Shut the fuck up, STEVE pic.twitter.com/LrNUjLdFtn
— vocational politics appreciation account (@Convolutedname) September 21, 2023
Whether or not you agree with General Milley, this longish read has already garnered quite a bit of attention, and it’s going to get more. Jeffrey Goldberg, in the Atlantic:
… In normal times, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs, the principal military adviser to the president, is supposed to focus his attention on America’s national-security challenges, and on the readiness and lethality of its armed forces. But the first 16 months of Milley’s term, a period that ended when Joe Biden succeeded Donald Trump as president, were not normal, because Trump was exceptionally unfit to serve. “For more than 200 years, the assumption in this country was that we would have a stable person as president,” one of Milley’s mentors, the retired three-star general James Dubik, told me. That this assumption did not hold true during the Trump administration presented a “unique challenge” for Milley, Dubik said.
Milley was careful to refrain from commenting publicly on Trump’s cognitive unfitness and moral derangement. In interviews, he would say that it is not the place of the nation’s flag officers to discuss the performance of the nation’s civilian leaders.
But his views emerged in a number of books published after Trump left office, written by authors who had spoken with Milley, and many other civilian and military officials, on background. In The Divider, Peter Baker and Susan Glasser write that Milley believed that Trump was “shameful,” and “complicit” in the January 6 attack. They also reported that Milley feared that Trump’s “ ‘Hitler-like’ embrace of the big lie about the election would prompt the president to seek out a ‘Reichstag moment.’ ”…
Twenty men have served as the chairman of the Joint Chiefs since the position was created after World War II. Until Milley, none had been forced to confront the possibility that a president would try to foment or provoke a coup in order to illegally remain in office. A plain reading of the record shows that in the chaotic period before and after the 2020 election, Milley did as much as, or more than, any other American to defend the constitutional order, to prevent the military from being deployed against the American people, and to forestall the eruption of wars with America’s nuclear-armed adversaries. Along the way, Milley deflected Trump’s exhortations to have the U.S. military ignore, and even on occasion commit, war crimes. Milley and other military officers deserve praise for protecting democracy, but their actions should also cause deep unease. In the American system, it is the voters, the courts, and Congress that are meant to serve as checks on a president’s behavior, not the generals. Civilians provide direction, funding, and oversight; the military then follows lawful orders.
The difficulty of the task before Milley was captured most succinctly by Lieutenant General H. R. McMaster, the second of Trump’s four national security advisers. “As chairman, you swear to support and defend the Constitution of the United States, but what if the commander in chief is undermining the Constitution?” McMaster said to me.
For the actions he took in the last months of the Trump presidency, Milley, whose four-year term as chairman, and 43-year career as an Army officer, will conclude at the end of September, has been condemned by elements of the far right. Kash Patel, whom Trump installed in a senior Pentagon role in the final days of his administration, refers to Milley as “the Kraken of the swamp.” Trump himself has accused Milley of treason. Sebastian Gorka, a former Trump White House official, has said that Milley deserves to be placed in “shackles and leg irons.” If a second Trump administration were to attempt this, however, the Trumpist faction would be opposed by the large group of ex-Trump-administration officials who believe that the former president continues to pose a unique threat to American democracy, and who believe that Milley is a hero for what he did to protect the country and the Constitution.
“Mark Milley had to contain the impulses of people who wanted to use the United States military in very dangerous ways,” Kelly told me. “Mark had a very, very difficult reality to deal with in his first two years as chairman, and he served honorably and well. The president couldn’t fathom people who served their nation honorably.” Kelly, along with other former administration officials, has argued that Trump has a contemptuous view of the military, and that this contempt made it extraordinarily difficult to explain to Trump such concepts as honor, sacrifice, and duty…
The story of Milley’s promotion to the chairmanship captures much about the disorder in Donald Trump’s mind, and in his White House.
