wrote.

'As a military aide, carrying the football, and working closely with the Secret Service, I objected to that. It simply wasn’t a matter of her political agenda; it was national security.

'If the balloon went up, the Secret Service would need to find me as quickly as possible. Seconds matter. Finding the aide in military uniform made complete sense. Besides, what commander in chief wouldn’t want to advertise his leadership and command?'

Patterson said Hillary 'finally relented because the Secret Service weighed in', but said the incident was a telling moment for his understanding of how the White House worked under the Clintons.

'The Clintons are corrupt beyond words,' he concluded the scathing X post.

Link

-Short Attention Span Theater-

Donald Trump shares shocking theory about Clinton 'assassinations'

2025-05-19

Shitposting, amirite? Troll level: whatever.

[Daily Mail, where America gets its news] President Donald Trump has shared a shocking conspiracy theory linking Bill and Hillary Clinton to a series of high-profile deaths.

Trump shared an explosive video on his Truth Social account on Saturday accusing the powerful political couple of eliminating several enemies and potential threats over the decades.

Titled 'THE VIDEO HILLARY CLINTON DOES NOT WANT YOU TO SEE', the footage attempts to connect the former First Lady and her husband President Bill Clinton, to a string of deaths including those of John F. Kennedy Jr., DNC staffer Seth Rich, and former White House lawyer Vince Foster.

Trump didn't offer any comment of his own to accompany the bizarre post.

The controversial footage pushes the 'Clinton Body Bags' conspiracy theory that has circulated since the 1990s.

The video shockingly claims that Hillary Clinton was somehow involved in JFK Jr.'s fatal 1999 plane crash because he was allegedly a 'frontrunner' for the New York Senate seat she would later win.

‘Remember John F Kennedy Jr? He was declared the front runner for the New York Senate seat back in 1999 days later, his plane crashed into the Atlantic Ocean, and his rival Hillary Clinton was elected senator,’ the video begins.

Link

-Great Cultural Revolution

Democrats Drag America Into the Mouth of Their Madness

2025-05-15

[JOHNKASSNEWS] Watching the Democrats storm the Immigration and Customs enforcement facility in New Jersey, applauding themselves and singing their creaky old ’60s protest songs like a collection of cos-playing Pete Seegers dressing up as clergy, and threatening the government to protect illegal migrant criminals and gang members, I couldn’t help but think of France.

Why France?

We’re on our way, aren’t we?

Only a moron couldn’t see it. And only a servant of the Democrats—or CNN anchor Jake the Fake Tapper—would watch this and say nothing.

Just imagine their current revolutionary princess—Alexandria Ocascio-Cortez— leading the Democrat Party back in the late 1789 at the storming of the Bastille.

You can see her there, can’t you? Of course you can. You see it there just as you can see her here.

Can’t you?

And the French Revolution was born. The lopping off of heads began. They hated Christianity. The Roman Catholic church was in their way, an impediment to their ambition. They were their own gods. They had their slogan, "Liberté, Égalité, Fraternité."

The Jacobins of our own time—we call them Democrats—have their slogans and their leaders, full of pride, full of anger, full of rage. And violence. Violence in their rhetoric, violence in their speeches, violence in their imagery.

In the France of 1793, not the United States of 2025, they not only believed in the death penalty, they embraced political murder as a nation of zealots. Approximately 16,594 people were officially executed by guillotine, the severed heads raised aloft to the lusty cheers of the mob. According to the World History Encyclopedia, an estimated 10,000 to 12,000 individuals were executed without trial, and some 10,000 died in prison. In France.

And in the United States of 2025, the Democratic Jacobins in America, led by their revolutionary princess Alexandria Ocasio Cortes threatens anyone who dares stop them by supporting the law.

That’s the key to understanding this political drama now. It’s all about public outrage and performance art, but if and when they grab power in the mid-term elections next year, the heads will roll.

As the Federalist’s Todd Bensman reminds us, "Where Was Democrats’ Outrage When Obama and Biden Deported Illegal Alien Housekeepers and Gardeners?"

Bensman writes, "...Americans need to be reminded that no such war for their hearts and minds happened when Democrats Joe Biden, Barack Obama, and Bill Clinton collectively deported millions of illegal aliens who also merely worked hard, paid taxes, and stayed out of U.S. prisons and off gang and terrorism intelligence databases.

"When Democrats carry out deportations, there is nary a peep of protest from this very same peanut gallery. When the Biden administration secretly air-deported hundreds of thousands of Central American and Haitian mothers with babies in their arms just a couple of years ago, there were no stories planted to spin up a rage machine. Those operations drew no tear-jerking stories in the corporate press — or really, any coverage at all.

"And when Biden was vice president, he and Barack Obama practically got a blank media hall pass when they air-deported tens of thousands of unaccompanied illegal alien children back to Central American tarmacs to shut down a surge of those in 2015. Most Americans still don’t even know they did that, not to mention the millions of other non-criminal family members and oft-vaunted "breadwinners" they deported during all eight of their years in office.

"And Bill Clinton? His party base lauded him in the mid-1990s when he spearheaded tough deportation-centric legislation known as the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act of 1996.

"The coming war on Trump’s mere remake of Democratic Party deportation programs lays bare the profound double-standard hypocrisy of the activists waging it along with their partisan media allies who so willfully believe that a unique new MAGA inhumanity is afoot.

"It isn’t. This is an old story with new, politically motivated framing."

And the political left is always making threats to rally their followers to the barricades before the head lopping can really begin.

AOC: If anyone is breaking the law in this situation, it’s not members of Congress — it’s DHS. It’s people like Tom Homan and Secretary Kristi Noem. You lay a finger on Rep. Bonnie Watson Coleman or any of the Representatives that were there... we’re going to have a problem. pic.twitter.com/QTo1H8AAHS
— Acyn (@Acyn) May 11, 2025

So, if you can cut through the whiny sentimental weeping and AOC’s drama-queen bit, and the old Pete Seegar protest songs outside that ICE facility in New Jersey, what do you find?

A ravenous appetite for power. Pure power.

Who are the Democrats fighting for?

The child rapists? The murderers? The gangbangers? The sex-traffickers?

The beasts who murdered and raped the young nurse in Georgia, Laken Riley and the mother of five in Maryland, Rachel Morin. And beasts like these also sexually assaulted and murdered Jocelyn Nungaray, a 12-year-old American girl in Texas. Former President Joe Biden opened the American borders and let in between 12 million to 20 million of these illegal criminal migrants. The corporate legacy media lied for Biden and they gaslit other concerned Americans. They harassed anyone who cried out and called them fascists. Biden and the Democrats let in the worst of the worst. And now AOC and the others threaten us with more violence.

