General Kelly followed the Trump playbook to the letter in a presser this afternoon. Here he is attempting to deflect criticism of his odious boss for the insensitive remarks that upset Sergeant Johnson’s widow to Congresswoman Wilson, the long-time family friend who called Trump out on them:
Rep. Wilson should be ashamed of herself.
General Kelly eloquently scolds Rep. Wilson for her despicable actions. pic.twitter.com/hwblVv6lhW
— The Columbia Bugle (@ColumbiaBugle) October 19, 2017
Kelly’s remarks were carefully considered: He blasts the congresswoman — lord knows the base will lap that up. Not only is Representative Wilson a politician, she’s a black woman: a hate-object trifecta for the Trumpsters. Kelly conveniently neglects to mention the fact that Sergeant Johnson’s wife and mother agreed with Wilson’s assessment.
Kelly pretends to be “stunned” that the congresswoman was “listening in to the sacred call” — as he himself was. Kelly lays the blame for Gold Star families losing their “sacred” status “at the conventions,” either eliding the fact that it was his boss who attacked the Khans or, worse, obliquely attacking the Khans himself. Utterly contemptible.
Everything Trump touches turns to shit. But perhaps General Kelly was shit all along.
schrodingers_cat
The generals are not going to save us. Mattis has ceded defense policy to Steven Miller. GC holders can no longer enlist in the army. Kelly has been a willing tool of this President in both his positions. McMaster has lied for his boss on camera, at least twice.
ETA: I have held this opinion since the beginning of this shit show.
Corner Stone
OOOHHHH, BOOOOMMM!!!!
Mary G
Birds of a feather.
rikyrah
UH HUH
UH HUH
Corner Stone
The Dignity Wraith does not steal someone’s dignity. He allows them to reveal themselves.
feebog
You know whats stunning? That Trump did not call these family members for 13 days. That he only called them after being outed on national television. That his staff is so incompetent that they would call Mrs. Johnson WHILE SHE WAS ENROUTE TO PICK UP HER HUSBANDS REMAINS. Kelly is completely and utterly compromised at this point.
Quinerly
He was shit all along. I dread the next news cycle.
bystander
Malcolm Nance called for Kelly to resign to preserve his own honor and integrity. I thought the same thing Rikyrah thought.
Corner Stone
Come on, Nicolle. Do not sugarcoat over what just happened at the WH podium.
Elizabelle
People are trying to prop Kelly up as hard as possible, but what we saw is what he said, and a lot of it was indefensible. Whether he is a Gold Star parent or not.
This will enhance and lengthen the shit show, not shorten it. Moar gasoline.
Our military does not deserve this, and neither do we as citizens. Do not fucking use Gold Star families and the fact that we have a military to divide us.
Kay
@schrodingers_cat:
So true.
Elizabelle
@Quinerly: Hello there. You wuz missed.
I am interested in what we see. It will be most illustrative: are you a weakened institution, trying to prop yourself up by waving the flag?
Or do you see these horrible remarks for what they actually were? I think a LOT of the military can see right through their Commander in Chief and his shit show parade.
raven
Yea, fuck that Eugene Robinson for trying to prop Kelly up.
trollhattan
Is Kelly trying to unseat Flynn for the “Most embarrassing Trump speech by a general” award?
JMG
It’s pretty obvious Kelly supports Trump’s agenda and only wishes Trump wasn’t the one in charge of it. Also, he believes that military people are inherently superior to civilians, morally better people. Only the entire history of war proves that wrong.
Zattarra
Has any supposed man of honor ever revealed himself to be such a hack and political fraud as General Kelly.
Remember, before taking on the role of legitimizing the Trump Circus of Failure as Chief of Staff he was running Trump’s racist policies at Homeland Security and overseeing the breakup of immigrant families. Now he places his fake honor out there to defend Trump from being an inhuman POS.
Most of Trump’s cronies we knew the human waste they were ahead of time. Kelly was and is still treated as some sort of honorable hero in the press. But he keeps showing that what he is is a hack bigot like Trump who’ll do or say anything to stay in power.
SenyorDave
To have accepted a position with the Trump administration is prima facie evidence that you are shit. Kelly didn’t have to worry about losing his honor or dignity, he never had any to begin with. This whole thing started with trump trying to smear other presidents, particularly Obama. I’m actually surprised Kelly didn’t attack Obama.
Villago Delenda Est
John Kelly has made the special “Trump Tumbrel” manifest.
Kay
Before they manage to bury this in layers of Trump bullshit, recall that this started with Donald Trump’s mean-spirited and ass-covering LIE:
Trump lied. It wouldn’t have been a controversy if he had just told the truth.
Dorothy A. Winsor (formerly Iowa Old Lady)
Remember when Trump said we were in the quiet before the storm? Do we have any idea of what was about yet?
Olivia
What the hell is in it for him? Does Trump have something so damning on Kelly that he has reduced himself to this? Nothing like blowing your lifetime military reputation and beingcoming known throughout history as just another trump whore.
A Ghost To Most
@JMG:
Anyone who has ever served knows better than that. They may not admit it, but they know.
bystander
Maybe Obama thought it was better not to call Kelly, since they seemed to have had some adversarial encounters. Guess Kelly is not fully familiar with the expression “Commander in Chief”.
Sounds pretty unsoldierly to me but what do I know?
From WaPo, too lazy to link. Article on Kelly’s nomination by Trump to head DHS.
trollhattan
On things election-related, I remember posting here about a BBC investigation last fall from Wisconsin regarding their voter suppression efforts, the federal intervention and how, when the reporter tagged along as voters tried in vain to register, state employees were still obstructing the process. It was outrageous and perhaps enough to turn the state.
NotMax
Amazing he can speak intelligibly with Dolt 45’s cock wedged in his throat.
Brachiator
Kelly is just disgusting. No reason for him to make any remarks. None.
Kelly is disgusting. Trump is despicable.
Fuck ’em. Fuck them all.
Gin & Tonic
Where/when did the “Gold Star” term originate? I’ve been consuming news for a long time, and I can’t recall hearing/reading that term before last year.