By 2018, Trump was growing tired of General Dunford, a widely respected Marine officer. After one White House briefing by Dunford, Trump turned to aides and said, “That guy is smart. Why did he join the military?” Trump did not consider Dunford to be sufficiently “loyal,” and he was seeking a general who would pledge his personal fealty. Such generals don’t tend to exist in the American system—Michael Flynn, Trump’s QAnon-addled first national security adviser, is an exception—but Trump was adamant.
The president had also grown tired of James Mattis, the defense secretary. He had hired Mattis in part because he’d been told his nickname was “Mad Dog.” It wasn’t—that had been a media confection—and Mattis proved far more cerebral, and far more independent-minded, than Trump could handle. So when Mattis recommended David Goldfein, the Air Force chief of staff, to become the next chairman, Trump rejected the choice. (In ordinary presidencies, the defense secretary chooses the chairman of the Joint Chiefs, and the president, by custom, accedes to the choice.)…
But a group of ex–Army officers then close to Trump had been lobbying for an Army general for the chairmanship, and Milley, the Army chief of staff, was the obvious candidate. Despite a reputation for being prolix and obstreperous in a military culture that, at its highest reaches, values discretion and rhetorical restraint, Milley was popular with many Army leaders, in part because of the reputation he’d developed in Iraq and Afghanistan as an especially effective war fighter. A son of working-class Boston, Milley is a former hockey player who speaks bluntly, sometimes brutally. “I’m Popeye the fucking sailorman,” he has told friends. “I yam what I yam.” This group of former Army officers, including Esper, who was then serving as the secretary of the Army, and David Urban, a West Point graduate who was key to Trump’s Pennsylvania election effort, believed that Trump would take to Milley, who had both an undergraduate degree from Princeton and the personality of a hockey enforcer. “Knowing Trump, I knew that he was looking for a complete carnivore, and Milley fit that bill,” Urban told me. “He checked so many boxes for Trump.”…
During Milley’s time in the Trump administration, the disagreements and misunderstandings between the Pentagon and the White House all seemed to follow the same pattern: The president—who was incapable of understanding or unwilling to understand the aspirations and rules that guide the military—would continually try to politicize an apolitical institution. This conflict reached its nadir with the Lafayette Square incident in June 2020. The day when Milley appeared in uniform by the president’s side, heading into the square, has been studied endlessly. What is clear is that Milley (and Mark Esper) walked into an ambush, and Milley extracted himself as soon as he could, which was too late.
The image of a general in combat fatigues walking with a president who has a well-known affection for the Insurrection Act—the 1807 law that allows presidents to deploy the military to put down domestic riots and rebellions—caused consternation and anger across the senior-officer ranks, and among retired military leaders…
======
“I absolutely, positively shouldn’t have been there,” Milley says of Lafayette Square. “I’m a soldier, and fundamental to this republic is for the military to stay out of politics.”
“I just about ended my friendship with Mark over Lafayette Square,” General Peter Chiarelli, the now-retired former vice chief of staff of the Army, told me. Chiarelli was once Milley’s superior, and he considered him to be among his closest friends. “I watched him in uniform, watched the whole thing play out, and I was pissed. I wrote an editorial about the proper role of the military that was very critical of Mark, and I was about to send it, and my wife said, ‘You really want to do that—end a treasured friendship—like this?’ She said I should send it to him instead, and of course she was right.” When they spoke, Milley made no excuses, but said it had not been his intention to look as if he was doing Trump’s bidding. Milley explained the events of the day to Chiarelli: He was at FBI headquarters, and had been planning to visit National Guardsmen stationed near the White House when he was summoned to the Oval Office. Once he arrived, Trump signaled to everyone present that they were heading outside. Ivanka Trump found a Bible and they were on their way.
“As a commissioned officer, I have a duty to ensure that the military stays out of politics,” Milley told me. “This was a political act, a political event. I didn’t realize it at the moment. I probably should have, but I didn’t, until the event was well on its way. I peeled off before the church, but we’re already a minute or two into this thing, and it was clear to me that it was a political event, and I was in uniform. I absolutely, positively shouldn’t have been there. The political people, the president and others, can do whatever they want. But I can’t. I’m a soldier, and fundamental to this republic is for the military to stay out of politics.”…
The week after Lafayette Square, Milley made his apology in the National Defense University speech—a speech that helped repair his relationship with the officer corps but destroyed his relationship with Trump.