This is who they are. They’re showing all of us. All who are of the left are doing anything they can to stop the lawful deportation of the criminals. That is who the Democrat Party have become.

It’s more than idiotic political theater. It is dangerous and stomach turning.

All you have to do is look up the French revolution. The ICE facility in Newark isn’t the Bastille, but they’d like it to be. It works for them.

According to the left wing news site Politico: "Newark Mayor Ras Baraka’s Friday arrest fired up liberal Democrats in and outside of New Jersey, turning his hours in federal custody into a political moment for progressives and the region’s immigration activists while boosting the mayor’s national profile as he runs for governor.

"Free Ras Baraka! Free Ras Baraka!" protesters chanted for hours outside the federal facility where Baraka was held Friday.

He’d been arrested earlier that day at another protest outside an immigration detention center on a trespassing charge.

By the time he was released that night, a wave of support had formed following his arrest, which came after armed federal officers got involved in a scrum with three members of Congress who were seeking to tour a new Trump administration Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention facility in Newark, Delaney Hall."

It’s obvious that the Democrats think they’re above the law. Baraka is using this to launch his New Jersey campaign for governor.

What is the cost?

"Democrats across the country have major trouble following that "no one is above the law" precept they keep invoking — as witness multiple recent scuffles as the left goes to bat for illegal immigrants," argues The New York post in an editorial. "First up, at New Jersey’s Delaney Hall Detention Center — which houses border-jumpers accused of crimes ranging from rape to murder — Reps. Robert Menendez Jr. and LaMonica McIver got into an altercation with ICE agents as McIver tried to force her way into the facility.

"Also protesting was Newark Mayor Ras Baraka, who ended up in cuffs and custody for his part in the fracas."

Menendez, son of the corrupt Senator, went on TV this weekend, insanely, to blame the immigration enforcement officers he and his colleagues went after. In the view of the Democrat Jacobin Party, every criminal and thug who crossed our border illegally deserves to stay here forever and hoover up infinite tax dollars.

"And Democrats get to do whatever they want, whenever they want, with zero consequences ever or else it’s fascism," says the Post.

Stupidity is not only reserved for Democrats.

The corrupt and craven Republican establishment led for years by China supporter Sen. Mitch McConnel is on its last legs.

Consider his ally, the Republican fool from North Carolina, Sen. Tom Tillis.

"Tom Tillis is part of an establishment GOP that now has waning power, has waning influence in Washington. And this is sort of the last gasp of the Mitch McConnell wing of the GOP that’s slowly disappearing," Federalist Senior Editor John Daniel Davidson said on Newsmax.

"It’s, frankly, to me, disgusting to hear someone like Tillis say that he opposes Ed Martin because he defended defendants on January 6th, when one of our own Founding Fathers, John Adams, defended British soldiers who killed American patriots. Offering legal defense for the accused is not disqualifying.

If anything, it shows Ed Martin’s commitment to the rule of law, as does the pardons that freed up resources in the DOJ to go after actual violent criminals in Washington, DC."

Yes, the Democrats are power mad, and determined to destroy our nation because they hate it. And Republicans like Tillis and McConnel? I’ve seen the spineless half of the bi-partisan combine destroy a great state of Illinois.

For Illinois and Chicago there is no reprieve, no sanctuary. The Combine chopped Chicago and Illinois to bits, and sold off the scrap. Just as they will destroy America herself.

Think of 1793 and now think of 2025. There is only one responsible thing to do:

See them clearly for who they are and what they want.

And vote like the life of your nation depends upon it.

Because it does.

Let’s hope the American people wake up and wash their eyes before the 2026 mid-term elections, so they might save the country.

If they don’t save it, at least polish the face-cages for the rats. And polish up Madame Guillotine. Because I think she’ll be busy,

Link

Economy

VDH Breaks Down Why He Thinks ‘Real Economic Boom' ‘Nobody's Talking About' Could Be Coming

2025-05-14

[Daily Caller] Hoover Institution Senior Fellow Victor Davis Hanson said Tuesday on his show that President Donald Trump’s negotiations with China and other policies could bring a "real economic boom" to the U.S.

The Trump administration began its first negotiations with China on Saturday, with Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent announcing Sunday that "substantial progress" had been made since the tariff war broke out in April. While discussing the issue on "The Victor Davis Hanson Show," Hanson questioned the "outrage" from outlets like the Wall Street Journal and said Trump is trying to save American jobs through his tariff negotiations.

"What Donald Trump is trying to do is to lower the amount of foreign capital and exchange they have at their disposal and save American jobs," Hanson said. "So if he gets this $1.2 dollar surplus down to $500 hundred million — that sounds to me like he might be able to do that. Cut it in half without destroying them. Then wean us off slowly of Chinese dependence. It’s a fantastic boom."

"What’s so weird about it is that every economist that I know of has been warning us ... that it was not sustainable to be running these huge trade deficits," Hanson added. "No other president has really addressed it. No other president has talked about the trade deficit. Nobody’s talked about the budget deficit, not since Bill Clinton and Newt Gingrich balanced the budget deficit. Nobody’s talking about the national debt. I never heard Biden — did you ever hear him say one word that we’re paying $3 billion dollars a day in interest? I didn’t."

After Trump announced tariffs against a handful of countries, China responded with retaliatory measures. While the president later placed a 90-day pause on tariffs for all nations except China, the country was hit with a 145% tariff from the U.S.

Link

Syria-Lebanon-Iran

Trump says he’ll lift sanctions on Syria, restore ties with new president Sharaa

2025-05-14

See also here.

[IsraelTimes] Meeting between leaders set for Wednesday; sources say Damascus may offer talks on normalizing relations with Israel under Abraham Accords

US President Donald Trump
...New York real estate developer, described by Dems as illiterate, racist, misogynistic, and whatever other unpleasant descriptions they can think of, elected by the rest of us as 45th and 47th President of the United States...
said Tuesday he will move to normalize relations and lift sanctions on Syria’s new government to give the country "a chance at peace."