Droppy
@SenyorDave: I think this is the main thing to know about the character of anyone who speaks for this administration. By joining it in the first place, you have already declared what you are. Everything you do after that will just be further evidence of your disgrace.
SatanicPanic
@Dorothy A. Winsor (formerly Iowa Old Lady): farts
JMG
Kelly went on about respect for women. He was a Marine, a branch of the service that had a very recent sexual harassment scandal, Marine United.
SatanicPanic
Well, that’s depressing. We are ruled by horrible people.
bystander
@Villago Delenda Est:
First one’s full. So let’s move DeVos and Prince out so they can go together in Tumbrel Two. Leaving enough space for Kelly and one more. Who else can we add?
Olivia
@bystander: It isn’t typical to call the parents if there is a spouse. Has anyone asked if Obama called the widow?
divF
@Gin & Tonic: Dates from WW I.
dmsilev
@Corner Stone:
Sort of like what Michelle Obama said about the Presidency: It doesn’t change who you are, but instead it reveals who you’ve always been.
(from memory, so probably mangled a bit)
SFAW
@trollhattan:
Was that Ari Berman? Or someone else? (I didn’t associate Berman with the BBC.)
rikyrah
@Quinerly:
Quinerly!!!
Hey there!!
Missed you. Say hi to Poco, Ivan and John Lennon :)
Quinerly
@bystander:
Kelly’s son had a wife. I have wondered since Tues if maybe Obama called the wife. I do have to admit I haven’t read everything posted/reported.
NotMax
@Dorothy A. Winsor (formerly Iowa Old Lady)
It is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.
Calouste
@bystander: The only way KKKelly can even try to preserve his honor and dignity is the traditional Japanese way.
dmsilev
@Gin & Tonic: Either WWI or WWII, can’t remember. Families who had children serving in the military would have flags outside their house with one silver star per serving child (son, usually). In the event of one of those children dying in the military, the silver star would be replaced with a gold one.
SiubhanDuinne
@Dorothy A. Winsor (formerly Iowa Old Lady):
This is not the first time that a BJ commenter has asked a question that seemingly never occurs to our fine Village media to ask.
Tokyokie
I just assume that any member of der Trumpenführer’s Cabinet or inner circle is manifestly corrupt or they wouldn’t have been chosen for their positions. Which is why I’d like to see Congress, should it return to Democratic Party control, investigate Gorsuch. I figure any jurist who would happily accept a Supreme Court seat that had been so thoroughly tainted then immediately act like a complete prick has sufficient dirty linen to be tossed off the court.
Kay
The constant nastiness is what gets me. How they’re always attacking individual people.
It’s just not necessary to throw everything at everyone all the time. They can’t get in front of a microphone without going after someone. One could give this speech without attacking anyone at all, yet they feel they MUST.
It’s just really inappropriate for such powerful people and it’s arbitrary – the kneeling football players get the same blast of venom as the congresswoman or the Gold Star father.
Ultimately it makes them look weak, like they’re staggering around just shooting wildly.
Patricia Kayden
MMM. Yeah. Why are people on the left giving any credence to any of the idiots who support the Bigot-in-Chief? If they are willing to work for Trump, they’re awful people. Period.
? ?? Goku (aka The Hope of the Universe) ? ?
@bystander:
That right there tells you all you need to know about the “honorable” John Kelly.
Elizabelle
How the media will do it: just watched CNN:
Their correspondent giving a comprehensive summary, with the points that appalled us. Not whitewashing them.
Meanwhile: the chyron: to effect that Kelly is heartbroken Gold Star father; criticizes the congresswoman
If you are in an airport or bank or cannot hear the audio, what do YOU take away from that?
Patricia Kayden
@schrodingers_cat: And if you didn’t fall for Assange’s b.s. when other leftists were doing so, you were right about that as well. We really have to stop falling for everything.
d58826
@Kay: or just answered the question that was asked – i.e. why hadn’t the WH commented for 12 days on the the attack in Niger.
And just a little trip in the wayback machine – remember the holy h–l the GOP made out of HRC’s words of condolence to the families of the CIA operators at Benghazi. I have no idea what she said and I have no idea what the family members heard. It is a high stress, highly emotional moment and misunderstandings happen. So you apologize and move on
Kay
I think if you’re that powerful there’s an assumption you won’t pick up every weapon and wield it- that you’ll pick your battles and fight only with heavyweights because that’s a fair fight. The Trump people will fight with anyone, at any time, over anything.
SFAW
@Quinerly:
I’d say “welcome back!” but Ozark said you’ve been around, just not commenting often.
Anyway, glad to see you.
The Golux
@NotMax:
Actually, it’s not too difficult to talk with a toothpick in your mouth.
Patricia Kayden
@? ?? Goku (aka The Hope of the Universe) ? ?: Exactly. He also oversaw CBP/ICE’s harassment of immigrants and increased deportations of migrants when he was head of Homeland Security. And let’s not forget when he advocated separating children from their parents in an effort to lessen migration to this country. He’s an awful person. Glad he’s finally showing his true colors in such a manner that everyone can see.
Kay
@d58826:
Right, because that WAS the actual issue- that the White House hadn’t commented on the attack.
Are they ever like “you know, we’re hugely powerful, running the whole country. Maybe we can let this one thing go and not fight with this or that person?”
lgerard
It is astonishing that the Papaya Pinochet wants to escalate this instead of diffusing it.
To him, I guess everybody is some kind of enemy
Ksmiami
I want them gone, humiliated, strung up and then I want to stop red areas from voting forever. I mean it’s not like anything created in Wilkes Barre even matters
Steeplejack
@Villago Delenda Est:
Tumbrel PreCheck®—no waiting!
Quinerly
@rikyrah: @Elizabelle:
Thanks for the sweet words. Poco, Ivan and I are in NC. Little Ivan probably is on his last trip…his kidneys are failing fast. Vet said he was OK to travel…in fact insisted that he wasn’t suffering and should come because he is a kitty who loves to ride. Lab results showed a real deterioration since June. As for posting, I’ve turned into a bit of a lurker. Since the changes on the site a month ago, it won’t load completely on my Microsoft smarty pants phone. The comments don’t load at all. By the time I get to my tablet or lap top, threads be dead.