“There are different gradients of what is bad. The really bad days are when people get killed in combat,” Milley told me. “But those 90 seconds were clearly a low point from a personal and professional standpoint for me, over the course of 43, 44 years of service. They were searing. It was a bad moment for me because it struck at the heart of the credibility of the institution.”…
I asked Milley to describe the evolution of his post–Lafayette Square outlook. “You know this term teachable moment ?” he asked. “Every month thereafter I just did something publicly to continually remind the force about our responsibilities … What I’m trying to do the entire summer, all the way up to today, is keep the military out of actual politics.”
He continued, “We stay out of domestic politics, period, full stop, not authorized, not permitted, illegal, immoral, unethical—we don’t do it.” I asked if he ever worried about pockets of insurrectionists within the military.
“We’re a very large organization—2.1 million people, active duty and reserves. Some of the people in the organization get outside the bounds of the law. We have that on occasion. We’re a highly disciplined force dedicated to the protection of the Constitution and the American people … Are there one or two out there who have other thoughts in their mind? Maybe. But the system of discipline works.”…
Trump was and is a deranged man who has no sense of honor or duty. Apparently, that’s what his cult loves about him. https://t.co/QKaj5Y0K4L
— Tom Nichols (@RadioFreeTom) September 21, 2023
CNN's coverage at the time vs reality pic.twitter.com/fIIZ7SuwR2
— Eric Schultz (@EricSchultz) September 21, 2023
In my heart I know that Trump is guilty of basically every depravity caused by a dearth of human feeling, but it never fails to shock me to see accounts of him saying it out loud to other people like this. https://t.co/ncJdy3V5tQ
— The Fig Economy (@figgityfigs) September 21, 2023
War for Ukraine Day 575: President Zelenskyy Met With Congress
Mike in NC
Remember when Fat Bastard was informed of peaceful protesters in Lafayette Park, and he said “shoot them”? That incident with the Bible was the beginning of the end for him. But he could still teach Putin a thing or two about being a fascist thug. Milley is a real hero of the Trump Error.
mrmoshpotato
The baldass Jewish Nazi should be told to shut the fuck up AND be fired into the Sun.
Alison Rose
“No one wants to see the wounded” no you fetid sack of roadkill, YOU don’t want to see them because you don’t care about them and they might take an iota of attention away from you and you simply can’t have that.
I don’t know if the top tweet was meaning to channel Awkwafina, but I do love imagining Milley saying that line in her voice.
BruceFromOhio
Evil is most efficient when it gets good people to do its bidding.
Ruckus
I had an entire comment about ShitForBrains, but I just don’t have the will to discuss this far worse than worthless POS any more.
different-church-lady
Yet another reminder that the only reason we still have a democracy today is that there were enough Mark Milleys willing to tell the Steven Millers to shut the fuck up.
Citizen Alan
I am 100% convinced that Tommy Tuberville doesn’t really care about abortion. I think he just believes he can use it as an excuse to can keep all those important command level positions vacant so that Shitgibbon or some other GOP President can fill them with RWNJs who will happily give the order to shoot Democrats. I will defer to the wisdom and experience of others who say the military promotion system doesn’t work like that because I know Tuberville is a fool as well as a traitor. But I 100% think that’s what the simple bastard believes will happen.
NotMax
Remember the (thankfully, squelched) plan to have a Red Square-esque parade of tanks and military hardware rumble down the Mall and past the White House?
jonas
As bad as you thought it was, it was always worse. Way worse.
There is no bottom to this fucker. Nor his supporters.
Omnes Omnibus
@different-church-lady:
That is always the case.
Alison Rose
If you’d like a lovely palate cleanser after reading that article, here’s a short and sweet video from the Monterey Bay Aquarium about the sea otter community in Elkhorn Slough where many of them live after being cared for and released back into the wild by the Aquarium.