Trump is set to meet Wednesday in Saudi Arabia

...a kingdom takingup the bulk of the Arabian peninsula, largely made up of sand and oil rigs. Its primary economic activity involves exporting oil and soaking Islamic rubes on the annual haj pilgrimage. The country supports a large number of princes in whatcha might call princely splendor. Formerly dictatorial and steeped in Olde Tyme Religion, deferring to Salafist holy men on all issues, it has now done a 180 and is making a serious effort to modernize, so as not to be left in the sand by its Gulf Arab neighbors. The holy men have been shoved to the background and the nation is now still dictatorial but somewhat rational. That doesn't make them trustworthy, but it's a start...
with Syrian President Ahmad al-Sharaa, the onetime Death Eater who last year led the overthrow of former leader Bashir Pencilneck al-Assad
Scourge of Qusayr...
. He said the effort at rapprochement came at the urging of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman

...Crown Prince and modernizer of Saudi Arabia as of 2016. The Turks hate him, so he must be all right, despite the occasional brutal murder of Qatar-owned journalists...
, the Saudi de facto ruler, and Ottoman Turkish President His Enormity, Sultan Recep Tayyip Erdogan the First
...Turkey's version of Mohammed Morsi but they voted him back in so they deserve him. It's a sin, a shame, and a felony to insult the president of Turkey. In Anatolia did Recep Bey a stately Presidential Palace decree, that has 1100 rooms. That's 968 more than in the White House, 400 more than in Versailles, and 325 more than Buckingham Palace, so you know who's really more important...
"There is a new government that will hopefully succeed," Trump said of Syria, adding, "I say good luck, Syria. Show us something special."

Syria’s Foreign Minister Asaad al-Shaibani said Tuesday that Trump’s decision to lift sanctions was a "pivotal turning point for the Syrian people, as we move toward a future of stability, self-sufficiency and genuine reconstruction after years of destructive war."

Sharaa will be the first Syrian leader to meet an American president since the late Hafez al-Assad met Bill Clinton
...former Democratic president of the U.S. Bill was the second U.S. president to be impeached, the first to deny that oral sex was sex, the first to have difficulty with the definition of the word is...
in Geneva in 2000.

It was a major boost for the Syrian president, who at one point was imprisoned in Iraq for his role in the insurgency following the 2003 US-led invasion of the Arab country. Sharaa was named president of Syria in January, a month after a stunning offensive by Death Eater groups led by Sharaa’s Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, formerly al-Nusra, before that it was called something else
...al-Qaeda's Syrian affiliate, from which sprang the Islamic State...
, or HTS, stormed Damascus, ending the 54-year rule of the Assad family.

According to the London Times, citing unnamed security sources, Sharaa may use the meeting to offer talks on normalizing relations with Israel under the Abraham Accords.

A US security source confirmed the possibility of Damascus joining the accords, with the United Arab Emirates as a mediator. Sharaa confirmed last week that Abu Dhabi is already acting as an intermediary between Israel and Syria, with talks focusing on security and intelligence matters and confidence-building between the two countries, which have no official relations.

The source added that Washington and Gulf countries are seeking to pull Syria away from Iranian influence. Tehran, sworn to Israel’s destruction, propped up the former Assad regime throughout the bloody Syrian civil war.

The US has been weighing how to handle Sharaa since he took power in December. Gulf leaders have rallied behind the new government in Damascus and will want Trump to follow, believing it is a bulwark against Iran’s return to influence in Syria.

Then-president Joe The Big Guy Biden
...46th president of the U.S. Joe's wife and daughter weren't killed by a drunk driver. He didn't graduate with three or even two degrees, wasn't in the top half of his law class, and his daddy didn't come home from a hard day's work in the mines and play football with the guys. The NAACP hasn't endorsed him every time he's run....
left the decision to Trump, whose administration has yet to formally recognize the new Syrian government.

"The president agreed to say hello to the Syrian President while in Saudi Arabia tomorrow," the White House said before Trump’s remarks.

The comments marked a striking change in tone from Trump and put him at odds with Israel, which has been deeply skeptical of Sharaa’s turban past and cautioned against swift recognition of the new government.

Formerly known by the nom de guerre Abu Mohammed al-Golani, Sharaa joined the ranks of al-Qaeda gunnies battling US forces in Iraq after the US-led invasion in 2003. He still faces a warrant for his arrest on terrorism charges in Iraq, and the US once offered $10 million for information about his whereabouts because of his links to al-Qaeda.

In 2011, Sharaa came back to his home country, where he led the branch of al-Qaeda that was known as the Nusra Front. He later changed the name of his group to Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) and cut links with al-Qaeda.

Syria has had fraught relations with Washington since the days of the Cold War, when Damascus maintained close links with the Soviet Union and later became Iran’s closest ally in the Arab world.

London-based Syrian analyst Ibrahim Hamidi said Trump’s meeting with Sharaa marks a "strategic shift" in the country, with Iran
...a theocratic Shiite state divided among the Medes, the Persians, and the (Arab) Elamites. Formerly a fairly civilized nation ruled by a Shah, it became a victim of Islamic revolution in 1979. The nation is today noted for spontaneously taking over other countries' embassies, maintaining whorehouses run by clergymen, involvement in international drug trafficking, and financing sock puppet militias to extend the regime's influence. The word Iran is a cognate form of Aryan. The abbreviation IRGC is the same idea as Stürmabteilung (or SA). The term Supreme Guide is a the modern version form of either Duce or Führer or maybe both. They hate ~~Jews~~ ~~Zionists~~ Jews. Their economy is based on the production of oil and vitriol...
forced to leave and Russia, which also backed Assad and now gives him sanctuary, weakened.

"The Syrian-American meetings in Riyadh open the gate for the two sides to start discussing disagreements and issues between them with an atmosphere of dialogue," said Hamidi, editor-in-chief of the Arabic magazine Al Majalla. "This is important."

Link

-Short Attention Span Theater-

Shaddup, Already! The Air Force One 'Gift' Is Having Its Intended Effect

2025-05-14

[PJMedia] In 1974, President Richard Nixon gifted Egyptian President Anwar Sadat a Sikorsky VH-3A Sea King helicopter similar to Marine One. After chain-smoking first lady Pat Nixon asked Chinese Premier Zhou Enlai for a cigarette and commented on how cute the pandas were in his special pack, Zhou gifted them two giant pandas. The Nixons also received a set of crown jewels. Azerbaijan gifted Hillary and Bill Clinton
...former Democratic president of the U.S. Bill was the second U.S. president to be impeached, the first to deny that oral sex was sex, the first to have difficulty with the definition of the word is...
a priceless handmade rug with their images on it. President Reagan received a white horse from Mexico. And on and on it goes.