Patricia Kayden
@Quinerly: President Obama hosted Kelly for breakfast after his son died. Has Kelly forgotten that?
Mai.naem.mobile
@schrodingers_cat: I have to say I thought/was hoping you were wrong about what you have been saying about Kelly,but you’re right. He’s a massive racist POS.
d58826
@bystander: Mattis retired in 2013 – a polite way of saying he was fired by Obama over policy disagreements. Obama canned Flynn also. I’ve always wondered if Der Fuhrer picked his generals based on those who did not get along with Obama.
Quinerly
@SFAW:
Thanks.
Jane2
@schrodingers_cat: Couldn’t have said it better. I roll my eyes every time I see a reporter characterizing Kelly as the reasonable one, or thinking his pained theatrics at Trump’s speeches are genuine. He’s in bed with them all.
Jane2
@Quinerly: Sorry to hear about Ivan, but sounds like he’s getting to do a thing he loves.
trollhattan
@SFAW:
It was a BBC reporter, clipped accent and all. Just tried searching their site but don’t find a link to it. Recall driving and trying to strangle the steering wheel while listening, little suspecting Trump would go on to win.
Kay
@Elizabelle:
I feel like we’re beyond that point, Elizabelle. People are going to have to do some work to figure out what’s going on. If they’re getting their opinions from CNN titles then they will drown in Trump’s bullshit. It’s really on them at this point.
If they are the kind of people that are likely to focus on the Trump Administration’s enemy of the week then they’re a lost cause- they have to save themselves.
Chris
@schrodingers_cat:
Please permit me to associate myself with this position.
Quinerly
@Patricia Kayden:
Oh, I knew that but certainly no mention by Kelly. I just had wondered if the phone call thing was a red herring…seems Obama, if calling, would have called the wife. Protocol?
Brachiator
@d58826:
You don’t have to wonder about it. Easy money says that Flynn groused openly about Obama and Trump ate it up like catnip. And Obama even warned Trump about hiring Flynn, and Trump hired him anyway. And then look what happened.
boatboy_srq
#NotPatriotic
trollhattan
@d58826:
Roger, I think that’s an affirmative. The rest of the cabinet was selected for being an enemy to humanity.
boatboy_srq
@Patricia Kayden: Of course he has. Blah President was Blah.
Redshift
@bystander:
The “Obama didn’t call Kelly” talking point is complete BS, in the same vein as Trump’s “I wasn’t lying, I was saying I call, and some presidents just write.” Obama invited Kelly and his wife to the White House for a Gold Star breakfast, so the fact that Kelly would allow the “Obama didn’t call” BS to continue tells you exactly how much honor he has.
d58826
@Kay: And a responsible answer would have been
1. Press sec. Sanders commented on it the day after it happened
2. waiting on the DOD after action report so that we have the facts straight
3. always a tragedy when we lose people and thoughts and prayers with the loved ones.
If someone did ask about a phone call a good answer would be those are private moments that the WH does not comment on.
Kay
I try not to think about all the things they’re doing that they distract from with these fights they start.
There were like two days where they weren’t fighting with someone and we learned about the charter jets. God knows what else they’re up to.
Elizabelle
@Quinerly: There’s always the morning OTR thread. My sympathies on the ads.
And best to Ivan. He’s having a wonderful road trip sendoff. Hope he has some good time ahead of him.
boatboy_srq
@d58826: Mandatory requirement for consideration for the position.
FlipYrWhig
Why did Kelly have to collect himself after something something Congresswoman politicized something sacred something, rather than after his sack of shit boss started telling lies about who does and doesn’t call families of soldiers killed, like his own son was? Maybe he had to go cringe and hang his head before swallowing his dignity all over again. Fuck him.
Patricia Kayden
@Quinerly: Adding my words of sympathy about Ivan. They live relatively short lives but they pack so much joy in. I hope you get to enjoy your kitty for a little while longer.
Kay
@d58826:
That’s actually perfect and would have ended it. But Trump can’t do that. He has to lie.
Quinerly
@Jane2:
Thanks. He’s eating well, windows open…seems to be enjoying beach sounds and smells. Vet said let him go back to the food that he loved. He hated the prescription kidney diet. Obviously, it wasn’t helping his kidney function.
? ?? Goku (aka The Hope of the Universe) ? ?
@Patricia Kayden:
I almost forgot about his time at DHS too. This guy just wants power to hurt people. He’s nakedly transparent.
Chris
@Zattarra:
LGM had a decent post a few months ago commenting on the fact that public figures who are renowned for their honor and integrity generally have those reputations because they’ve cultivated the shit out of them, which doesn’t necessarily mean they’re all wrong or that the person being discussed is bad, but at the very least means that he (it’s almost always a he) is more scheming, calculating, and self-promoting than his public image would lead one to believe.
The proximate target of the article was James Comey, but I pointed out that it applied to equally well to Colin Powell, David Petraeus, and John McCain, and given a few more months, I think I might’ve commented on “the generals” of this era too. (Honestly, I suspect any general who’s gotten into the public eye has this. They benefit from the whitewashed reputation of the U.S. military in general, and the fact that they couldn’t have gotten to where they are without being political creatures in their own right is simply glossed over).
Sadly, the article was pre-Disqus, so all the comments are now gone…
FlipYrWhig
@d58826:
I think he picked them based on height and the coolness of their nicknames.
trollhattan
@Brachiator:
How could Trump not hire Flynn after his RNC speech? I thought I’d seen it all until I watched that.
chris
@trollhattan: an enemy to humanity
No kidding. Jesus…
Patricia Kayden
@FlipYrWhig: What dignity did he have to swallow? He had none. If he did, he wouldn’t have taken a position with a fiend like Trump. This is a no shame administration. And a no truth one as well.
