Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

The poor and middle-class pay taxes, the rich pay accountants, the wealthy pay politicians.

A norm that restrains only one side really is not a norm – it’s a trap.

You don’t get to peddle hatred on saturday and offer condolences on sunday.

No offense, but this thread hasn’t been about you for quite a while.

If you voted for Trump, you don’t get to speak about ethics, morals, or rule of law.

Whoever he was, that guy was nuts.

There is no right way to do the wrong thing.

Republicans in disarray!

Conservatism: there are people the law protects but does not bind and others who the law binds but does not protect.

Too often we confuse noise with substance. too often we confuse setbacks with defeat.

This fight is for everything.

Oppose, oppose, oppose. Do not congratulate. This is not business as usual.

Jack Smith: “Why did you start campaigning in the middle of my investigation?!”

I am pretty sure Katy Tur wasn’t always such a bootlicking sycophant.

Their boy Ron is an empty plastic cup that will never know pudding.

Republican speaker of the house Mike Johnson is the bland and smiling face of evil.

JFC, are there no editors left at that goddamn rag?

Consistently wrong since 2002

The cruelty is the point; the law be damned.

I might just take the rest of the day off and do even more nothing than usual.

Let’s bury these fuckers at the polls 2 years from now.

The willow is too close to the house.

The press swings at every pitch, we don’t have to.

GOP baffled that ‘we don’t care if you die’ is not a winning slogan.

You are here: Home / Foreign Affairs / LTG Flynn: The Primer

LTG Flynn: The Primer

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Rumors are flying that President Elect Trump has chosen/selected/designated LTG (ret) Flynn as his National Security Advisor. This position does not require Senate confirmation. The only thing I’ve seen is the MSNBC crawl – nothing else. The National Security Advisor is basically the defense, foreign, security, and intelligence policy gatekeeper for the President. In many ways the position is a Chief of Staff position for these areas. When they do their jobs well, they deconflict disputes between the various principles and senior deputies from the defense, foreign affairs, security, and intelligence portions of the Interagency and manage the National Security Staff. The classic organizational document for this is National Security Council Paper 68 (NSC-68) issued under President Truman. Each President modifies and adapts the National Security Staff structure and processes to better suit their preferred leadership style. Here’s the link to President Obama’s orders restructuring the National Security Council System to fit the needs of his Administration.

If, indeed, LTG (ret) Flynn is the next National Security Advisor, it makes sense to get a better idea of how he understands the global system and the threats, challenges, and opportunities facing the US and how the US should approach them. Fortunately for us, al Jazeera English’s Mehdi Hasan got LTG (ret) Flynn to join him in committing an act of journalism and reporting. Hasan’s interview with Flynn is below.

Reader Interactions

192Comments

  5. 5.

    lamh36

    Hey Adam, I posted this in one of the previous threads. I was waiting to see one of your post to ask you what you think.

    @asnoel
    Richard Engel just said on NBC that some generals are reading the Constitution to determine their authority to override the President. Wow.
    12:37 AM – 9 Nov 2016

    As I said I haven’t watched cable news in months even before I lost my cable. Do you have any idea what Engel is hinting at here?

  10. 10.

    Steeplejack (tablet)

    I am reliably informed that ISIS/ISIL will not be a problem because Trump will be informing the generals of his secret plan and instructing them on its implementation right after Inauguration Day.

    Tick-tock, radical Islamic terrorists.

  12. 12.

    Adam L Silverman

    @lamh36: I saw that when it was first tweeted. The general officers/senior officers take Civilian control over the Military very, very seriously. But they also take the UCMJ, laws of war, and Foundational/Constitutional Law very seriously too. We spent a lot of time in the seminar room discussing that our client is the Constitution and via the Constitution the American people. While the President may be at the top of the chain of command – the Commander in Chief for the uniformed services and DOD, Department of the Army, Navy, and Air Force civilians (the President is just the President for everyone else!) – the military does not swear allegiance to him (and one day her). The allegiance is to the Constitution. So this does not surprise me at all.

  14. 14.

    mouse tolliver

    @lamh36: He was talking about how the generals he knows are worried that Trump will ask to do things that consider immoral, and they want to know what legal authority they have to say no.

  18. 18.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @Adam L Silverman: They are looking at their options if Trump gives a blatantly unconstitutional order. Refuse or resign are the obvious answers. They are looking for any other options.

    Also, I am having difficulties not screaming back at Flynn. Gahhhhh!!!!

  19. 19.

    Timurid

    @lamh36:
    Probably obstruction, not an outright coup.
    A mutiny in the older sense of the word. Most pre-modern military mutinies were not violent takeovers like the “Sepoy Mutiny” or the “Mutiny on the Bounty.” They were essentially strikes. Soldiers would stop work and stop obeying orders until their grievances (often involving back pay) were addressed.

  20. 20.

    Mnemosyne

    @mouse tolliver:

    That was kind of what I was assuming — they’re trying to figure out how to legally refuse to obey stupid and/or illegal orders. IIRC, the Army and Marines were not big fans of the torture that happened in Iraq, to put it mildly.

  22. 22.

    schrodinger's cat

    @Timurid: Sepoy Mutiny was no mutiny, the limeys were in India, Indians had every right to throw them out, instead of accepting to British rule. Unfortunately, they failed and they were stuck with that fat bitch with the handkerchief over her head (Queen V) for a long time.

  25. 25.

    Lev

    Trump had all the party’s has-been and Z-grade nobodies around him during the campaign because the GOP elite knew he wasn’t fit to be president and anyone with a better option took it. Now he’s forming a government with that bunch of inexperienced cranks and retreads.