Now, everyone is having a conniption fit over President Trump possibly receiving a 747 jetliner that Qatar
...an emirate on the east coast of the Arabian Peninsula. It sits on some really productive gas and oil deposits, which produces the highest per capita income in the world. They piss it all away on religion, financing the Moslem Brotherhood and several al-Qaeda affiliates. Home of nutbag holy manYusuf al-Qaradawi...
currently uses as a charter jet.

Calm down, everyone.

Unless you're Crooked Hillary Clinton
<q>Crooked Hillary</q> Clinton

...former first lady, former secretary of state, former presidential candidate, Conqueror of Benghazi, Heroine of Tuzla, formerly described by her supporters as the smartest woman in the world, usually described by the rest of us as The Thing That Wouldn't Go Away. Politix is not one of her talents, but it's something she keeps trying to do...
and order staff to pack up all the good stuff out of the White House and send it to your new home, presidents can't keep gifts like that. In fact, they can't keep anything worth more than about $500. Even Hillary couldn't. She had to return $190,000 worth of furniture, dishes, rugs, TVs, and other items. They were given a chance to purchase other items and paid out $28,000 to keep them.

Aside from concerns I have about the Qatari plane being a security fiasco because Qatar is not our friend and hasn't met a jihadi they don't love and want to fund, all of those spendy gifts go to the woke National Archives or other government entity and are doled out for loaning to museums and presidential libraries after the administration has used them.

The two presidential Air Force One jets now in use have been flying since 1990 and have been used by every president since George H.W. Bush. The old ones were mothballed. This is the reason why former President Reagan was able to park one of those out-of-commission bad boys at the Reagan Library.

But the discussion about the Boeing jetliner being gifted to the Trump administration has lit a fire under Boeing's CEO to speed up the delivery of the Air Force Ones.

The Boeing jets have been on order since 2015, when Trump 45 complained that the time and materials contract was a disaster and demanded a renegotiation for an all-inclusive deal for one price and not a penny more in 2018. Trump saved the Air Force $1.4 billion over the previous deal.

Initially, Boeing said it would get them out the door in 2024, but Trump said he wanted the craft delivered by 2021. But Trump left office, and nobody seemed to ride herd on Boeing. Recently, delivery dates were pushed back to some time in 2029.

Trump 47 has been complaining about the slow production since his first days in office.

But labor problems at Boeing and the defense contracting giant's difficulty in finding parts and components, along with other supply chain issues, have made it difficult to finish the two jetliners.

Ortburg now says he hopes to have them done by 2027, before Trump leaves his second term of office.

Qatar made the offer of the plane in February, and President Trump toured the craft when it was parked in Palm Beach, Fla., near the Summer White House at Mar-a-Lago.

Let's recap: Boeing's late and probably over budget. Qatar offered a plane a couple of months ago. Trump toured said plane, noting that it will cost millions to retrofit it to minimum Air Force One standards. And Boeing is left sputtering about speeding up production.

The mediacrats are shilling the fake news that Trump only wants the Qatari 747 for himself because they can't expand their minds to consider that what Trump really wants is for Boeing to get off their backsides and get these done. That's applying pressure on Boeing.

Trump just did Boeing a solid in the recent deal with the UK.

The company is a defense and national security asset, and now the man in the Oval Office wants them to get their production lines moving.

Trump to Boeing: Help me help you, or I may buy a new plane and ask another company to kit it out. It's up to you, Boeing.

Link

Home Front: Politix

James Carville says Democrats can't afford to lie like 'Republicans do'

2025-05-07

[NYPOST] Democratic political strategist James Carville expressed frustration with the state of his party on his podcast Thursday, arguing that Republicans are able to get away with lying while Democrats

...every time you hear the phrase white people, white supremacy, white anything but paint, you're listening to a Democrat. Ask him/her/it to reimagine something for you; they do that a lot, though not well. They can hear a dog whistle a mile or two away. They invented the spoils system and Tammany Hall, and inspired the addition of the word (Thomas) Nasty to the English language. They want to stop continental drift and repeal the law of unintended side effects...
are held to a higher standard of credibility.

Talking to guest Ryan Lizza, a journalist, he said, "People say to me all the time, ’James, why don’t we just do like the Republicans do? Just stand up and lie?’ Because our f—ing people wouldn’t stand for it!" Carville said. "If I stood up and lied, you would be the first person to say, ’James Carville lost all credibility last night when he said X, Y and Z.’"

Carville, a longtime political talking head, was a top strategist for former President Bill Clinton
...former Democratic president of the U.S. Bill was the second U.S. president to be impeached, the first to deny that oral sex was sex, the first to have difficulty with the definition of the word is...
’s 1992 campaign.

"Yeah, I can spin," Carville continued. "I can shade. Everybody does that. They just look you right in the eye and lie!" He added, "And then our people say, ’We ought to lie like them!’ No, we shouldn’t! ’Cause they would not do that. It would not go over well."

President Clinton was impeached in 1998 by the House of Representatives on charges of perjury and obstruction of justice connected to his testimony about a relationship with White House intern Monica Lewinsky.

The issue of authenticity came up more recently during the 2024 election. A new book claimed Democrats had major concerns about former President Joe The Big Guy Biden
...46th president of the U.S. Sleazy Dem machine politician, paterfamilias of the Biden Crime Family...
’s decline and cognitive abilities ahead of his June debate against President Donald Trump
...dictatorial for repealing some (but not all) of the diktats of his predecessor, misogynistic because he likes pretty girls, homophobic because he doesn't think gender bending should be mandatory, truly a man for all seasons...
, despite publicly maintaining that the former president was fit to serve another four years.

Link

Government Corruption

Regarding Trump’s many “due process” controversies

2025-04-28

Jay Hubbard
1h ·
Regarding Trump’s many “due process” controversies, part of the reason there’s confusion is that differing legal pathways exist from which to achieve deportation, all of which have different standards, and some of which aren’t subject to due process whatsoever.…
— clarice feldman (@claricefeldman7) April 27, 2025

Continued
I believe people are mixing the legal standards up or are unaware of them. I also believe the legacy media is demonstrating double standards in pretending these presidential powers aren’t (for the most part) lawful.

Take, for instance, the IIRIRA.

