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You are here: Home / Open Threads / Late Night Open Thread: Opening Salvo?

Late Night Open Thread: Opening Salvo?

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Late Night Open Thread: Opening Salvo

(Jeff Danizger via GoComics.com)

Pete Hegseth’s mother to Hegseth:

“We are on the side of good and that is not you.”

Mother knows best.

www.nytimes.com/2024/11/29/u…

[image or embed]

— Katie Phang (@katiephang.bsky.social) November 29, 2024 at 11:28 PM

One gets the impression that Fox News personality Pete Hegseth might be the next Trump nominee up for the full media shock’n’awe [gift link]…

The mother of Pete Hegseth, President-elect Donald J. Trump’s pick for secretary of defense, wrote him an email in 2018 saying he had routinely mistreated women for years and displayed a lack of character.

“On behalf of all the women (and I know it’s many) you have abused in some way, I say … get some help and take an honest look at yourself,” Penelope Hegseth wrote, stating that she still loved him…

Questions about Mr. Hegseth’s treatment of women have emerged in the weeks since Mr. Trump chose him, a veteran of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, to lead the Pentagon. The issue is expected to be a subject of scrutiny during Senate confirmation hearings.

Reports of his infidelity have focused attention on his character and leadership, particularly for a civilian overseeing the military, where active-duty service members can be subject to prosecution for adultery under the Uniform Code of Military Justice.

Another issue is how the senators will view a rape complaint against Mr. Hegseth filed to police in October 2017 after an incident at a political conference in Monterey, Calif. No charges were ever brought and the complainant has not come forward publicly.

Mr. Hegseth has said that he was falsely accused by a woman with whom he had a consensual sexual encounter. He secretly paid her a settlement a couple years later — only because, according to his lawyer, he wanted to protect his job as weekend anchor at Fox & Friends.

Mrs. Hegseth emailed her son on April 30, 2018, during a turbulent period in his life. He was in the middle of a contentious divorce from his second wife, Samantha, the mother of three of his children. Samantha Hegseth filed for divorce after her husband impregnated a co-worker, part of a pattern of adultery that dated back to his first marriage…

The disclosure of the email comes as Mr. Hegseth and his allies, including Vice President-elect JD Vance, are mounting a concerted effort to help him win approval by the Senate. Mr. Trump will not be able to formally submit his nomination until after taking office on Jan. 20.

Several key Republican senators have said that the sexual assault allegation in Monterey is not an obstacle to Mr. Hegseth’s nomination because it was never proven. But Senator Joni Ernst, a Republican of Iowa who has said she was sexually harassed while in the military, told Politico: “Any time there are allegations, you want to make sure they are properly vetted, so we’ll have that discussion.”

But SRSLY…

Reader Interactions

65Comments

  4. 4.

    Starfish (she/her)

    I hope so Anne Laurie. I hope this is the second dude that Republicans vote off the island before Donald Trump is even President.

    I just learned about Evie magazine. I just read that it is like Cosmo for the far-right contrarian woman, and they just did a photo shoot with the Ballerina Farm lady.

  7. 7.

    Gloria DryGarden

    I am interested in actions I can, we can, take. I’m interested in community building.

    I’m keen to keep my mind out of the dark despair on the floor of the dungeons of dreaded future predictions. It’s a tough job, building little spots of brightness.

    It’s hard for me to discuss rapists in potentially powerful positions, without losing my temper and wanting to pass out my (virtual, imaginary)chemically treated cards that say, “you raped someone, this card has been treated with special chemicals, and your bit is going to wither and fall off within two weeks.” Such a satisfying fantasy.

    So, in the interest of building, and action taking, a river rafting story:

    Friends who were thrown overboard during whitewater rafting, report after they finally come up, that the the waters kept pulling them down, and bringing them up, kind of circling them, pulling them down each time they almost felt they could surface. That the way they finally got out and were able to surface, and continue to live, was to swim out sideways. We had to pull my bestie back into the raft after such, and she she came up, holding her paddle. We’d been instructed to hold onto our paddle if we went in, because we only had one spare. It seems an important part of my metaphor.

    When we go around and around, here in BJ, sometimes we start to attack each other, AND much more  so since Nov 6, I notice.

    But also, it goes beyond interesting info, deepening discussion and clarification, and starts to look like we’re running in a gerbil wheel.

    When it gets like that, I call BJ, Bickering Jackals. Sorry guys.

    I’d be interested in Brainstorming Jackals. Or action- designing juicers. That would help. If you find it’s going around and around, maybe find a way to get off the circling, swim out sideways, hold onto a paddle so you can steer in a direction.

    I don’t mind at all the humor, the little snark about situations in the news, and a certain amount of furious angry venting, and the absolute silly jocularity and word play that sometimes happens.

    Just saying, when it gets to spinning, and circulating bitchiness, consider how to find a bit of direction, or clarity or action or some way to uplift or help or encourage. Something. Swim out, hold a paddle.