  26. 26.

    mai naem mobile

    The Elliot Cohen story(WaPo IIRC) said something to the effect of the Trumpies having a hard time recruiting people for NSA/Spooks etc not only because of Trumpies instability but because Flynn has a bad reputation from when he worked at the NSA before.

  29. 29.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Omnes Omnibus: Without a doubt. But the general officers/flag officers and the senior executives at DOD and the service specific departments know how to work the system better than the people that are going to get the political jobs. And the Geographic Combatant Commanders have a significant amount of power to work the boundaries on the operational side of the house.

  30. 30.

    Timurid

    @Omnes Omnibus:

    Agreed. Respect for civilian authority is in their DNA.
    By the time any general officers seriously contemplate a coup, it will be far too late to matter.

  31. 31.

    Omnes Omnibus

    Mr. Hasan is a better man than I. I watched 15 minutes and I know he is dangerously off. The ease with which he conflates Islam with Islamist is enough of a tell.

  32. 32.

    donnah

    @lamh36:

    Late on Election night, Richard Engel was pulled onto the panel on NBC news and was asked by Chuck Todd and Tom Brokaw about the views abroad about the Trump presidency. It’s worth seeing on Google. He said immediately that a Trump presidency will be catastrophic. He said the US would be like a nuclear battleship stuck in the water, a sitting duck for aggressive countries.

    And then when Chuck Todd said Trump said he knew more than the generals, Richard said that he’s talking to generals, too, and they’re reading the Constitution closely to see if they can refuse to take part in immoral actions issued as orders from Trump to round up immigrants.

    He was dead serious.

  33. 33.

    Adam L Silverman

    @mai naem mobile: No one wants to work with him from when he was DIA Director (he’s never been at National Security Agency). The reporting and scuttlebutt is that he is considered to be a toxic leader and alienated significant numbers of his peers among the general officers/flag officers.

  34. 34.

    Mnemosyne

    @Omnes Omnibus:

    I’m trying to remember what the phrase is — is it “working to rule”? Where you do the absolute bare minimum required of the job to protest something?

    I suspect there’s going to be a whole lot of that at all levels of government and the armed forces for the foreseeable future.

  35. 35.

    rikyrah

    marla sue ⭐️
    ‏@marlasue01
    More making America great ~>The President-Elect Is Suing Washington, D.C., So His Luxury Hotel Can Pay Less in Taxes

  36. 36.

    mai naem mobile

    Camacho had time tonight to tweet about some Kate Upton/Ayesha Taylor twitstorm about the MLB. I don’t follow Camacho so I actually clicked on his tweet just to make sure it wasn’t a parody account. I am not kidding. He also had.Bob Kraft and Woody Johnson at Trump Tower today. I fully expect a Camacho Rally at the Superbowl with Orange flavored Brawndo.

  37. 37.

    Timurid

    @schrodinger’s cat:

    Yes, I know all about the ‘First Indian War of Independence.’ It was a broad-based rebellion that happened to include elements of the military. I just referenced it because the ‘Sepoy Mutiny’ and things like the Bounty are the stereotypical examples people think about when they hear ‘military mutiny.’

  40. 40.

    WaterGirl

    @Mnemosyne: I used to work with a fellow who said when they (the bosses) really pissed him off, he would do exactly what they would tell him to do. Since they didn’t understand the consequences of what they were asking him to do, it didn’t turn out well for them (the bosses).

    This sound like maybe a similar thing.

    edit: or maybe not.

  41. 41.

    Gin & Tonic

    @Mnemosyne: I think a lot of us at some point or another have been faced with an asshole boss who came in from elsewhere. I know I did, but I was quite secure in my job and knew *way* more than the boss about the subject area, so I just did what needed to be done according to my training and experience. Slowly and carefully. Eventually the boss was gone and I wasn’t. I’m sure we’ll see plenty of that.

  42. 42.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @Adam L Silverman: “You ordered me to move against ISIS with all due force. And, Mr. President, we are using SF and the Rangers to do xyz in preparation for the moment when we….” “Yes, sir, it is not yet time for … because we are doing abc. “

  43. 43.

    Adam L Silverman

    @mai naem mobile: Give this a look:
    http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2016/10/how-mike-flynn-became-americas-angriest-general-214362

    On August 7, 2014, clusters of well-dressed men and women filed into the gleaming metal and glass superstructure of the Defense Intelligence Agency at Joint Base Anacostia-Bolling, just across the river from Reagan National Airport, for the retirement ceremony of Lieutenant General Michael T. Flynn, the agency’s director. Among those present to honor Flynn were James Clapper, the nation’s top intelligence officer—who was a master of ceremonies for the event—and Michael Vickers, the undersecretary of defense for intelligence.

    It wasn’t an easy moment. Together, Clapper and Vickers had forced Flynn out as the head of DIA.

    The Defense Intelligence Agency is the Pentagon’s version of the CIA, a vast intelligence organization focused on providing senior officials in the Office of the Secretary of Defense, and senior uniformed leaders, with the intelligence necessary to develop strategy and make scores of difficult decisions each day. During the ceremony, Flynn would be extolled by Admiral Mike Rogers, the director of the National Security Agency, as “the best intelligence officer of the past 20 years.” But given the nature of the intelligence business that united them, many of the attendees also knew that Flynn’s retirement at age 56 was premature. A well-known maverick, Flynn had been asked to “shake things up” at the 17,000-person agency. He brought a more wartime mind-set and ethos to a sleepy Washington bureaucracy, until the bureaucracy pushed back and Flynn’s gung-ho style was deemed too “disruptive” for an administration determined to put the unpleasant memories of Iraq and Afghanistan in the rearview mirror.