In 1996, congress specifically authorized the executive branch to conduct non-judicial deportations NOT SUBJECT TO DUE PROCESS. [a] While one might argue against this on ethical grounds, one cannot argue that the president lacks the authority. The Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act of 1996 (IIRIRA) was passed by Bill Clinton [a], enforced by George W. Bush, and expanded by Barack Obama, with support from both political parties.

PER CONGRESSIONAL RECORDS:
“The expedited removal process, created by the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act of 1996, is codified in INA § 235(b)(1).

The statute permits the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to summarily remove aliens arriving at a designated U.S. port of entry (arriving aliens) WITHOUT FURTHER HEARING OR REVIEW if they are inadmissible either because they (1) lack valid entry documents, or (2) tried to procure their admission into the United States through fraud or misrepresentation. INA § 235(b)(1) also authorizes—but does not require—DHS to extend application of expedited removal to "certain other aliens" inadmissible on the same grounds if they (1) were not admitted or paroled into the United States by immigration authorities and (2) cannot establish at least two years' continuous physical presence in the United States at the time of apprehension.” [a]

To be clear, this wasn’t always the case. As the ACLU wrote back in the Obama administration:

“The deportation system has dramatically changed over the past 19 years – moving from a judicial system prior to 1996, where the vast majority of people facing deportation had immigration court hearings, to a system today of nonjudicial removals, where 75 percent of people removed do not see a judge before being expelled from the U.S. The numbers are staggering: in 1995, 1,400 immigrants were subject to nonjudicial removals, representing 3 percent of total deportations. By FY 2012 that number had sharply increased to 313,000 nonjudicial removals.” [b] So to reiterate, all the way back in 2014, the ACLU specifically cited that 75% of Obama’s deportees had NO DUE PROCESS.

[b] I’m outlining these complaints from the ACLU not necessarily to agree with them nor to disagree with them, but to demonstrate that this presidential power was well established prior to Trump. Unless you were deeply involved in following the ACLU’s advocacy, you likely weren’t aware anyone took issue with it. This - yet again - exposes the legacy media’s double standards. They were silent regarding Obama’s use of non-judicial removals, going so far as to let him classify his administration as “scandal free”[c], yet when Trump’s in office, non-judicial removals become a scandal.

Per the American Immigration Council:

“Individuals placed in expedited removal generally have no right to challenge their deportation in federal court, thanks to jurisdiction-stripping provisions in the 1996 law which created the process. …Individuals may only bring a lawsuit challenging their expedited removal order if they are a lawful permanent resident, or someone already determined to be a refugee or granted asylum, who has been wrongfully subject to expedited removal. In 2020, the Supreme Court upheld this law, finding that it did not violate the right to habeas corpus or due process. Expedited removal has become a bedrock of the United States’ processing of noncitizens, particularly at our southern border.” [d]

The law also made deportation eligibility retroactive and introduced penalties for overstaying visas, including bars on reentry for certain periods. It also made it more difficult for undocumented immigrants to adjust their status, even if they had family members who were US citizens. [e] I’m again pointing this out not to argue for or against it, but merely to demonstrate that these expanded authorities existed prior to Trump. This is not a power grab. His office was granted this authority by democratically elected legislators.

Up until now, I’ve been discussing the 1996 law which allowed expedited removal under Section 235 of the INA. That pivoted away from the usual removal proceedings which were governed under Section 240 of the INA. It’s Section 240 (the usual process) where suspected illegal aliens are afforded a hearing (due process) in front of an immigration judge. [f] If someone doesn’t qualify for expedited removal, only THEN are they entitled to that formal hearing.

That was the case until Trump named some groups “terrorist organizations” while invoking the Alien Enemies Act, however.

When Trump entered office the 2nd time, he designated several globally powerful gangs as terrorist organizations. These massive organized crime networks had been competing with governments around the world for control, often by forcing businesses to pay them “taxes”. They were guilty of human trafficking, drug trafficking, murder, rape, extortion, and racketeering.

This is worth pointing out since the Anti-Terrorist and Effective Death Penalty Act,” also passed in 1996, criminalized the act of providing material support or resources to terrorist organizations [g] and has been argued by the New York Law Review to have encroached on due process. Again, as is the theme of this editorial, I’m not noting this to agree or disagree, only to demonstrate that the power existed before Trump. It was a 1996 law, and formally designating someone as a terrorist means they legally have different entitlements.

As for the Alien Enemies Act? Here, too, exists an authority granted to the presidency by congress in 1798. “It allows the president to detain or deport the natives and citizens of an enemy nation. The law permits the president to target these immigrants WITHOUT A HEARING and based only on their country of birth or citizenship. Although the law was enacted to prevent foreign espionage and sabotage in wartime, it can be — and has been — wielded against immigrants.” [h]

CONCLUSION:
Whether violating the concept of due process concerns you or not, these ARE legal pathways toward deportation. Each case is different, where some were deported under the expedited removal standard, others deported under Section 240, and others deported under the Alien Enemies Act, but these legal pathways were all created by Congress. I won’t deny that the efficacy and morality of all laws are worth debating, but that’s different from legality.

Also, why wasn’t there a national debate on these laws while Biden, Obama, Bush, or Clinton were president? Why now? That they are becoming scandalous NOW despite being barely noticed in prior administrations is a testament to the legacy media’s political bias. It's argued that a rogue President is engaging in an unlawful power grab, but that’s simply false.

These laws existed prior to Trump. These laws were enforced prior to Trump. These powers were democratically granted to the executive branch by Congress. If you don’t like them, fine, petition Congress to change the law, but don’t falsely claim the President is acting unlawfully.

Link

Home Front: Politix

How China beat the US Clinton at its own free trade game

2025-04-20

[FoxBusness] China was welcomed into the WTO in 2001, kicking off the flood of low-cost Chinese goods into U.S. markets

The U.S. has known for decades that China has been stealing its intellectual property, and even Trump’s 25% tariffs under his first term could not stop it, prompting bolder action this time around, according to Gatestone Institute fellow Gordon Chang.

From favored trade status to forced technology transfers, Beijing leveraged American goodwill, market access and corporate greed to become Washington’s most powerful strategic competitor.

Around the turn of the century, the U.S. gave up its market dominance on critical minerals, began mass-importing Chinese goods and exporting intellectual property to access Chinese markets – all while the Chinese Communist Party grew into America's biggest foe.

"The Chinese have been predatory, and they've engaged in criminal acts, theft of U.S. intellectual property. But the story here is not China," said China expert and Gatestone Institute fellow Gordon Chang. "The story here is that we allowed them to get away with this. We knew what was going on. We've known it for decades, and we never really took effective action to stop it."