Adam L Silverman
Goldberg’s piece selectively edits out the actual truth behind how Milley became chairman of the Joint Chiefs. Milley lobbied Trump for the position. Gen Goldfein, who would’ve been the first Jewish chairman, was next up because it was the Air Force’s turn. Goldfein as Chief of Staff of the Air Force, like Mattis, had also been quite outspoken in pushing back against Trump’s bizarre orders and commands by tweet or off the cuff at press conferences and press gaggles. Milley, while Chief of Staff of the Army, had not. Mattis considered Milley a disgrace both because of his weight and because he appeared to suck up to Trump. Am I glad Milley did the right thing when push came to shove? Sure. But he put himself in that position by undermining a peer and usurping that peer’s position. And he only did the right thing after every one called him out for doing the wrong thing.
Yarrow
@Citizen Alan: An enterprising reporter would do well to look into Tuberville and abortion. As in, how many has he paid for. When they protest like he’s doing there’s usually some projection going on.
kindness
@Alison Rose: There is a marina at the foot of where Elkhorn Slough meets the Pacific. They rent kayaks and gear so you can paddle into the slough and be around all the critters there. It’s a great way to spend a day. I have kayaks, so I used the marina to park & head out of.
piratedan
@Adam L Silverman: it does appear to be a recurring theme that our Democracy was “saved” by people with a tattered moral and ethical code from those whose code was only to themselves.
Urza
@Adam L Silverman: Hard enough to keep history straight in normal times. Now with all the competing narratives historians will get to pick and choose what to believe and write the future in the process.
Omnes Omnibus
@Adam L Silverman: But he did do the right thing when it mattered. Is he the epitome of the soldierly ideal? Of course not. OTOH, someone who was probably would never have been Chief at that time. So I am that that he learned from his mistakes and, when the chips were down, did the right thing.
Scout211
@Alison Rose: I’ve taken the Elkhorn Slough boat tour. It was awesome. So many otters. So cute!
Hoppie
Just to brag here, our kid will be 50 years old in six hours. Yes, I am old.
jonas
@Citizen Alan: I know a lot of people are wondering this as well. On the other hand, he’s extremely stupid and politically extreme, so who knows? Has any reporter actually asked him or his staff straight up if there is any truth to this? Seems like someone should get him on the record.
The fact that 95% of normie America is completely unaware of this asshole’s attempt to hollow out the US military because of his anti-abortion extremism is yet another example of how worthless the DC MSM is. Of course, if it was a Democratic senator holding up all military appointments over something like gender-neutral bathrooms or whatever, the country, as I’ve said, would be in flames right now.
teezyskeezy
@Urza:
Hm…I think it’s the same as it always was in this respect. I know I know, when you read about past eras, it doesn’t feel that way. Interesting, huh? ;-)
Alison Rose
@kindness: They are just the sweetest little things. Except when they go HAM on surfers, but then they’re awesome instead of sweet so it’s okay.
Alison Rose
@Hoppie: Happy half-century to them! When I turned 40 three years ago, I was talking to my mom and I said “Good Lord, I’m 40” and she said “Good Lord, my youngest child is 40” and it felt somewhat even.
Adam L Silverman
@Citizen Alan: @jonas: His position on this issue, and the idea for the hold on all senior defense nominations was created by a now departed senior aide and advisor. That guy was a nut job, hard MAGA enthusiast US Army reserve colonel. Tubberville isn’t smart enough to come up with anything like this. The position he’s taken and the actions based on it were created for him. He’s just the useful idiot.
Frankensteinbeck
@Citizen Alan:
It is very difficult for me to believe that Tuberville is that stupid given that his colleagues will have explained how the process works to him a hundred times in their attempts to make him stop being a jackass.
Difficult, but not impossible. Some people are that willfully stupid, and he certainly has that kind of personality.
teezyskeezy
@Omnes Omnibus: Also, he’s a disgrace because of his weight? Really? I didn’t think older generals in administrative positions being fat was a new or even unusual thing.