    Those who’ve known Flynn for years wonder how a kid from an Irish Catholic family of blue-collar Democrats who went on to be a dedicated, much-admired soldier ended up being a top national-security adviser to a man widely viewed as a demagogue, friendly to Russia and widely seen as ignorant of foreign policy. They worry that in his political naivete and innate loyalty Flynn is being used—and will be branded as a radical himself. And some of them are concerned that Flynn, who believes he was pressed into early retirement for appearing to question the Obama administration’s public narrative that Al Qaeda was close to defeat, is being handed a national stage to play out his personal frustrations.

    In Flynn’s speech, Obama has been a “weak and spineless” leader who “coddles” terrorists and has brought mayhem to our streets with his “fumbling indecisiveness,” “willful ignorance” and “total incompetence.” Clinton should not only be locked up for her careless handling of classified emails, he has repeatedly said, but she is also “somebody who will leave Americans behind on the battlefield.”

    In a recent exclusive interview, Flynn was unapologetic about his harsh rhetoric. In his mind, Clinton “did real damage to the country” and has dodged all accountability with her use of an unclassified email server to conduct government business, and the Obama administration perpetrated a “big lie” in insisting that the enemy, Islamist terrorists, is on the run. “So when Republican presidential candidates reached out and asked for my advice and help, I thought I had something to offer because of my strong belief that the country is going in the wrong direction.”

    Yet a number of Flynn’s old bosses and some of the most respected leaders among the generally collegial fraternity of retired general and flag officers have been unsparing in their criticism. For months, retired Admiral Mike Mullen, former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, had reached out privately to Flynn trying to get him to tone down his rhetoric on the public airwaves. For Mullen, the Republican Convention speech was a final straw. “For retired senior officers to take leading and vocal roles as clearly partisan figures is a violation of the ethos and professionalism of apolitical military service,” Mullen wrote recently to the Washington Post. “This is not about the right to speak out, it is about the disappointing lack of judgment in doing so for crass partisan purposes. This is made worse by using hyperbolic language all the while leveraging the respected title of ‘general.’”

    Even more egregious in the eyes of many national security experts and former colleagues is Flynn’s bestowing legitimacy on the particular Republican presidential nominee this year. Trump has trampled on, or simply ignored, many of the fundamental tenets and doctrines that have defined U.S. national security and foreign policy for decades. In Trump’s America, terrorism suspects would be tortured and their families killed in clear war crimes, even as the country instituted a ban on Muslim immigrants. The U.S. nuclear umbrella would fold over South Korea and Japan, possibly provoking them to develop their own nuclear weapons arsenals and risking a long-feared breakout in nuclear proliferation. NATO allies could no longer assume American support if attacked by Russia.

    There’s a lot more at the link.

  46. 46.

    Corner Stone

    I’m getting the strong feeling that the Bannon appointment is the lightening rod being used to distract all the elected D’s and the media chasing this bullshit story.

  48. 48.

    WaterGirl

    I am starting to feel kind of panic-y like I did on election night once it became clear that Trump had won.

    In an effort to quell those feelings, I read again the article summarizing Obama’s phone call with OFA from 11/14

    Would anyone care to speculate what Barack Obama might have meant by this, particularly the part I have bolded?

    And what that means is staying engaged, staying involved, and figuring out how do we move forward not only to protect what we’ve accomplished, but also to see this as an opportunity — because a lot of conventional wisdom has been upended.

  50. 50.

    rikyrah

    Brendan Karet
    ‏@bad_takes
    Trump surrogates are already citing Japanese internment camps from WW II as “precedent” for Muslim registry

  51. 51.

    Adam L Silverman

    Apparently former SeAL Carl Higbee is part of this National Security leadership team. Higbee published a book before retirement that caused DOD to downgrade his clearance. And they changed his discharge after his retirement from honorable to general. He did 8 years, got in trouble, and decided to retire. Nothing but tactical level experience. So he’s a real winner too!

  54. 54.

    rikyrah

    Matthew Yglesias ✔ @mattyglesias
    This seems to confirm, incidentally, that Trump is doing diplomatic talks over non-secure phone lines.
    8:35 PM – 16 Nov 2016

  57. 57.

    Ian

    @Adam L Silverman:
    It was just the sheer audacity of that answer. Criticize the Obama admin, and when pressed offer a vague non answer. Not a policy proposal, not a context laden answer, nothing.

  58. 58.

    Timurid

    @donnah:

    Trump is going to use law enforcement as his Revolutionary Guard.
    The military is largely incorruptible, but police chiefs will be lining up around the block to piss on the Constitution…

  59. 59.

    GregB

    It is really a big fucking deal to staff the most powerful nation in the world with a rogues gallery if misfits, malcontents and wannabe mob bosses.

    It continues to be not good and getting worse.

    The season opener of this show could be worse than The Walking Dead.

  60. 60.

    NotMax

    @rikyrah

    Yellow crescents on the horizon.

    It’s like they open their meetings by singing a snippet to the tune of Swanee but with the lyrics changed to Wansee.

  61. 61.

    Timurid

    @schrodinger’s cat:

    Since we’re on the topic of mutinies, our best shot is probably the Electoral College going full inqilabi. It’s the only option that doesn’t leave us with President Pence. But it’s a hell of a long shot. There would be violence if it happened. Aside from the concerns for precedent and propriety, any Electors who went rogue (and any Republican pols who egged them on) would be in real danger.

  62. 62.