    Thank you for listening to my TED talk

  8. 8.

    Leto

    inexperienced? Unqualified? Multiple affairs with women, while married, resulting in one of them getting pregnant? We already elected him… oh, you mean his nomination for HHS? Oh, there’s another? I could keep this sad joke going but I’ll just says grats to raven’s Dawgs and head to bed.

  9. 9.

    Yutsano

    Git em Tammy.

    But seriously: how many of his nominees won’t be able to pass a basic background check, much less a security clearance?

  11. 11.

    Gloria DryGarden

    @Yutsano: im telling ya. I’d like all those background checks and security clearance checks to go on record. So we know what we’re getting.

    oh dear. ( Crying emoji, angry emoji, super furious and frustrated emoji)

  13. 13.

    Jay

    @Yutsano:

    It didn’t matter in the Dolt 45 Admin, won’t matter in the Dolt47 Admin,

    the only impact is no briefings, not intel until after Dolt47 is sworn in.

  16. 16.

    JoyceH

    At Princeton Hegseth ran a conservative magazine that published a column arguing that sex with an unconscious woman was not rape. He’s always been like that.

  24. 24.

    scav

    @JoyceH: He’s probably got a shrine to Dominique Pelicot up in his bedroom.  Is he hoping to send in a team to rescue that poster-child and the 50-odd others being mistreated in France and get his boss to offer them asylum from the international cabal of feminists?

  25. 25.

    MagdaInBlack

    When I see the people trump is assembling for his mal-administration, I feel I’m watching the run up to Hunger Games.

  27. 27.

    Jay

    @MagdaInBlack:

    Gotta count our blessings, he was dead, is dead, hasn’t risen from the grave, so I am guessing that the oak stakes, garlic cloves and Holy Water did their jobs.

  30. 30.

    Jay

    @MagdaInBlack:

    1am here. T on Wednesday got an emergency appt. with the surgeon, had non-intrusive surgery to have bands installed to kill some of the nerves lower down to reduce her pain, so she’s not rolling on the floor screaming in pain anymore, just uncomfortable, and got a better pain med regimen and some diet info. No milk products, zip nada.

    So, better. Still not great

    Watching some Hardthrasher on youtube while T watches the Food Channel.

  32. 32.

    NotMax

    Did find a few bargains* for Black Friday, which Amazon assures me are “scheduled to arrive between December 11 – 17.” Happy I held on to the gift card someone gave me last Xmas for additional savings, which brought the final total a hairsbreadth over my planned budgetary upper limit .

    *in addition to the new microwave oven to replace the one which went kaput during Thanksgiving prep on Wednesday. Same model as I bought for Mom in the spring of ’23 after hers left this mortal coil, only on sale now it was 50 clams cheaper.

  35. 35.

    Jay

    @MagdaInBlack:

    454 Horse Power, Kicking Horse Coffee, yeah, Nelson BC product,

    They have just recently started making it available in Kurieg cups, sort of biodegradable, slow, but excellent for starting seeds.

  38. 38.

    mrmoshpotato

    @Yutsano:

    But seriously: how many of his nominees won’t be able to pass a basic background check, much less a security clearance? 

    Ain’t that the truth!

  44. 44.

    TBone

    These fucking guys, again.

    Nov 29 (Reuters) – BlackRock, Vanguard, and State Street have been sued by Texas and 10 other Republican-led states, which said the large asset managers violated antitrust law through climate activism that reduced coal production and boosted energy prices.

    Wednesday’s complaint filed in the federal court in Tyler, Texas, is among the highest-profile lawsuits targeting efforts to promote environmental, social and governance goals, or ESG.

    reuters.com/legal/blackrock-state-street-vanguard-sued-by-republican-states-over-climate-accords-202…

    Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, whose office filed the lawsuit, in a statement accused the defendants of promoting an “illegal weaponization of the financial industry in service of a destructive, politicized ‘environmental’ agenda.”

    The lawsuit seeks to block the defendants from using their investments to vote on shareholder resolutions and take other steps that could undermine coal output and limit market competition.

    The free market requires intervention after all, I guess.

  46. 46.

    Ramalama

    @Gloria DryGarden: I knew swimming sideways helped me get out of a riptide in plum island Massachusetts one summertime swim. Did not know its the same in whitewater.

    i think people do what they can do here, sending ideas, links, etc. but then also blowing off steam and propping some of us up. I’m not sure what you want different. More talk of strategy?

  47. 47.

    Liminal Owl

    @Gloria DryGarden: I love your TED talk and would like to hear more.

    Also, I may share your fantasy. Or I might modify it so that tbe “bit” doesn’t fall off, but experiences permanent, secere, uncontrollable itching with no remedy.

  48. 48.

    Princess

    At the end of the day, Hegseth has done nothing Trump hasn’t done. I think the GoO senators will recognize that and confirm him. Hegseth is them. All his vices are features to them.

  49. 49.