Here's a look back at five times China manipulated U.S. industry and policymakers into more favorable economic terms:

MOST FAVORED NATION (MFN) STATUS AND WTO ACCESSION (1990S–2001)
Throughout the 1990s, China lobbied aggressively to normalize trade relations – and found a key ally in President Bill Clinton. By 2000, Congress granted China permanent normal trade relations, paving the way for its entry into the World Trade Organization in 2001.

At the time, China was already the world’s sixth-largest economy, with a population topping one billion. It was a stark contrast from the decades prior, when its communist system had kept the country largely closed off from global markets.

And while China was already known for human rights abuses and heavy state control over its economy, it made vague promises of reform and cooperation – promises that helped win over the U.S.

The U.S. hoped that bringing China into the WTO would check its communist government and accelerate its shift toward a market economy. By joining, China would have to cut tariffs and pledge to protect intellectual property rights.

Clinton wasn’t alone in believing that trade with China would also export Western values. "No nation on Earth has discovered a way to import the world’s goods and services while stopping foreign ideas at the border," his predecessor, President George H.W. Bush, had said.

China’s WTO accession and Most Favored Nation status opened the floodgates to low-cost Chinese goods. Imports to the U.S. surged from $102.3 billion in 2001 to $426.9 billion in 2023, according to the U.S. Bureau of Economic Data.

In the other direction, China imported around $26 billion worth of U.S. goods in 2001, according to Chinese customs data, compared with $147.8 billion in U.S. exports to China in 2023, according to U.S. import data.

In the 1990s, Congress raised the de minimis threshold for imports to $200 – and in 2016, it jumped again to $800. Under that rule, goods valued below the threshold could enter the U.S. duty-free and without formal customs checks, a system intended to ease low-value shipments but since widely exploited by Chinese e-commerce sellers. President Donald Trump recently moved to eliminate the threshold for Chinese goods, closing a loophole that had allowed billions in untaxed imports to flood the U.S. market.

RARE EARTH METAL DOMINANCE AS A PRESSURE TOOL (2010–PRESENT)
As recently as the 1980s, the U.S. was a key player in the rare earth minerals industry, but price increases led its flagship Mountain Pass mine in California to close in 2000.

China, with its cheap labor, near-nonexistent environmental regulations and cash flow from the government, now controls over 80% of the rare earth minerals market, which is crucial for electronics, defense systems and green energy.

In 2010, China cut off Japan’s access to its mineral market in a diplomatic spat over a fishing trawler and territorial disputes. While not directly impacting the U.S., the move spooked Washington by proving China was willing to use its dominance of the market strategically. It shaped trade talks around tech and minerals – and prompted serious concerns about U.S. dependence on China’s mineral market that have yet to be fully addressed even today.

The incident reframed China in the American mindset – not just as a trading partner, but as a rising strategic competitor. It also sparked broader cooperation between the U.S. and its Indo-Pacific allies.

Since 2023, China has been instituting further crackdowns on mineral exports aimed at hurting the U.S., limiting access to gallium, germanium, antimony, graphite, tungsten and more.

The Obama, Biden and Trump administrations have all moved to prioritize domestic rare earths mining, but the onerous licensing process and environmental regulations mean domestic projects can take decades to get off the ground.

TRUMP’S FIRST TRADE WAR (2018-2019)
In March 2018, President Trump launched a protracted trade war with China, accusing Beijing of "ripping off" the U.S. and stealing intellectual property. He began by imposing global tariffs of 25% on steel and 10% on aluminum under Section 232, citing national security concerns.

China retaliated with $3 billion in tariffs on U.S. exports like fruit, wine and pork.

Then in April, the U.S. trade representative listed $50 billion in Chinese goods for tariffs under Section 301, citing IP theft and tech transfer.

China responded with tariffs on soybeans, cars and airplanes, and Trump, under pressure from impacted farmers, offered bailouts for the agriculture industry.

The trade war escalated in tit-for-tat fashion, with Trump slapping 25% tariffs on hundreds of billions of dollars’ worth of Chinese goods – and Beijing responding in kind – until tensions eased in 2020.

In January 2020, Trump and Xi signed a "phase one" trade deal where China agreed to increase agricultural purchases by $32 billion over two years, purchase more energy and manufactured goods and improve IP protection and cease forced tech transfers. The U.S., in turn, agreed to suspend new tariffs and roll back some existing ones.

China then doubled down on its "Made in China 2025" strategy, ramping up self-reliance in key sectors like technology and agriculture. Beijing’s central bank stepped in to cushion any economic fallout.

PRESSURE ON U.S. CORPORATIONS TO SELF-CENSOR OR SUPPORT BEIJING'S POSITIONS
China has long used its massive market leverage to coerce U.S. businesses into compliance - adding indirect pressure to U.S. policy discussions.

Chinese actors have pressured various U.S. companies – Nike, Meta, Disney and the NBA - to toe the line on Taiwan, Hong Kong and the abuse of Uyghurs in the Xinjiang province or risk losing market access.

In 2019, China lashed out at the NBA after the general manager of the Houston Rockets tweeted support for pro-democracy protests in Hong Kong. Beijing swiftly suspended NBA broadcasts and severed ties with the Rockets entirely.

A former Meta employee turned whistleblower, Sarah Wynn-Williams, has alleged that CEO Mark Zuckerberg developed and tested custom censorship tools to offer China in hopes of gaining access to its tightly controlled internet market. A Meta spokesperson has called Wynn-Williams' claims "divorced from reality" and false.

TECH LICENSING AND IP TRANSFER TO ENTER MARKETS
China has often required tech transfer or joint ventures as the price of doing business within the country, leveraging market access to gain access to intellectual property.

U.S. firms, hungry for Chinese consumers, complied. But the demands gave China enormous economic benefit while weakening U.S. innovation and IP competitiveness.

The practices were the grounds for Trump’s Section 301 investigations, first launched under the first term, that led to tariffs.

Chinese theft of American IP costs between $225 billion and $600 billion annually, according to a 2018 report from the U.S. Trade Representative’s office.

Link

-Great Cultural Revolution

Democrats Are Now The 'People's Revolutionary Party' — Issues & Insights

2025-04-17

[ISSUESINSIGHTS] In February, a bunch of centrist Democratic officials gathered in ritzy Potomac, Maryland, to complain that the party had become too radicalized and needed to ''get out of elite circles and into real communities (e.g., tailgates, gun shows, local restaurants, churches).''