    Vhh

    @Adam L Silverman: Except for the like of Kissinger, most Nat Sec Advisors appear to me to be Presidential desk accessories, or in the case of a Trump or a W, what Germans call Schlanghalters. I gather that Flynn’s a second rater who was forced into retirement. Disgruntled vengeance seekers cause trouble but burn out. Trump will prob choose a loon as Sec State, who will drive away competent ppl by the score if not hundreds. Neocon and Pnac founder Eliot Cohen is loudly telling even GOP policy pros to stay away from Trump. So the nation’s foreign policy will be run by an ignorant ADHD narcissist surrounded by sycophants determined to promote idiotic ideas. Bad things will happen, but we can at least hope they will happen so fast, so embarassingly, on such small things that the system’s survival instincts will kick in. My worry is what NO ONE in the US public is talking about: Putin taking the Baltics a la Stalin (who emulated Peter the Great and Catherine the Great, who did the same thing), breaking NATO and ultimately the West. Poland and Hungary are now run by neofascists, Brexit happened, Le Pen is rising in France, and the new right AfD is gaining in Germany. It could become the 1930s all over again very quickly, but this time with Russia as the military giant. Fun times. We are moving to NE Germany next yr for work (big science project) so we’ll have a front row seat (gulp). I speak Russian and French well already, expect to get better in German real fast. Ready to meet up with new overlords, whoever they are. Too bad the Wehrmacht won’t be there when our side needs them.

  63. 63.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Ian: Yep. I think part of the problem is that LTG Flynn looks at the overall strategic picture through the lens of what Special Operations needs from Intelligence. He was, from every report I’ve seen and from people I know that worked for GEN McChrystal at the same time, though lower, down, that he was excellent overseeing intelligence for GEN McChrystal when he was the Joint SOF commander. Sometimes people, with excellent records and qualifications, get promoted where they can no longer excel. Additionally, I think he couldn’t shake the SOF mindset. The DIA has a lot of career civilian personnel, not just uniformed. A good chunk are retirees or former military, but a lot are just civilians. They don’t react the same way as a bunch of SOF guys do and that may have contributed to the conflicts and the creation of the toxic environment.

  65. 65.

    Omnes Omnibus

    So, when I was a teenager, I thought it would be cool and romantic to be a part of the French Resistance. And Stauffenberg in Germany (as an army officer, I met his son who was a German general). Okay, karma, I was a fucking kid and I wanted to be on the side of good guys. And get a medal. Don’t make me live through this. The medal is not that important.

  66. 66.

    SWMBO

    My daughter sent this and I thought it was worth sharing. For those of us struggling to say what we need to say, this is a place to start.

  68. 68.

    Mnemosyne

    @Timurid:

    The military is largely incorruptible, but police chiefs will be lining up around the block to piss on the Constitution…

    You might be surprised to hear this, but there’s actually a pretty major political split among police chiefs. The International Association of Chiefs of Police publicly apologized for how minorities have been treated. It’s not going to be as cut-and-dried as you think.

    Here in CA, the LAPD has already said they will refuse to participate in any kind of round-ups of immigrants. Big city cops know that doing that kind of stuff just makes their own jobs harder.

  72. 72.

    Timurid

    @NotMax:

    That’s what I thought on 11/9. But… holy fuck this transition… barely a week in and we’re already way off the rails. What kind of headlines will we be seeing by the time those guys sit down to vote?

  73. 73.

    CaseyL

    It just gets better and better, doesn’t it. Flynn at NSC, Tom Cotton at the Pentagon.

    Flynn will be feeding incredibly lousy intelligence from the NSC to guide whatever insane military adventures Cotton decides to get us into. Cotton hates the Iran deal, so I guess we can assume Iran is top of his list.

    I’m thinking Trump’s first State of the Union speech will be an occasion to declare we’re declaring war on Iran. Won’t that be special.

    I know Obama is deeply respectful of institutional norms, and I know that arresting and locking up the entire Trump team would cause a shitstorm the likes of which this country hasn’t seen since the Civil War. It might cause a Civil War, in fact. But I think even that would be preferable to what Trump’s going to get us into.

  77. 77.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Omnes Omnibus: He started his career in 82nd ABN, went to 25th ID, back to XVIII ABN with several other stops in between. This included being an intel officer for joint special ops for the Grenada invasion. He was the XVIII ABN G2 – the current one is one of my former students. My guess is that he and GEN McChrystal knew each other, had worked together, and that GEN McChrystal specifically picked him. When I was at SOCOM in 2015 the vast majority of the uniformed personnel assigned there were not Special Operations Forces (SOF), they were conventional Forces. That’s my guess for how Flynn got the billet.

  83. 83.

    Adam L Silverman

    @CaseyL: If he picks Senator Cotton it would be a huge mistake. You don’t put an Army captain (O3), who’s last assignment was as the staff weenie for a State Department Provincial Reconstruction Team (you got this assignment because NO ONE wanted you serving with them!!!) and nothing but tactical level experience in charge of generals and admirals. He also has no administrative experience. If they make him SecDef his career will be over in short order. I think he’s far too ambitious to give up a pretty safe seat in the Senate to be SecDef.

  86. 86.

    NMgal

    @SWMBO: Thanks, bookmarked. I called my rep today about Medicare. I *hate* making calls to politicians’ staffs. Am going to do it anyway. Desperate times and all that. Phone calls are nothin compared to what might be coming down the pike, we need to put on our big girl/boy panties.

  88. 88.

    Psych1

    @Adam L Silverman: Adam, you may recall a few months back, before all the Bernie-hate drove me away from here, I brought up that Trump was considering Flynn for VP. I worked with Flynn some years ago and found him to be outstanding. And, that is comparing him to many other top-tier players. True his book with Ledeen is a bit nuts but don’t dismiss him. As I said some months ago, he is formidable.

  89. 89.

    Mary G

    @Adam L Silverman: He also doesn’t know how the government works very well. That letter he wrote to the Iranians before the treaty was signed was ridiculous. He and Marco Rubio are both empty suits.