    Gloria DryGarden

    @Ramalama: good answer! I mean I take your point, and I’m sure you’re right, people are doing what they can do.
    It’s just sometimes it’s lively and interesting, and we’re bouncing ideas about the possible causes, and other times, it’s just the same discussion over and over, just bitching And reiterating, so much that even watergirl has said could we not, could we move the discussion on, stop relitigating x.

    for example was it 3 days, or three weeks after the joe Biden debate, and it went on and on, he was fine, just sick and on meds, no he’s not an ok candidate. Back and forth, over and over.

    There have been other days that get like that. And it feels like spinning, going nowhere, no new thoughts, no possible actions, no hope. maybe im the only one that gets bogged down by it. When it seems directionless, I can of course swim away myself.

    i didn’t know swimming out sideways helped in the ocean- wow, in a rip tide. Glad you got out. Ocean can be scary big, powerful.

  50. 50.

    Gloria DryGarden

    @Liminal Owl: thank you! What would I say more about?

    yours in shared fantasy variations. Yes itching, difficulty, pain, a little time feeling terrified..

    i never understand why the karma department doesn’t go straight to the god department to request some good old fashioned smiting. Or , I think it’s called flaying, I forgot the word.

  51. 51.

    Ramalama

    @Gloria DryGarden: I will admit that I avoided all news and posts after Biden’s bad debate performance. And the calls for him to step down. I just couldn’t. So People were circling, but I was checked out. Also i miss entire things like someone pretending to be Martin and  fcking around…and Martin coming back in full after other people said, yeah where’s Martin. So basically I miss out a ton.

    Also I am a swimming maniac, except for the fact that I don’t know how to do that meditative crawl stroke and it bothers me. Maybe some day. I have spent more than an hour swimming, only pulled in when the company I keep waves me in, annoyed by all that time in the water.

  52. 52.

    AM in NC

    @NotMax: That was my question as soon as I read about that.

    Would either the author the piece or Hegseth, as the editor who chose to run the piece, feel it was just “no harm no foul” if some guy shoved his dick inside their sleeping/unconscious bodies?

    Imma guess no.

  53. 53.

    Gloria DryGarden

    @Liminal Owl: oh, say!

    , I borrowed a few lines from a poem you shared on Election Day, and I made an epigraph poem,  I think it went on one of the threads that night. If I decide the poem is good enough, I might decide to keep it, put it in a collection. It’s traditional ( mandatory) to credit the writer who’s lines one has borrowed. (It was your line about holding your breath)

    it would be great to exchange emails so I can be clear how you’d like to be credited. would that be ok?

  54. 54.

    Gloria DryGarden

    @AM in NC: at your mention of no harm no foul, I’m thinking about the harm to a woman if she finds that while she was sleeping, someone not only entered her body without permission, but left her a deposit of free ranging sperm,   And she finds herself pregnant in some fabulous red voting state where her only choice is to carry the pregnancy to term or to miscarriage, as the case may be.

    it makes me shudder.

  55. 55.

    Gloria DryGarden

    @scav: asylum from the international cabal of feminists

    im not sure there is asylum from the cabal of feminists. We are everywhere. Women who don’t appreciate rape. There’s nowhere to run, to get away from us.

    im savoring the concept, thank you…

  56. 56.

    Jackie

    @Princess: Remember the senate also approved Kavanaugh; who also was accused of rape. TCFG blocked the FBI from investigating the accusations.😡

  57. 57.

    gene108

    A guy with a propensity for sleeping around with a bunch of different women, cheating in his wives, etc. is at best a possible blackmail risk and at worst will end up banging a Russian* spy and spilling state secrets.

    *Pick any country here. The Russians probably have spies lined up to get information from this administration.

  58. 58.

    TBone

    @Betty:  agreed.  Plus the asshat AGs of all of these:

    The 11 states (10 who joined Paxton’s lawsuit) also include Alabama, Arkansas, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, West Virginia and Wyoming.

  59. 59.

    RevRick

    @Gloria DryGarden: Oar….Oar we can continue on the path of Bickering Jackals, because that gives us cheap thrills.

    I like your idea of finding ways to engage, upbuild, seek positive directions. The weakest thing about internet communities is that they are thin, and by thin I mean they lack ongoing face-to-face interaction. And real community requires confession, the baring of one’s soul. I’m saying this, because I believe it’s critical for us to have a clear-eyed understanding of what we can and cannot do.

    I need to mull this over for a couple of days to figure out exactly what ideas, suggestions, benefits I can bring to the table.

  61. 61.

    RevRick

    Before Gaetz dropped out of contention as the AG nominee, I was skeptical that  enough GOP Senators might arise to say any of Trump’s nominees were a bridge too far. But now, seeing Trump’s willingness to quickly substitute someone else with few threats of retaliation, Hegseth’s nomination may well sink. There are four GOP women Senators and Romney who may find the wherewithal to say, “Nuh-uh.” And if there are any others who might balk, and word gets back to Trump, then he may just let it be known to Hegseth that he needs to take a long walk off a short pier.

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