Elie
I had said previously that I did not think ANY of the generals were what they were being cracked up to be but that particularly Kelly, was truly a supporter of Trump’s goals, not a defender of this country’s values. He is all in and I think that the others are too — though they may have varying levels of commitment to the “cause”. As Betty has pointed out previously — what kind of “patriot” could support what is going on in this administration and not have to walk out and say why? It is just not possible to give this cover without complete loss of self respect, unless you support the agenda. Sorry, that is just reality and human nature…. Only question is how far they will go to support this regime and what they are willing to sell out to do so.
Mai.naem.mobile
@Quinerly: what I heard was that Obama called the sons wife which is standard protocol. I even read somewhere that Fox&Friends were going on and on about how Obama hadon’t called Kelly and had to finally admit that he called the wife because that was protocol. Maybe Kelly has a bug up his ass because Obama didn’t call him but hes the one who says he wants to keep his sons death private.
SFAW
@Quinerly:
Sorry to hear the news about Ivan. I hope he’s enjoying himself as much as is possible.
Well then, your presence will breathe new life into them!
Miss Bianca
@JMG:
As I remakred at the end of the previous thread: I was prepared to give this guy the benefit of the doubt as the ‘best’ of a supremely bad administration, perhaps relunctantly allowing himself to be dragooned into it for the greater good of the country. But no more. He showed his ass at the DHS and he’s shown it to even uglier effect here. He’s no man of honor – he is pond scum. Actually, I’ve met pond scum that struck me as less slimy.
LurkerNoLonger
@JMG: Exactly. Just because someone is a General or in the military, or a doctor, or a teacher or a firefighter or any number of other professions we as a society have put on a pedestal doesn’t automatically make them a good, and honorable person.
Gin & Tonic
@Redshift: Was Kelly’s son married? If so, his wife and not his father should have gotten the call, just as SGT Johnson’s widow got Trump’s call. I don’t see any mention of that, and it seems important.
Tokyokie
@Kay: No, because he’s a bully, President Asshole only picks fights with those who cannot capably fight back.
Patricia Kayden
@Kay: Now I’m afraid to google “charter jets” to see what nonsense Trump’s administration is up to. It’s always something awful with this regime. Seriously. We cannot afford four years of this.
Kay
As usual with the Trump people, you’re wondering whether it’s malice to repeat these things or just a lack of preparation.
If he didn’t know why Wilson was listening to the call why would he talk about it at all? I mean, God almighty I knew she knew the kid and I’m not opining on national television. Why doesn’t he know?
They just say things. It has no connection to reality.
VOR
I don’t think anyone expects the President to personally call the family of every fallen service member. But Trump said his predecessors didn’t do that but he did, essentially saying Trump is better. This was a flat lie, which he retracted after it was challenged.
Second, there was a legitimate question of why Trump hasn’t addressed the deaths of the soldiers in Niger. After all, he has ample time for the NFL and golf. His excuse was basically that he was going to call the families, eventually. Never addressed why we were in Niger, what goal was worth American lives, and whether there will be an after-action report. Instead he turned it into an attack on his predecessors.
I maintain that Trump is the incarnation of the Seven Deadly Sins.
FlipYrWhig
@Mai.naem.mobile:
He seems to be as private about that as John McCain is about how he was a POW.
Quinerly
@Patricia Kayden:
Thanks. Vet seems to think come December,
I’ll have a decision to make. He was a special needs rescue kitty from the get go. Really bad shape when I adopted him.. probably brain damaged….his flea collar had literally grown into his neck. Front declaw job…not done by a vet. He’s been pampered and loved living with me for about 8 years. A sweet but odd little boy. Never has weighed over 6lbs. Now at a little over 5lbs.
ChrisH
#wraithed
Don’t worry Kelly, I’m sure using your dead son as a political shield for Trump won’t haunt you forever.
Elizabelle
Way for Kelly to step on George W’s incredible speech today.
Could that perhaps have been additional impetus to Kelly’s performance? It happened several hours before Kelly’s presser.
rikyrah
@schrodingers_cat:
yes, you have, and you were on point.
Quinerly
@Gin & Tonic:
I’ve been saying that since Tues.
Kay
@Mai.naem.mobile:
Doesn’t it seem like you would call his wife? If he’s married you don’t call his father first. She’s literally his next of kin.
I would be horrified if they skipped my husband and went to my parents. I haven’t been a child in a LONG time.
Patricia Kayden
@Elie:
I doubt there are any limits on how far they will go to support Trump. There is no way that they haven’t figured out that he is unfit to hold the office of the presidency and yet they back up everything he says — even if it means twisting themselves into pretzels to do so. No one in this administration deserves the benefit of the doubt that they will do the right thing in any situation involving Trump. I really hope that when Mueller takes down Trump, all of Trump’s sycophants are brought down with him.
bystander
@d58826: When I originally read twitler picked Kelly I thought his only qualifications were that he dissed the CIC publicly and sounded like a cretin. Today it became clear how vile Kelly is.
rikyrah
@Quinerly:
Awe Quinerly… you’ve done right by him…He has been loved greatly.
SatanicPanic
@Elie: It’s starting to look like any impulse he has to prevent the country from going to war is only on account of his wanting to not have the country be distracted from accomplishing Trump’s awful domestic goals
zhena gogolia
@Mai.naem.mobile:
The ICE stuff didn’t offer up much hope.
Davebo
I haven’t and don’t want to watch. But did he back up Trump’s claim that he never made the “he knew what he was getting into” crack?
Quinerly
@Mai.naem.mobile:
Thanks for clarifying. Gen Kelly is a POS. Felt good to type that.
bystander
I missed Nicolle Wallace today…well, not really missed, as such. Did she get to kvell over W today?
JMG
Special Forces are in Niger primarily to train and then lead Niger’s own counterterrorism forces. I suspect nobody in our government is talking about it because Niger’s government isn’t anxious to have it known. Over on Charlie Pierce’s page at Esquire, former Army Lt. Col. Robert Bateman has a very good explainer of all that’s known at present. Recommended.
Davebo
Never mind, I saw enough to see he didn’t. He just excused it.