The response of rank-and-file Democrats
...every time you hear the phrase white people, white supremacy, white anything but paint, you're listening to a Democrat. Ask him/her/it to reimagine something for you; they do that a lot, though not well. They can hear a dog whistle a mile or two away. They invented the spoils system and Tammany Hall, and inspired the addition of the word (Thomas) Nasty to the English language. They want to stop continental drift and repeal the law of unintended side effects...
? ''Go left, young gender-fluid person!!''

This week, RealClearPolitics reported on a poll from Survey USA that found 74% of Democrats either want the party to be even more ''progressive'' (50%) or like it just the way it is (24%). Fewer than one in five wants the party to move toward the center.

Yes, some are trying to keep sanity alive.

Caliphornia, an impregnable bastion of the Democratic Party, Gov. Gavin Governor Hair Gel Newsom
Gavin <q>Governor Hair Gel</q> Newsom

...mayor of San Franciscoas it transformed itself into Poopville, currently governor of Californiaas it transforms itself into Cinderland...
— who desperately wants to be president — has been pretending to be a moderate by inviting conservatives onto his podcast and saying things such as ''the Democratic brand is toxic.''

Former reliably Democrat Chicago, aka The Windy City or Mobtown
...home of Al Capone, the Chicago Black Sox, a succession of Daleys, Barak Obama, and Rahm Emmanuel...
Mayor Rahm Emanuel is warning Democrats that they ''can't be a party that believes in equity and allows two-thirds of your kids who can't read.'' He's also said that Democrats have ''sunk'' their own party.

Democratic New Mexico District Attorney Sam Bregman is running for governor against the ''radical Left.''

But this isn't the 1990s, and there is no interest or appetite among Democrats in reviving Bill Clinton
...former Democratic president of the U.S. Bill was the second U.S. president to be impeached, the first to deny that oral sex was sex, the first to have difficulty with the definition of the word is...
's ''New Democrat'' corpse.

The party is now irretrievably in the grip of those toxic, party-sinking radical leftists. In the Survey USA poll, there wasn't a single demographic group where even a plurality felt the party should be more moderate.

More than half of young, urban, college-educated, well-paid whites — the very people who make up the ''elite circles'' and will never venture into ''real communities'' — want the party to move further to the left.

Meanwhile,
...back at the shootout, another bullet hole appeared in Butch's hat......
avowed socialists Bernie Sanders

...The ~~only~~ first openly Socialist member of the U.S. Senate. Sanders was Representative-for-Life from Vermont until moving to the Senate for the rest of his life in 2006, assuming the seat vacated by Jim Jeffords. He ran for the 2016 nomination for president, to be cheated out of it by Hillary Clinton, then went back to being an Independent socialist, waiting for 2020 to roll around...
and Alexandria Boom Boom Ocasio-Cortez
Dem Congressgirl from da Bronx in Noo Yawk and leader of the Mean Girl Caucus in Congress. One of the Great Minds of the 21st Century, she is known as much for her innaleck as for her dance moves. She is all in favor of socialism, even though she's fuzzy on the details. She was the inventor of the Green New Deal, though she doesn't talk about it much anymore
are drawing big crowds and generating loads of fawning press for their ''fight the oligarchy
... derived from the Greek words oligos, a few and the verb archo, to rule, to govern, to command. Oligarchies are invariably effectual rather than established, to whit, they disguise themselves as other systems, working as the real government behind the face of of democracy, fascism, socialism, monarchy, or what have you...
'' tour.

Link

-Great Cultural Revolution

Fired Insubordinate Officers Reveal Massive U.S. Military Resentment Against Elected Civilian Command

2025-04-16

[Federalist] Politics is the domain of the president, not the oath-bearing members of the uniformed services.

There is a cancer in America’s military ranks, and it must be expunged before it’s too late. That cancer lies in uniformed service members’ widespread rejection of the uniquely American concept of civilian control of the military and disregard for the absolute necessity that America’s military officers remain apolitical in the face of the constitutional will of the electorate.

Recent events reveal this cancer, and they include the relief for cause of Navy Vice Adm. Shoshana Chatﬁeld after she reportedly refused to hang photos of President Donald Trump and Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth on her headquarters’ customary "Chain of Command" board and reportedly told her subordinates in a town hall that she would "wait [the Trump administration] out" the next four years. They also include the relief for cause of Col. Sussanah Meyers, commander of the U.S. Space Force’s base in Greenland, after she openly questioned (to all of her subordinates via email) Vice President J.D. Vance’s official pronouncements regarding the United States, Greenland, and Denmark.

Since Trump’s inauguration, numerous other senior generals and admirals have been relieved by President Trump for various publicly unspeciﬁed reasons, including the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Air Force Gen. Charles "CQ" Brown; Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Lisa Franchetti; Adm. Linda Lee Fagan, the commandant of the Coast Guard; and Air Force Gen. Timothy D. Haugh, director of the National Security Agency and commander of U.S. Cyber Command. Each of these four-star ﬁrings is publicly shrouded in a certain degree of mystery, but rumors abound that so-called diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) played a part in one way or another.

Admittedly, a president ﬁring his senior generals is not a new thing. Barack Obama ﬁred his senior general in Afghanistan, Army Gen. Stan McChrystal, after a Rolling Stone article revealed derisive comments by McChrystal and his staff regarding Obama’s leadership. Harry S. Truman ﬁred one of America’s most famous and revered military leaders, Army Gen. Douglas MacArthur, after MacArthur repeatedly disobeyed Truman’s orders regarding the Korean War. And Abraham Lincoln famously had no problem ﬁring his senior Army generals in the heat of the Civil War. What made these ﬁrings so noteworthy, however, is that they were rare exceptions that proved the rule of America’s senior generals and admirals wholly respecting civilian control of the military.

What we see now is not Obama and McChrystal, Truman and MacArthur, or Lincoln and his failed generals. The widespread nature of the current problem looks and feels like something completely new in the American experience and appears to be pervasive across the force.

I am a retired U.S. Army colonel. My service record runs a typical gamut for an old colonel, with tours in tactical units (including service in Afghanistan and Iraq) interspersed with service at high-level military headquarters in and around Washington, D.C. Nowadays, I run an account on X with a little more than 200,000 followers. I offer commentary on political and social issues, with a particular emphasis on the military. As a result, I have many military followers, including some still on active duty. I offer active-duty service members a conduit to anonymously share disturbing military trends.