    ETA: Iranians, not Iraqis. Can’t even blame AutoCorrect, either.

  90. 90.

    Seth Owen

    Our military is too vast to be of one mind, either.

    Generally speaking, in order of decreasing reliability as to apolitical/devotion to Constitution I would put the Army at the top, followed by Coast Guard, Navy, Marines, National Guard (albeit with state variations), Air Force, Special Forces (while administratively part of parent services, since creation of SOC they are essentially a separate service).

    Most problematic are the last two. SOC is heavily white, USAF has disturbing Dominionist Christian influence.

    I agree that law enforcement is more fertile ground for trouble but at least some elements of the military could be tapped if they were ruthless enough.

  91. 91.

    WaterGirl

    @SWMBO: Please send that to Richard Mayhew or Tim F. so that it can be front-paged on a “call to action” thread.

    That is awesome. If every sane person made all those calls every day or every week, maybe it could make a difference.

    PLEASE send that to one of them so it can be front-paged.

  92. 92.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @Mnemosyne: Won’t happen. But if does, I am guzzling the damned booze. I am appalled that my adolescent fantasies might come to life. OTOH, if they do, and if so dog help us, I have already started by putting my name on the useless faithless elector petition.

  93. 93.

    Ian

    @Adam L Silverman:
    I think Tom Cotton is far to stupid to do the smart thing. Any chance to promote Tom Cotton to the rubes outside of his state is great for Tom Cotton. The whole letter to Iran thing worked out just great for him :P

  94. 94.

    weaselone

    Obama spent the last 8 years shoring up and repairing the web of alliances and dependencies that had become unsteady and frayed during the Bush years and these morons are going to blow the whole network up, douse the rubble with gasoline, set it on fire, piss on the ashes and then flush them down the toilet. Our actual enemies couldn’t have accomplished this in their wildest dreams with years of effort and Trump along with the backing of the Republican Congress is going to do it for them.

    Although it’s not as though it isn’t deserved. We’ve basically become the country equivalent of Jekyll and Hyde. Democrats are in power and we are a strong leader and exemplar in the global community. Republicans take power and we turn everything we touch to shit.

  95. 95.

    Mary G

    @Adam L Silverman: Here’s another winner:

    Another former CIA officer who is a particularly polarizing figure and is apparently being looked at for high office is Clare Lopez, who has claimed that the Obama White House is infiltrated by the Muslim Brotherhood. Lopez is regarded by the Trump team as “one of the intellectual thought leaders about why we have to fight back against radical Islam.” She has long been associated with the Center for Security Policy, headed by Frank Gaffney, a fanatical hardliner who believes that Saddam Hussein was involved in both the 1993 World Trade Center attack and the Oklahoma City bombing, that Americans for Tax Reform head Grover Norquist is a secret agent of the Muslim Brotherhood, that Gen. David Petraeus has “submitted to Sharia,” and that the logo of the U.S. Missile Defense Agency reveals “official U.S. submission to Islam” because it “appears ominously to reflect a morphing of the Islamic crescent and star.”

    And they will probably say objecting to her is sexist and racist for extra credit.

  96. 96.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Psych1: I’ve never met him, The closest I’ve ever come to interacting with him was when Tom Ricks, of CNAS and Foreign Policy, asked me to write a response (as I’m an actual practitioner of the topic) to Flynn’s CNAS report on how to better use cultural information.
    http://foreignpolicy.com/2010/01/18/the-flynn-report-v-how-to-feed-the-beast/

    He’s clearly very, very smart. He’s clearly a very sharp Intel officer. I think he was placed in the wrong billet, it killed his career, and he’s angry. I have some significant concerns about his not drawing a sharp enough line (I’m not even sure he’s drawing a line) between Muslims and the Muslim extremists and terrorists/Islam and Islamic extremism and terrorism. That may be a blind spot. That may be just too many years looking at and trying to deal with threat. As I’ve written – I don’t know him. I just knew him by reputation, which until the DIA stuff, was considered excellent/exemplary. I was always surprised that LTG LeGere did not get the billet, but my take was that GEN Odierno, for who she’d served as the G2 when he was the Force Commander in Iraq, wanted her, and got her, as the Army G2. But I’m also not privy to the promotion and assignment selection boards and do my best not to meddle in general officer/flag officer politics.

  99. 99.

    Timurid

    Obama is deeply respectful of institutional norms.

    That’s like saying “molten lava is warm to the touch.”
    Obama is the straightest arrow that ever arrowed. An obsession with precedent, propriety and the rules are the only reason he made it all the way to the White House as a black Democrat. Nothing ever stuck to him. He was completely above reproach. If it had been even a tiny bit different, he would have been destroyed like Gore and Hillary. As President and as ex-President he will stick to the letter of the law long while Trump and his minions trample on every written and unwritten rule. It’s not in his nature to act differently. What was his greatest strength in a sane, peaceful country is going to be his greatest weakness in an unprecedented crisis.

    When Obama starts calling for a revolution… or the Joint Chiefs are sitting around a table asking ‘so how does this here coop thing work again?’… the game will already be over. The clock will have hit zero. The teams will have left the field and hit the showers. Of course only the winning teams’ showers will be the kind with water in them…

  103. 103.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @Timurid: I am an institutionalist with rather leftist goals. I think Obama was the same. It makes us center left people. Not because of what, but because of how.

  106. 106.

    Mai.naem.mobile

    If you can get Camacho’s tax returns you might be able to flip some electors. Even if you do that you would have real crazy riots and HRC would have to travel around in a literal bullet proof bubble. Otherwise try and get the LA senate seat and get two GOPrs to flip to independent and mitigate the damage. I don’t see any GOP senator doing that. Even the old farts like Hatch and McCain who don’t have many years left.