Still, in doing so he called Trump a liar.
Kay
@Davebo:
No, honestly he backed up Wilson’s account.
It doesn’t matter. The President lies all the time. People are going to have to stop listening to him. He’s a liar. They’ll have to figure that out, and they better do it quickly.
zhena gogolia
@Quinerly:
This is the (sad) freedom I’m having with my tuxedo cat Louis, who has a kidney tumor — I’m not counting his treats any more, he can have as many as he damn well pleases. And none of that Oxy-Fresh stuff in his water to keep his teeth from decaying.
Tilda Swintons Bald Cap
Don’t ever, ever question the military again, don’t ever question first responders, and don’t ever question the Supreme leader. This is the setup for 2018 and 2020.
Dorothy A. Winsor (formerly Iowa Old Lady)
@Redshift: Obama called Kelly’s son’s widow. She’s the next of kin.
trollhattan
@VOR:
Nixon would have spend his entire day on the phone, Johnson too.
MJS
@LurkerNoLonger: True, but no profession puts on such an ostentatious display of alleged “honor” as the military does. It,and the accompanying worship it generates among a good portion of the public is truly nauseating.
zhena gogolia
@VOR:
I been sayin that since Day One! Lust, anger, sloth, gluttony, envy, pride, greed! nuff said
Except they didn’t know about racism back then, so let’s add that one in
Mart
From the NYT’s with a (couple) additions:
“I was stunned when I came to work yesterday, and brokenhearted, when I saw what a (black woman with funny looking cowboy hats) member of Congress was doing,” he said. “What she was saying, what she was doing on TV. The only thing I could do to collect my thoughts was to walk among the finest men or women on this earth.”
“I thought at least that was sacred,” Mr. Kelly said, expressing dismay at other aspects of society that were no longer sacred, including (puszy grabbing) women, (war on Christmas) religion, and (Kahn family) Gold Star families.
trollhattan
@FlipYrWhig:
GTFO, McCain a POW? Wowzers, why didn’t I know that?
Patricia Kayden
@Quinerly: Sounds like you did good by Ivan. 8 years is a nice long time to show him love.
zhena gogolia
@Elizabelle:
I thought that too, just by looking at the WaPo front page, where GWB got moved down to make room for Gen. Asshole.
FlipYrWhig
@Davebo: To be fair, maybe overly fair, I’m not sure it was ever supposed to be a “crack.” That’s supposed to be part of the boilerplate consolation statement. Trump I’m sure mishandled _delivering_ the line, but in and of itself it’s an acceptable line. No one would find fault in saying something like, “It’s a job that will never be without risks–and the danger is what brave men like your husband sign up for–but that doesn’t make it any less tragic,” etc. It can be both an acceptable line _and_ painful to hear when delivered by an unfeeling, hapless buffoon.
Quinerly
@zhena gogolia:
Let Louis do exactly what he wants to do.
JPL
@Elizabelle: That tends to be what Trump does.
Jeffro
@Patricia Kayden:
I guess the generals must think – just like the GOP leaders in Congress – that they can keep riding this tiger, regardless of the damage to the country, and keep trying to get what they want (tax cuts, deporting brown people, etc etc) safe in the knowledge that they’ll be able to keep it all from going to hell one fine day. I think they (and we, unfortunately) are in for a very rude awakening. You can’t control everything, not even if you’re a four-star general. Events will overtake, and then with this complete moron in the WH, where will we be?
d58826
And he should know since he works for a ‘man’ whose only service is to his ego.
Dorothy A. Winsor (formerly Iowa Old Lady)
Here’s a link about Kelly’s son that says he was married for three years when he was killed.
Quinerly
@bystander:
Gen Kelly big footed it.
Tilda Swintons Bald Cap
@FlipYrWhig: The goalposts have moved. It’s all about “the Line” and who heard it and who should have heard it. It all started with a blatant lie by Trump, which is no longer part of the story anymore. The right and their enablers in the MSM are geniuses at this game.
Patricia Kayden
@VOR:
There should be a Congressional investigation into the Niger operation. Sounds like it was a mess and that there was poor planning which resulted in four soldiers not having the protection they needed in hostile territory. The families deserve to know why we were in Niger in the first place and why this operation went sideways.
Immanentize
@Quinerly: Yea Quinerly!
I assume that you have not been commenting because the piece of rock rejected by the builders…. is back.
Please share my most respectful woofs and purrs with Poco, Ivan and John.
ETA — especially love to Ivan who has had a tough life, but a great friend in you.
JPL
My fear is that with the general’s in charge, they are approving missions that are not well thought out. Trump just wants a win, and he could care less, if a soldier died. That’s what they signed-up for.
Elizabelle
CNN and Wolf Blitzer. Jeff Zeleny done had some sense slapped into him. Gave a more balanced report on the Kelly remarks.
But we saw his real colors too.
lamh36
Did i call it or did I call it?
I don’t want to hear one more person who ALWAYS defending John Kelly to say word boo defending him anymore ??
FlipYrWhig
@Tilda Swintons Bald Cap: It doesn’t seem that genius, though, because everyone is talking about how Trump is such a dumbshit he can’t even console a grieving family properly.
Patricia Kayden
@Jeffro: GOP leaders are getting a lot out of Trump: Judges, repeal of President Obama’s initiatives, increased military spending, etc. However, when Trump goes down, they all go down which is the price they’ll pay for riding an unhinged tiger with no self control and no real loyalty to the GOP. Trump is about Trump. I doubt he cares about the damage that he is doing to Republicans as a whole.
trollhattan
Trolls R Us
Story may have hit a nerve because the McClatchy link is borked on every one of my browsers. Payback?
MJS
@d58826: Is he suggesting that only the military is engaged in “selfless service” to this country or am I reading that wrong? If I’m not reading it wrong, Christ, what an asshole.
Davebo
@trollhattan: He WASN’T A POW!
He spent the war lounging by the pool at the Hanoi Hilton drinking mai tai’s with little umbrellas in the glass!
raven
@lamh36:
raven
@MJS: You can read whatever you want into it, everyone else is.
trollhattan
@Davebo:
And pupu trays, never forget the pupus!