Since Trump’s inauguration, I have been ﬂooded with reports of insubordination in the ranks toward Trump and Hegseth. Those reports range from fairly senior officers in the Pentagon showing open disrespect around the E-Ring coffee maker, all the way down to junior enlisted disrespecting their president and secretary of defense in the ship’s galley or the chow hall.

As one active-duty Army officer recently described to me regarding the experiences of a female Army officer colleague:

Women across the unit are coming to [her] asking about what happens to them. It’s in their minds that SECDEF is going to pull them from combat arms and reclass them. Zero evidence of that but doesn’t stop the rumor mill anyway. Those rumors are playing the telephone game across all soldiers, men and women alike. So they are all on this "f*** Trump f*** Hegseth" train.

For over 235 years, the idea of a civilian commander-in-chief has been a sacred premise guiding our military, enlisted and officer alike. I grew up around the Army, joined as a young man, served for 22 years, and have kept my ﬁnger on the pulse of the defense establishment since I retired from active duty. I can honestly say that never once in that time was I ever made aware of the political leanings of any officer superior to me.

Rarely would I even hear political thoughts from my peers or subordinates. In fact, I recall that early in my career, senior officers advised me not to vote in elections, as such an act might suggest I was a political partisan. The duty to remain apolitical was simply that important to officers of that bygone age. We saw ourselves as a sort of band of violent monks, bound by sacred oaths.

To me, that bygone commitment was never more evident than when Bill Clinton became president. During Clinton’s 1992 campaign, it came out that as a young man he had avoided the draft, in part because he "loath[ed]" the military. Vietnam was still a raw wound in the minds of many senior officers and senior enlisted, yet despite Clinton being arguably the most anti-military president in U.S. history, he was respected as the duly elected commander-in-chief, and signs of "resistance" in the uniformed ranks were impossible to detect. We honored our oaths.

Somewhere along the way, something changed. I believe that change has taken place within the senior ranks and, by way of example, has spread throughout the force. We must once again make senior officers loyal to their oath, and the rest of the force will follow.

I have heard from some anti-Trump officers that it is acceptable for them to challenge Trump and be "disloyal" to him on political matters because while the enlisted oath of office includes the phrase "that I will obey the orders of the President of the United States," no such words regarding the president appear in the officer oath of office. This idea is highly disturbing.

It suggests that officers are not bound to follow the lawful orders of the president if they disagree politically. Not only is this contrary to the sacred officer tradition of being apolitical, but it is also contrary to the part of the officers’ oath that requires officers to "support and defend the Constitution" (after all, the president’s military role arises in the Constitution). Finally, it is contrary to the actual commission of all U.S. military officers, which states in part: "And this officer is to observe and follow such orders and directions from time to time as may be given by the President of the United States of America."

The trends we are seeing feel dangerously close to an embrace of 1970s South American-style military juntas. Think about Gen. Mark Milley telling China he would warn them about U.S. military activity. Think about Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman using his position on the National Security Council as a springboard for impeaching a president because he did not like the way that president was lawfully discharging his duties. These are not the marks of healthy civilian control of the military. They are instead marks of a military approaching the rationalization of a coup.

I have heard numerous theories as to how we got here, ranging from "Obama purged all the good generals" to "Gen Z are too narcissistic for selﬂess sacriﬁce," but I attribute the breakdown quite directly to DEI policies and practices. I do not mean that the advancement of officers for DEI reasons is the cause. Rather, the inculcation of DEI policies as a core ethos of military service has been monstrously destructive. Our military has always been driven by core values, such as, "Don’t give up the ship," "Duty, Honor, Country," and "Always Faithful." Traditionally, those values have been apolitical and solely revolved around the military’s fundamental mission of defeating America’s battleﬁeld enemies.

Somewhere in these early years of the 21st century, however, DEI also became a central ethos. One need only read the policy pronouncements of the likes of C.Q. Brown and Lisa Franchetti to see that they embraced so-called diversity for diversity’s sake and that DEI policies became a core ethos of America’s military — a new "warrior ethos" grounded not in warﬁghting but in a purely political and public policy doctrine.

So on the one hand you have a president elected to purge the political doctrine of DEI from America’s government, and on the other hand you have a generation of senior generals and admirals who mistakenly view DEI as an apolitical military ethos, every bit as essential to the military’s lineage and traditions as Audie Murphy, the Medal of Honor, and the USS Constitution. Thus, when Donald Trump seeks to exercise his constitutional powers to purge a purely political doctrine, the generals and admirals mistakenly see this as an effort to purge a fundamental, essential, and apolitical military ethos. This gives them license to feel justiﬁed in "resisting" the lawful orders of their commander-in-chief and engaging in insubordination as they falsely imagine they are protecting a core competency of our nation’s defense.

Fortunately, ﬁxing this problem is not that hard. It merely requires some extreme intestinal fortitude by Trump, Hegseth, and the military department secretaries in the face of a media determined to discredit their every move. The solution lies in two parts: education and example-setting.

Education will involve reinvigorated training, in every service and at every level, regarding the military’s duty of loyalty to elected civilian leaders and their lawful orders. A standard curriculum must be developed in the Department of Defense regarding those constitutional duties, and that curriculum must be taught in great detail at every level and in every professional development course, from basic training for every recruit up to the "charm school" for new generals and admirals.

Example-setting will mean more of what we have already seen: the relief for cause of senior officers for insubordinate behavior. But that’s not enough. Vice Adm. Chatﬁeld and Col. Meyers will no doubt soon be on MSNBC regaling us all with tales of the illegality of the Trump administration. Trump and Hegseth must take a more drastic approach, and the answer to that approach lies in Article 88 of the Uniform Code of Military Justice, which reads as follows:

Contempt toward officials: Any commissioned officer who uses contemptuous words against the President, the Vice President, Congress, the Secretary of Defense, the Secretary of a military department, the Secretary of Homeland Security, or the Governor or legislature of any State, Commonwealth, or possession in which he is on duty or present shall be punished as a court-martial may direct.

This is the tool by which senior insubordinate officers must be made an example. While I doubt any generals or admirals will soon be breaking rocks at Leavenworth, the mere act of initiating a few well-publicized courts martial will drive home the message: Politics is the domain of the president, not the oath-bearing members of the uniformed services.

Good order and discipline must be restored. There is a cancer in the ranks of America’s military, and it must be expunged before it’s too late.

Link

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