  107. 107.

    Lizzy L

    @Psych1: Outstanding is a big word; so is formidable. Can you say something about his character, if you know anything? Would he support/condone/approve of torturing prisoners, for example? (I recognize that you may not know.)

  109. 109.

    Mnemosyne

    Okay, if I talk about the Election Thieves any more tonight, I may start screaming.

    Any of my fellow ladies have clothing tips for San Francisco this time of year? I was thinking of fleece-lined leggings and a sweater, but I do get chilly easily. Do I also need a hat, scarf, and gloves? I have to travel light since I need to keep my backpack with me all day.

    ETA: I will also have a jacket, and probably a raincoat since there’s currently a 90 percent chance of rain on Saturday.

  110. 110.

    Aleta

    Republican Sen. Doug Ericksen announced plans Wednesday to introduce a bill that would criminalize illegal protests. Sen. Ericksen says the bill would focus protests aimed at “causing economic damage.”

    The bill would apply to unlawful disruption of transportation and commerce.

    “Washington needs to take a firm stand against illegal protests that block transportation and commerce, cause property damage, threaten jobs and put public safety at risk,” says state Sen. Ericksen, R-Ferndale in a release Wednesday. The bill would create a new crime of economic terrorism. The measure would allow felony prosecution of those who intentionally break the law in an attempt to intimidate or coerce private citizens or the government by obstructing economic activity.
    …
    The bill would also hold those who organize, sponsor or otherwise encourage economic terrorism, and could make those accomplices pay restitution of up to triple the amount of economic damage.

    “We are not just going after the people who commit these acts of terrorism,” Ericksen said. “We are going after the people who fund them. Wealthy donors should not feel safe in disrupting middle class jobs.”

    The bill has been prepared for next year’s legislative session.

    Also today: The oat=k==pers site put up a long screed against Tr. protesters, with fake photos and accusations (like communist flags!), and implying need for pat==ot vigilance against protestors.

  111. 111.

    WaterGirl

    @Omnes Omnibus: Nor do I. I am struggling with the fact that this is actually reality and there isn’t anyone or anything that can swoop in and rescue us from it. It’s shocking to know that we are well and truly fucked and that there doesn’t appear to be any way to stop the oncoming train.

    Young WG also thought it would be super fun to be in a flood because of how fun it would be to get to swim around in the streets. All the flood water was perfectly clean and clear by the way, and there were no casualties.

  112. 112.

    Jeffro

    @Timurid:

    Since we’re on the topic of mutinies, our best shot is probably the Electoral College going full inqilabi. It’s the only option that doesn’t leave us with President Pence. But it’s a hell of a long shot. There would be violence if it happened. Aside from the concerns for precedent and propriety, any Electors who went rogue (and any Republican pols who egged them on) would be in real danger.

    I agree. And I wonder…if enough madness happens these next four weeks…if there’s enough pressure from the right sources…and if HIllz played ball…

    …if the Electors (or even just enough of them to tip the balance) would agree to vote for her, provided she walked up to the Inaugural podium with a resignation letter in hand? Block Trump and his gang of incompetent Russia-stooges, be sworn in, turn, and turn it over to Kaine (America’s nice dad).

    She deserves it, but I’m sure she knows at this point what would happen to the country if she served her term – believe me I hate to say it or even hint that she should just walk away from a hard-earned victory and so much self-sacrifice. But still. We are where we are. He cannot be officially elected, and certainly not sworn in.

  113. 113.

    RealityBites

    I have problems with links. Was a lurker for too long, I expect. But I think Leonard Cohen’s “The Partisan” is appropriate for this thread if anyone wants to check it out. Will practice links later. I am at work and can only check in here occasionally.

  114. 114.

    Timurid

    @WaterGirl:

    No, certainly not. Not as long as things don’t escalate too far. And they might not.
    What I’m saying is that none of our presumed knights in shining armor, whether it’s the Army, President-for-life Obama or Hillary of Arc, would actually attempt explicitly illegal solutions until the situation was past the point of no return.

  115. 115.

    Jeffro

    @CaseyL:

    I know Obama is deeply respectful of institutional norms, and I know that arresting and locking up the entire Trump team would cause a shitstorm the likes of which this country hasn’t seen since the Civil War. It might cause a Civil War, in fact. But I think even that would be preferable to what Trump’s going to get us into.

    Obama’s temperamentally incapable of taking this situation head-on and doing as you say…but you have to wonder what would happen if in the next 29 days, he was presented with proof that Bannon, Flynn, Giuliani, any of them, were working with the Russians to tamper with our elections.

  117. 117.

    Aleta

    @Mnemosyne: Thin silk long underwear or t shirts are nice. You barely feel them under clothes, they roll up small, you can remove them in the middle of the day. (Wintersilk sells by mail, also prob REI in Berkeley etc.) A soft silk/wool hat works great too.

  121. 121.

    Jeffro

    @Aleta:

    We are not just going after the people who commit these acts of terrorism,” Ericksen said. “We are going after the people who fund them. Wealthy donors should not feel safe in disrupting middle class jobs

    One has to…speculate…as to how the Koch Brothers would react to a bill that could make wealthy sponsors of street protests liable for those actions. Especially if there were a “right-wing Astroturf” clause inserted in there….

  122. 122.

    Mnemosyne

    @Aleta:

    I have one of those, so that was at the back of my mind. I may end up looking strangely fashionable and wearing my tall black boots with low heels since they’re waterproof. I was planning to wear sneakers, but that just means squishy socks all day long, which would drive me nuts.

    ETA: I’m taking the train up from LA on Friday, staying overnight, and flying back on Saturday, so I have to be my own packhorse all day on Saturday. Thoughtful packing is a must.