SatanicPanic
Phone calls! Brave!
Tilda Swintons Bald Cap
@lamh36: The othering of Obama, and by implication liberals, continues apace.
psychobroad
I’d say it’s certain he was shit all along.
Chris
@MJS:
Ah, the theme of “soldiers defend the country even though it’s not worth defending.” How original.
Davebo
I was STUNNED! that morning.
So I fucked off for an hour and a half at Arlington instead of monitoring the idiots tweets.
Davebo
Talk about dishonoring dead hero’s! Fuck you General.
Barbara
Kelly in one fell swoop suggested that those not in the military should be viewed as second class citizens. He insulted the Congress woman for “listening in” when the call was on speaker and he was listening in himself. And he confirmed that yes, Trump basically told Ms. Johnson what Kelly was told when his son died as if it would never occur to anyone that a pregnant widow might not be ready for the same kind of message that a senior military official would understand.
So another missed opportunity at healing, to say, “we try to do the best but this is just a profoundly sad time and we are sorry if there was any misunderstanding, La David Johnson was a hero and will be missed, and let’s have a moment of silence to recognize that and then let this family grieve.” No, instead, let’s insult his family friends once more and shit on anyone who isn’t part of the sacred brotherhood.
FlipYrWhig
@MJS:
That seems to be the John Kelly “brand”: that he’s the last true believer in selfless service. Fuck him, he’s a sack of sewage.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
Betty has the measure of it; this is pure fan service for the Trump base. It’s been a long held fantsy of the Hard Right that some Marine will come and rebuke the hippies, women and Others for not knowing thier place and Trump got Kelly to do it. I suspect anyone with a brain cell right or left is going to see this as nonsense, but the idiots Trump’s base who think this is all just another reality TV show are going to collective wet themselves on this.
Gretchen
@Gin & Tonic: During WWII families who lost a son received a flag or something with a gold star on it to put in their front window. Those who lost more sons had flags with more stars.
Immanentize
@SatanicPanic: But not quite as brave as fighting off venereal diseases…. Which according to Trump was just like fighting in Viet Nam.
FlipYrWhig
@Barbara: It just dawned on me: I’d bet he’s one of these guys who thinks that only soldiers and cops have lives worth a damn anymore, that no one respects them, and that without them there will be no way to keep the savages and animals in line. Which is why he’s pleased to be Trump’s right hand man.
Yutsano
@Mai.naem.mobile: OBAMA FUCKING MET KELLY IN PERSON! Kelly has totally soiled whatever honour he may have had. Although he ruined that in his disastrous DHS tenancy.
raven
@Gretchen: The Blue Star was hung in the window when a loved one was overseas. My folks kept mine and gave it to me.
Barbara
@SatanicPanic: Did anyone ask him why Johnson and his comrades had to bravely fight without support from their own nation’s most expensive military in the universe? Or how the French tried to rescue him?
FlipYrWhig
@Enhanced Voting Techniques:
Sab
@Immanentize: Quinerly: where have you been. Also, I should remember (but I am a dog person) who is Ivan ? I of course remember Poco.
Chris
@FlipYrWhig:
The plural of anecdote is not data, I know. But anecdotal evidence from relatives, friends, and acquaintances, suggests that this “we’re a dying breed, the last line of honorable men doing our duty for a nation of sniveling, selfish, cowardly, unworthy, ungrateful civilians” crap is quite popular in the military as a whole. At least in the officer corps. (My Navy/NCO friend is given to making similar speeches about the state of the nation, but also regularly trashes the state of the Navy insofar as regs allow it. Little less delusion about the glory and honor of the service there).
Elizabelle
I think today was the beginning of the end of Chief of Staff John Kelly. He stepped in it, and then dipped the other foot too.
The mask is off. I don’t care if he is a Gold Star parent. He has a LOT of bad impulses. Can you imagine anyone from Obama’s administration doing anything like that?
A Ghost to Not
@trollhattan:
Spend 10 minutes in the WaPo comments, you can see it for yourself.
Chris
@FlipYrWhig:
Underrated film. Sad that that speech, taken at face value, is the thing that endures the most about it.
FlipYrWhig
@Chris: I have a friend(ish) who is very Trumpy and whose daughter just became a cop and everything you just said resonates with many things she has often said and now says more.
Bobby Thomson
Perhaps?
Shit is attracted to shit v
VOR
@Barbara: Bingo. This could all be so easily put to rest if the Trump Administration had any competent PR people and if they wanted to. I can only assume they think picking a fight with a black congresswoman and the family of a fallen service member is a winner with their base.
Immanentize
@Sab: Me? I’ve been trying to get my shit together and my head back in the game. Almost there, so I am trying small steps back on the blog. Small steps….
ETA Ivan is Quinerly’s sweet cat that went on the last trip east with her and Poco.
Elizabelle
@Chris:
I think it’s how trolls and the Russians help polarize. They target stuff at the obsequious military supporters and blue lives matter types.
One of my real life friends, now a FB friend too — the level of contempt for those who are not or do not have serving military in their immediate family circle — I think she got it from her Fox watching, and then the internet. I’d thought she was brighter than that.
She is a Ph.D. degreed professional. She’s on FB today, comparing the Dem congresswoman to Al Sharpton. Way to go, huh?
She takes the bait anytime Fox has a fit. She puts up Breitbart links. Maybe she was always like this, but I had no idea, and I liked and respected her so much. Still like her, but I’d kind of rather not know about this.
SiubhanDuinne
@Brachiator:
Did he go out and give the presser on his own initiative, or did Trump give him a little assist?
It’s really rather stunning, just over the last couple of weeks we had Tillerson making an appearance to say, basically, “Hey, the Prez and I get along great, just great!” and then Kelly last week showing up to say “I’m not quitting and I’m not getting fired, at least I don’t think I am, at least, not today. Yet.” and then just this week McTurtle and Trump doing a joint presser (before everything went off the rails) about how everything on both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue is copacetic and tickety-boo, and now today this appalling appearance from Kelly.