Adam L Silverman
@teezyskeezy: It is unusual now. Also, Mattis was an ascetic. His real nickname was the Warrior Monk. He ate one meal a day. So Miley’s weight both offended him professionally and personally.
Omnes Omnibus
@teezyskeezy:
Mattis was famously a fitness fanatic.
Hoppie
@Alison Rose: The Eighth Day by Thornton Wilder was my favorite novel. The metaphor of passing the message from cell to cell was powerful. We pass the message on: his daughter is 12, I strongly believe she will be a good person.
rikyrah
@Hoppie:
Happy Birthday🎂 to the kid🤗
Hoppie
@rikyrah: Thank you. Will pass it on.
jonas
@Adam L Silverman: I think I do recall hearing/reading something about Milley leapfrogging another candidate for CJCOS at the time, but didn’t really pay attention/understand the inside baseball of the whole thing at the time. But I’m surprised to hear about Mattis’s take that Milley was 1. fat and 2. a suckup to Trump. Up to the point he resigned in disgust in 2018, what had Mattis ever done to push back on Trump’s ridiculous behavior? I mean, he agreed to be SecDef for Trump even though he must have been aware that he would be serving a dangerously incompetent and unqualified president. I don’t see him, or John F. Kelly (especially), or McMaster really covering themselves in glory in that regard. Did they all really think they were throwing themselves in front of the oncoming train for the good of the country?
mvr
That whole paragraph that begins “For the actions he took and then goes on to quote among others, Gorka, do I actually need to say more about what is wrong with it? Gorka! Fucking Gorka!
Jackie
@Mike in NC: Per TIFG: “McCain was a loser because he was a prisoner. Veterans who died in the line of duty are suckers and losers.”
We need to never forget TIFG’s distain for prisoners of war and the wounded.
How he could become re-elected President boggles my mind and makes me fear for America.
Jackie
@different-church-lady:
YES to this!
Jackie
@Adam L Silverman:
😢
jonas
@Jackie: And yet, a lot of vets are still all-in on MAGA. The mind reels. They just tell themselves it was fake news or something.
teezyskeezy
@Adam L Silverman: One meal? That’s enough to drive a person…nevermind.
Jackie
@Omnes Omnibus: My claim to Mattis was he graduated from my high school: He’s a Richland Bomber and still lives here.
Jay
@Alison Rose:
there is conflict here in places between some of the Indigenous Peoples here and the sea otters.
In their absence because of the fur trade, the local ecosystems changed. Now that they are “back”, the ecosystem is changing back.
Many of the Indigenous Groups created lucrative niche fisheries, like sea urchins, that have been severely impacted by the sea otters return.
NotMax
@teezyskeezy
Not at all. Been my usual regimen since 1964. (Some days, no meals.)
TriassicSands
If anyone thinks the years 2017-2021 were horrendous, just wait. If we get the chance to experience a second four-year-term of Donald Trump, it will make round one seem like a fairytale picnic populated by faeries and unicorns.
Milley?
The list of “good guys” appointed by Trump? It seems like anyone appointed by Trump was the rough equivalent of ten (or maybe an infinite number of) “bombs” for a film. One not only doesn’t want to see it; one should run screaming in the opposite direction to get as far away as possible.
The fact that anyone did the right thing when “the chips were down” was remarkable and lucky. Thanks go out to anyone who did. It’s obvious a country is in trouble when it has to depend on scoundrels and luck to survive.
Carlo Graziani
@different-church-lady: Indeed, it wasn’t just Milley. The Civil Service, and the military, are full of people who would have experienced physical nausea at the very thought of seconding Trump in his transparent coup attempt, even had it not collapsed in the bathetic anticlimax of devolution into white-trash souvenir taking in the Capitol. I remain convinced that if Mike Pence had somehow been persuaded to play along with Team Crazy’s crackpot scheme, the next act would have been a revolt by the entire Federal Government against Trump, and he would likely have wound up in Federal custody.