  123. 123.

    WaterGirl

    I was just thinking that it’s really stupid of Trump to be showing his hand this early. It would have been much smarter for him to act like he was going to play nice and not burn the country down – until after January 20.

  125. 125.

    Philbert

    @Timurid: I see in Russia Today Trump has been named an honorary Cossack. They are the unregistered thugs Putin uses to attack demonstrations after stolen elections. Oathkeepers etc?

  128. 128.

    Lizzy L

    @Mnemosyne: My go-to fall/winter outerwear in the Bay Area is a sherpa-lined hooded zippered heavy sweatshirt that I bought at Sears men’s dept. about 8 years ago. The hood keeps my head warm and dry. When it’s raining, I wear a hooded rain poncho over the sweatshirt. If you are planning to do lots of walking in the rain you’ll want a raincoat or jacket with a hood. If your head gets cold easily — mine does, since my hair is buzz-cut — I suggest a watch cap. If your jacket doesn’t have a hood, a scarf is a good idea to protect your head and neck. Gloves aren’t necessary unless you’re going to be outdoors a lot. Wear warm socks and shoes that can handle rain.

  129. 129.

    CaseyL

    @Jeffro: It drives me insane to think we KNOW about the blatant thievery and interference by Russia and its agents (Wikileaks), and can do absolutely nothing while the government is stolen right out from under us.

    I felt something similar to this during the 2000 election, when SCOTUS handed the Presidency to W. But my rage at the time was tempered somewhat by the knowledge that throwing the election to the House would still have put W in the White House.

    This is different. This is a goddamn nightmare. Not only because the election was so corrupted, with the means and the perpetrators right out there in the open, but because the consequences are so much worse.

    We got W and from that we got 9-11, war with Iraq, and a financial collapse we’re only starting to get out from under. Not to mention the gross negligence and reckless disregard that characterized his domestic policies.

    Trump will make that era look like a Golden Age.

  134. 134.

    Lizzy L

    @Jeffro: Notice how acts of protest (First Amendment, right of the people peaceably to assemble) turn into acts of terrorism? Fuck him.

  135. 135.

    MisterForkbeard

    @Mingobat f/k/a Karen in GA: Depends. If enough faithless electors vote Hillary to put her at 270, she’s the President by law.

    As I understand it, if no one has 270 EV, then it goes to the House (sorta), where each state representation gets one vote, and the vote has to be for someone who was in the top 3 of electoral votes. At which point… probably Trump, due to Republican house representation. The only way they’d vote otherwise was if some incredibly awful news broke about Trump, such as deliberately working with the Russians against Hillary and there’s video of him talking about n-words to guys in white hoods while screwing a young boy.

  138. 138.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Jeffro: @Aleta: That’s aimed at George Soros. The word has gone out in the usual circles that Soros is funding all of this to bring down the government of the US on behalf of Communism or something.

  140. 140.

    Mingobat f/k/a Karen in GA

    @Timurid: Oh yeah. Any Republican gets in, and we watch Medicaid get cut to the bone and then some, and then we can’t pay for the nursing home my father-in-law is in. My family and I are screwed either way. But at least we’d have a President who conducts sensitive talks over a secure damned phone line.

  143. 143.

    Lizzy L

    @Mnemosyne: Better too warm than too cold, for me. If you’re planning to be mostly inside you may not need the poncho even in the rain, BTW. I only use the poncho when I know I’m going to be walking in the rain a lot. Also, I hate umbrellas and never carry one. YMMV. My friends from San Diego always freeze when they come up here to visit, even though it doesn’t seem that cold to me. It’s all what you’re used to.

  145. 145.

    Mnemosyne

    So, anyway, I’m going to wander off since I should at least try to do a little writing tonight. If ruemara shows up, can you guys remind her to check her e-mail? KTHXBAI.

  146. 146.

    WaterGirl

    Can it really be this bleak? Where we are left to ponder whether our democracy will go out with a whimper or a bang?

  147. 147.

    weaselone

    @Adam L Silverman:

    It’s not aimed at Soros. It’s aimed at the right to protest. Soros is just brought in as a boogeyman to discredit the protests and mark them as illegitimate.

  148. 148.

    Aleta

    One of Tr’s campaign promises and taunts is “say ‘radical islam.’ Flynn says (writes) it a lot. Proof that Tr gets things done faster than anyone.

    Bannon wants to make islam itself the enemy. Flynn’s already on board; in fact he claims Obama fired him for saying this. (Extreme Christians (my sister) see this as proof that Satan has infiltrated the Pentagon and Obama is allowing Islam to take over the armed forces. Not kidding.)

  152. 152.

    Lizzy L

    @Mnemosyne: That looks very warm. Might be a bit overkill for us. It says it can be worn at temperatures from -5 to +25 F: we don’t get that cold.

  153. 153.

    Mingobat f/k/a Karen in GA

    @MisterForkbeard: I was thinking there’d be no way Hillary would get enough electors to put her over 270. I have to admit, though, that in the happy rainbow fairy land I constructed in my head where all of this actually happens, I only got as far as flipping enough electors for Trump to fall short of 270 — I haven’t put much thought into the rest of the details.

    But there are unicorns that piss vodka and shit $100 bills, so there’s that.

  154. 154.

    frosty

    @Adam L Silverman:

    More likely sheriffs

    I hope it’s just the sheriffs. My eldest son starts Police Academy next month, and then to the job he’s been working towards with a BS in Criminal Justice and mustering out of Nat’l Guard as a Sargeant. I think he’ll do great but I’m worried about what kind of culture he’ll find himself in.