I am 75 years old, and in one way or another have been following politics and government since the last years of the Truman administration, and I have never seen anything to approach this level of insanity. In retrospect, even the cray of Watergate played out within “normal” institutional boundaries. I don’t know what shorthand term we’re going to use in future to describe this period in our history. I just hope no Fourth Millennium Edward Gibbon will have to write a ponderous tome bearing the title The Decline and Fall….
MomSense
@Quinerly:
Thank you for loving him. My heart breaks when I hear about suffering like that.
Had a really upsetting case of child neglect recently that shook me badly.
Dorothy A. Winsor (formerly Iowa Old Lady)
@Elizabelle: Has your friend served in the military? How nice that she gets off if one of her relatives goes instead.
Bookeater (formerly JosieJ)
@Jeffro:
Thus proving that they have no knowledge of–or capacity to learn from–history. I hope it doesn’t go to hell as badly as it has in the past, but that may be a vain hope.
schrodingers_cat
@SiubhanDuinne: Rs declared a war against truth and evidence since Reagan, these are their poisonous fruits.
SatanicPanic
@Barbara: Apparently it’s more important that people be upset about a friend of the widow listening in on a phone call that was very respectful. He knows this because he listened in.
Chris
@Elizabelle:
Trolls yes. Russians? Eh. If they have anything to do with this, they’re only the last ones on a bandwagon that’s been running for a long time. This one, sadly, we did to ourselves. And yes, I know exactly the kind of mentality you mean.
There’s a reason the founding fathers, and for that matter, Anglo-Saxon culture for much of history, has such a suspicion of standing armies.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@FlipYrWhig: Yes indeed,Trump made that movie scene happen in RL, that’s why Trump is awsome to his base.
dogwood
@Elizabelle:
Doubt it. Kelly is the darling of the media; his narrative is written in stone. He’s actually given them permission to fall back on another one of their favorite narratives – President Obama isn’t a real American, and he disrespects the troops. Kelly knows how to do this shit without insulting the press and going off script the way Trump does.
SiubhanDuinne
@lgerard:
A little tweaking and this would be fine on a bumper sticker.
Mike in NC
Plenty of retired generals and admirals turned down the opportunity to work for Fat Bastard. Maybe Kelly will still get fired soon so Trump can recall Bannon to be CoS.
RobNYNY
@Gin & Tonic:
https://www.legion.org/troops/bluestar
World War I, codified in World War II. My great grandmother was a Gold Star mother from November of 1944 for losing a son in France. VP candidate Tim Kaine wears a Blue Star pin for his son who serves in the Marines.
I don’t recall use of the stars during wars after WWII, but I wasn’t around for Korea.
debbie
@SatanicPanic:
Good point. Kelly was listening in too.
Do we know if the widow invited or asked Wilson to listen in? I didn’t hear this addressed.
Brachiator
@SiubhanDuinne:
I will bet good money that Trump sent him out and demanded that he do the loyal soldier dance.
Like you, I have followed politics for a while, and don’t think I have ever seen or heard of anything like this. I don’t know how many people went along with the BS during the McCarthy era, but I am as dismayed by the number of “good conservatives” who fall in line for Trump’s nonsense as I am appalled by Trump’s egotistical excuse for a presidential administration.
Quinerly
@MomSense: @Sab: @Immanentize:
Thanks for all the sweet words. Poco sends out a giant sweep of his fluffy tail….we are off for a beach walk. We have been chilling here on Bogue Banks on the NC coast this week. Tues was the second anniversary of my mom’s death. I was back at cleaning out/organizing the house I grew up in last week. Couldn’t bear to be there this week. Back to that task next week. I gotta figure out why BJ won’t fully load on my phone. Always did until the ad changes a few weeks back. Sometimes it will load but then I can’t comment. Miss the convenience of the smarty pants phone.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@SiubhanDuinne:
At the hight of it’s power The Roman Republic dengerated into a viscious series of Civil Wars over something no one has ever been able to figure out. Apparently it centered arround accents in one’s Latin. But the Roman Empire lasted centures after that. More like Trump will be viewed as some kind of Emperor Comodus type idiot, an indulgence only a super power can afford.
Elizabelle
@Dorothy A. Winsor (formerly Iowa Old Lady): Her son in law is in the military. It’s possible that her husband was too (they adopted one daughter from Korea, lovely girl.)
It’s very sad. She’s been marvelous to me, but she apparently lives and breathes Fox News and I had no idea.
What is funny: she has a lot of non-Fox News FB friends, and a lot of us call her out for the more egregious stuff. And then she retreats to “but I really meant this (some tangential issue)”, which is not believable, but she keeps getting schooled and keeps doing it …
She is not good at being a provocateur. I take comfort in that.
EthylEster
@schrodingers_cat: I’m with you. I am so tired of hearing folks say that we need the generals because only they can save us.
1. They are not going to save us.
2. What kind of punk ass democracy is saved by the military?
Mnemosyne
@trollhattan:
I still say that our troll LT has it in for me now because I bad-mouthed Macedonia. But, seriously, my friend who did research there said it was the worst shithole in Eastern Europe, and he’d been to Romania.
RobNYNY
@Quinerly:
And protocol would be to call the widow, not the father, since she is the next of kin.
The Lodger
@FlipYrWhig: Where the hell did that hot mess come from?
Elizabelle
@debbie: Didn’t the sergeant who was holding the phone put it on speaker so that everyone in the car could hear?
I know Cong. Wilson has said she wanted to speak out to Trump and the sergeant would not let her hold the phone.
MomSense
@Quinerly:
Big hugs to you, Poco, and Ivan.
Timurid
That speech was insane. He went full-on General Ripper. The only thing missing was the precious bodily fluids. Not reassuring from the guy who’s expected to stop Trump from starting World War III.
MomSense
@Mnemosyne:
Hmmm, that adds an interesting detail to LT.
Quinerly
@dogwood:
You nailed it. The entire narrative has now changed with the “Liberal” press in the last 3 hours. Plus, I guess you read Rep. Wilson is getting death threats.