Omnes Omnibus
@NotMax: Are you suggesting that you are somehow evidence that this regimen does not lead to madness?
Adam L Silverman
@jonas: Mattis basically undermined most of what Trump ordered him to do. What he didn’t do was overtly call Trump out. This is one of the reasons you don’t make retired generals and admirals Secretary of Defense. They can’t stop viewing the president, even one like Trump, as their commander in chief rather as the elected official who appointed them.
TriassicSands
I can’t stop laughing. The fact that Trump has contempt for the military seems coincidental with, not explanatory of his inability to understand or even recognize “such concepts as honor, sacrifice, and duty….” Honor, sacrifice, and duty — what could be more alien to Trump, a person who doesn’t even understand the most basic concept of honesty?
Name a positive quality and then ask yourself, “Does that apply to Trump?” I hope your life never depends on coming up with one.
Jackie
@Adam L Silverman: True.
columbusqueen
@Omnes Omnibus: Guess Mattis didn’t have a picture of Henry Knox hanging in his office.
Carlo Graziani
@Adam L Silverman: You can’t apply this kind of analysis to Trump: the guy is sui generis. He was never a normal commander-in-chief, and by November 2020 he was clearly recognized by pretty much every military and civilian official in the Federal Government as a clear and present threat to our Constitutional order. I would submit that any CJCS would have acted basically as Milley did. By that point, it was clear that the norms that general officers ordinarily steer by had completely broken down.
Omnes Omnibus
@columbusqueen: A marine with a picture of an army general? Never.
TriassicSands
@columbusqueen:
Mattis should have served under President Taft. All 340 pounds of him.
Jackie
Knock me over with a feather! This guy?
Westyny
Shit Midas smeared everyone within reach. Many of them leaned in.
HumboldtBlue
Mattis was known to Marines as the Warrior Monk.
TriassicSands
@Westyny: Many of them leaned in.
“Thank you, Mr. President, may i have another?”
Omnes Omnibus
@Carlo Graziani: We will never know what anyone else would have done. We do know what Milley did.
TeezySkeezy
@NotMax: I was just making a silly allusion to his other nickname. It’s kind of how I eat now too, but not out of any discipline and it certainly hasn’t returned me to my svelte 20s build.
teezyskeezy
@Carlo Graziani: Not saying you’re wrong, but at the same time I’m not sure I want to see them test your theory either.
Carlo Graziani
@Omnes Omnibus: I’m aware of the risk of trafficking in counter-factuals. I’m just arguing that Milley didn’t really have a choice, because he was socialized into an understanding of duty to the Constitution that is nearly a universal among people who choose government service as their vocation.
NotMax
TeezySkeezy
Svelte and I have yet to be formally introduced.
:)
Archon
Trump is the scum of the earth and anyone that supports him is scum too.
eversor
@Adam L Silverman:
Yep. I pointed out the Warrior Monk in a prior thread today and how Trump missed that and just got Mad Dog. Without getting too much into it as I can’t I recently did some work for a former four star who also was famous for eating one meal a day and an insane fitness routine who is scrawny as fuck and rather famous. (I’m sure some people can figure out who just based off that).
For people who didn’t serve here’s how it works.
As I’ve mentioned before I was in the service during the Bush The Lesser Era and got to ride all those shit shows and left on a flag command. Was under a two star Admiral who left and got his third star. For those who don’t know how a flag staff works it’s closer to a family than a normal military unit. In the Navy this means your bottom level enlisted starts at an E-5 (NCO that can command) but the ranks are riddled with O-4 to 0-6 and it’s more officer than enlisted heavy. You also have surface warfare and air warfare as the normal lines. Filling out intel, logistics, admin, comms, operations, JAG, and the usual mubo jumbo. When deployed this expands to include sub warfare, SEAL, EOD, and all sorts of other stuff. But everybody knows each other, each others family, and it’s vastly less formal when it’s just you. Dinners at the bosses house on holidays, trips to sports games, mandatory fun, are all common. This also means group PT tests!