  156. 156.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Major Major Major Major: All of it. They’ve accused him of being a sort of kapo, even though he was about 8 or 9 at the time. It is also often conflated with him being a Soviet and Communist dupe. Coherency is not a high priority here.

  157. 157.

    Lizzy L

    @Philbert: I had not heard this.

    The Cossacks, especially in Ukraine, were the destroyers of the shtetl. Most Ashkenazi families — like mine — brought those memories with them to the New World.

  159. 159.

    GregB

    I am starting to wonder for my own sanity too.

    When I saw that the future leader has gone out for steaks, had a meeting with Bob Kraft and was Twittering about celebrities while the transition is in crisis, I think surely will wake from this.

  160. 160.

    Adam L Silverman

    @weaselone: I meant that bit about outside financiers.

    “We are not just going after the people who commit these acts of terrorism,” Ericksen said. “We are going after the people who fund them. Wealthy donors should not feel safe in disrupting middle class jobs.”

    That part is aimed at Soros. He’s the bogeyman that’s always circulated as the money and evil genius behind every left wing protest.

  161. 161.

    Adam L Silverman

    @frosty: He should be fine. You all (his family) and the military have had a lot longer to acculturate him to appropriate norms and behaviors than the police academy will. If you have concerns, email me offline and I’ll ping a very close friend who is a SWAT sniper and law enforcement tactical trainer. And I’ve also taught a lot of cops, not to mention Soldiers, over the years.

  164. 164.

    GregB

    Twitter tells me that a surrogate to the future leader cited Japanese internment camps as precedent im dealing with Muslims. I watched the clip. He did in his interview with Megyn Kelly.

  165. 165.

    Steeplejack (tablet)

    Night Owl Movie Alert!

    Woodstock on TCM at 12:45 a.m. EST for those who could use a distraction.

  171. 171.

    WaterGirl

    I am worrying tonight that we are fiddling while Rome burns. And on that happy thought, I am signing off. Perhaps things will look brighter in the morning.

  172. 172.

    frosty

    @Adam L Silverman:

    He should be fine.

    Thanks, that helps, it’s mostly just free-floating anxiety here. And he voted for Hillary, so we indoctrinated him that far, at least. :-) And thanks for the offer, I’ll email if the anxiety has occasion to come down to earth.

  174. 174.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Peale: That and also because MoveOn.org often is involved in promoting them. So if MoveOn is involved, Soros is personally pulling the strings.

  176. 176.

    Aleta

    @Adam L Silverman: I fear it is not just directed at donors like Soros. Instead (and maybe I’m wrong) could be a way to come closer to introducing something like the material-support law for domestic “terrorist organizations” (with leeway for definition given to lower courts, if I remember and understand correctly). The Roberts Court did not exclude speech, even if urging nonviolence, from consideration when it ruled about material support for overseas organizations. So potentially an inroad to rulings that might inhibit our freedom of assembly and speech. (My legal understanding is limited; but this is what comes to mind for me.)

  177. 177.

    Timurid

    @catclub:

    I had a wingnut Marine veteran (he was a helicopter mechanic in Iraq) in one of my classes who claimed that about a third of active duty Marines and two thirds of Marine veterans were Oathkeepers.

    I’m pretty sure that was confirmation bias talking, but it still made my skin crawl…

  180. 180.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Aleta: I don’t know. I doubt it would be considered Constitutional from the article excerpted. There are already laws about riot and crimes against property and person on the books. Gonna be a tough sell to a Federal court to limit the rights to assemble, petition the government for redress of grievances, and lawfully protest.

  182. 182.

    Aleta

    @Adam L Silverman: Yes, I hope it would not even pass in Congress, or else get struck down right away. But the SC under Roberts is not consistent about protecting freedom of speech. I wish conservatives or patr.s had shown more awareness of this before they voted. Anyway, I’m not as confident that the right to protest will be protected in the way we are used to, under the new guys in power or the judges they will appoint.

  183. 183.

    Davebo

    @Omnes Omnibus: I’m curious, after having watched it all now, if your opinion of Flynn changed at all.

    Honestly, I started watching ready to be shocked and at some points I was yet I can’t ignore the fact that he didn’t seem to be the raving demagogue I had thought he was.

    I haven’t read all the comments yet but thank you Adam for that link.

  186. 186.

    Bess

    Reading through the comments, I might be the only one besides Adam who watched the entire video he linked. Something that he talked about at the end was very important, IMHO.

    He said that what we are doing now is tactical. We are fighting the fighters. But that will not end the problem. In order end ISIS type problems we need a strategy that removes the motivation for young men to be radicalized into the movement.

    He said, I think he has this right, the Mideast needs a new economy. A transition over the entire region where the economy is strong and growing and people have things to do. To me it’s the same problem where inner city violence is still a problem. Young men with energy and desire who see no hope of improving their lives.

    Flynn suggest that we work with the more affluent nations to build up the area. Create the sort of opportunities enjoyed in much of the rest of the world. It wouldn’t be a quick or easy task, but unless we create an alternative we may be fighting an unending war that could stretch far into the future.

    It’s worth discussing…

  188. 188.

    Psych1

    @Adam L Silverman:
    @Psych1: And glad you’re back.
    //Did anyone get you to sign the post election no longer Bernie loyalty oath?//

    NO!!! I believe that good analysis over time will show that Bernie, running with Liz Warren, would have won. Bloomberg would have come in and run a strong 3rd party campaign but taken most votes from Trump. I believe the misguided thinking exemplified here by most during the primary campaign is what got us Trump. And, it will be hard to go forward without seeing this.

    Regarding Flynn, I’m glad some here are taking a closer look. We could do a lot worse. I should clarify that while I did have regular contact with him for about a year our more intense contact was basketball not policy. He was a terrific basketball player and very clear on timing and strategy

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