A lot of people had their own standards. AKA pilots have stricter standards than most and the admiral was an aviator. That was based on your job. We were all mostly left to our own devices as we all had goals to hit outside of our command. None the less we did have to as a command take the bog standard Navy PT test on a regular basis. The admiral did it with us. And woe be it to the person who struggled at that let alone failed it. Failure was not an option. Rank did not get you out of this one. And even though some rather salty and canterous O-6s who were not going to get their star and thus were heavy drinkers and massively out of shape had to do this.
The military actually takes obesity, poor public education, and lack of proper nutrition as nation security issues. They are correct on all three. Of course Republicans don’t listen to them. Just like they ignore the DoD about climate change issues and the Navy about how that’s going to screw up all our ports. Which is you know, the DoD and especially the Navy’s fucking job.
BellyCat
@Citizen Alan: Agreed. Stack the court. Stack the military. The path to autocracy.
tokyokie
@Jackie:
Whereas tifg is a winner because he was able to submit phony documents to keep his fat worthless ass out of the military.
eversor
@tokyokie:
Dodging STDs in Studio 54 while watching models get banged in the VP lounge was his Vietnam!
Odie Hugh Manatee
His supporters have to stick with him because to abandon him would be admitting that the liberals were right and they were wrong. Oh fuck no… no way will they ever do that. They will go to their graves professing their love of that piece of shit and their hatred of their fellow Americans for knowing the score.
He did not want to be seen in public with our wounded vets. Get that? The President (at the time) DID NOT want to be seen with our wounded vets because “nobody wants to see that…”
He’s a criminal piece of shit who belongs in prison.
wjca
But it can be tricky to judge who, among those already holding office in 2017 (including those in the military), were supporting Trump vs those who were supporting the office that he held.
Geminid
I want to see Milley’s memoir. I’m pretty sure he’ll put one out. Trump and his henchman used Milley as a punching bag when he could not properly punch back. I suspect Milley has been looking forward to the time when he can finally throw some punches of his own.
Betty
@Adam L Silverman: The problem now is that it has gotten him a lot of media attention,something of utmost importance apparently. The Joe Manchin Syndrome.
cmorenc
@Citizen Alan:
It’s not mutually exclusive that Tuberville has multiple motivations for holding up military promotions:
schrodingers_cat
Are we singing peans to General Theranos again?
MisterDancer
Yeah. I read that piece last night before this post came up, and I was…not deeply impressed. And Adam’s note about how he got the role is of a piece with that.
This article is clearly a hagiography, a puff piece for a General who — in my opinion — ego and desire for power ran him aground. Esp. since it’s written by Jeffrey Goldberg, who I trust about as far as I can throw in these matters.
Uncle Cosmo
Seborrhea Dorka richly deserves to be shipped back to Hungary on a slow freighter in a box with no airholes.
Adam L Silverman
@eversor: I racked out, but your description of what it is like to work on a senior leader’s staff, especially in a senior position, is similar to my experience as a senior civilian advisor to 8 different GOs/FOs. With the exception of no one ever even suggested I had to do the PT test.
VOR
@TriassicSands: re: Trump’s contempt for the military. There was a story that Trump inserted a clause into his divorce decree from Marla Maples stipulating that his daughter Tiffany would be financially cut off if she joined the military. That strikes me as something which could be fact checked if it’s part of a legal agreement.
Tiffany was the one Trump allegedly didn’t recognize when he met her. She spent the TFG mal-administration going to law school and largely kept out of the fray.
Paul in KY
@Mike in NC: I don’t think TFG can teach Putin a fucking thing about being a fascist thug. Thank God someone with a mind like that of Putin was not President.
Paul in KY
@TriassicSands: TFG has contempt for everybody who isn’t him. He seems to think that if you have any intelligence or cunning, you go into making money and every other job in the world is for loser/suckers.
What a dude to have as POTUS. (spit)
Tray711
@tokyokie: Are you NUTS? He’s an extremely fit, practically professional athlete-golfer at ALMOST 215 lbs who should have gone pro!