Mnemosyne
@Barbara:
Let’s think about this for a minute: Kelly is saying that military wives are not part of that “sacred brotherhood.”
That ain’t gonna go over well. At all.
schrodingers_cat
WTF does it matter who President Obama called. 4 soldiers are dead, under T’s watch and we don’t know why. I remember Benghazi and Black Hawk Down. Where is the fucking outrage from the fucking media. Instead here we are on the day elebenty of the grudgefest started by his Incompetency in the WH.
Elizabelle
@Timurid: I was thinking Dr. Strangelove too, but haven’t seen it for a long time …
I think Kelly did himself a world of bad with his presser.
One good thing: I think it woke some of the WH press corpse up. Especially when he asked the room if they knew a Gold Star family member (presumably personally).
Elizabelle
Fucking Chris Cillizza thinks Kelly was referring to Harvey Weinstein with Kelly’s remarks about women’s status (pedestal, etc.)
It’s why he makes the big bucks.
Fucker. Did that in the least bit come to mind to any of YOU?
schrodingers_cat
@Elizabelle: If I were Pence I would watch my back. Seems like Kelly has political ambitions of leading the deplorables.
The Lodger
@The Lodger: OK, apparently it’s an extended movie quote. My bad. I’ll go look it up.
MomSense
@Timurid:
His tenure at Homeland and his bizarre comments about Mexico indicate he’s a wingnut. I hope he wants to tackle trump before he can access the football but I suspect that is just wishful thinking on my part.
debbie
From the transcript of Kelly’s remarks:
Expectations are that low! If Kelly really cared about the welfare of this country, he would have kept Trump from making the call and maybe have someone else — someone who can at least fake empathy and compassion — make the call instead.
Elie
@Patricia Kayden:
I am beginning to believe that Mueller alone — despite any evidence he has — will be able to do that. It is not going to be a straight line from those findings to his and his regime’s removal. I wish it were. I think that the path to that outcome is unclear at best but it may actually require people in the streets at some point. This regime and its supporting Republican congress have already demonstrated their complete imperviousness to anything resembling patriotism or true willingness to uphold the constitution. The agencies are semi populated or populated with Trump yes men who will block anything, so the pathways will have to be outlined for the first time. We have lots of work to do. Also, we have to be very careful how this is done. If we go outside of Constitutional lines, we risk endangering everything that we want to reassert. Nope… Mueller is one tool but just one… I am glad that we won’t rely on “the generals” anymore. That was always going to be very dicey and goes against the goal of civilian leadership of our governance. I am glad that they have been “found out”.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
I was on a long drive and I heard Nicole Wallace play a long clip of Kelly’s speech. She was in tears about his recounting of the process of returning a soldier to his family. Not even Gene Robinson or Donna Edwards commented on how the wheels came off the rails and hinges and everything else after that. “Women used to be sacred”, said Donald Trump’s chief of staff who apparently thinks there was no sexual harassment or assault in the days when a man tipped his hat to a lady. Also, “religion”: Once again, Donald “Two Corinthians” Trump, and fuck you.
Elizabelle
@schrodingers_cat: They’re all talking about “Emotion.”
Because too many of them are wankers.
CNN chyron right now: Emotional Kelly defends Trump’s condolence calls.
I mean, it’s classic.
Emotion.
Defends.
Condolence.
Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes
Sounds like John Kelly decided that he was going to emulate Courtney Massengale instead of Sam Damon.
Anybody know if his promotion track happened before Once an Eagle became required reading?
debbie
@Elizabelle:
I haven’t heard anything about specifics. Does this mean the widow was in the car? Or was this some kind of conference call?
MomSense
@Elizabelle:
Nope. I was more on the “under his eye” wavelength.
FlipYrWhig
@The Lodger: A Few Good Men. It’s what follows the “You can’t handle the truth!” bit.
SiubhanDuinne
@schrodingers_cat:
Oh, agree completely with you. But even during the Reagan years, there was an unspoken agreement to respect the norms and the institutions of governance/civil society. That began to unravel under the GOP Congress during the Obama administration, and is in complete tatters now.
Criticise press coverage? Fine. Threaten to repeal the First Amendment? That’s new.
Play the Legislative against the Executive? A fine, well-honed tradition. Vow to thwart every piece of legislation and obstruct a judicial nominee for a year? We know exactly when and why that started.
You know the examples as well as I do (probably better, as you’ve just recently gone through the rigorous citizenship process). Yes, the seeds were planted long ago, and germinated while we were thinking and telling ourselves that everything was fine, just fine; but we are now being offered the “poison fruit” and commanded to eat it.
AMM
Question about the Obama/Kelly phone call snarl:
If Obama did phone the Kelly family, wouldn’t he most likely have called Kelly Jr.’s next of kin, i.e., his wife and not his father?
I understand that there aren’t exactly rules for these calls and that the President and Mrs. Obama showed (what I think would be called) special attention to Kelly Jr.’s parents later. I can also imagine that expectations might be entirely different when someone of Kelly’s status is a relative, but I haven’t seen anyone addressing this question and it seems to me somewhat relevant to the hullabaloo.
debbie
When does Kelly address the obvious: that Trump has shown far less regard for the 4 deaths in Niger than Sec. Clinton did for the 4 deaths in Behghazi? This bears asking.
Quinerly
@debbie:
As I understood widow, aunt that reared him, her husband, Rep Wilson, and someone in the military were in the car. The call was on speaker phone.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
Actually, yes. It was pretty clear by that point that Kelly is a fox-news-watching crank who thinks of 1950s as the good old days
Elie
@Elie:
I was told that I “did not have the authority” to edit this comment but I wanted to say that Mueller alone will not be able to get rid of Trump.
EthylEster
@d58826:
Something was published today in NYT or WaPo saying that a press release WAS prepared just after the deaths occurred and circulated but never presented. The text was supplied. It was obviously NOT written by DJT. And it contained the ubiquitous “thoughts and prayers” line.
AL will probably post about it tomorrow.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@debbie: So Kelly is saying he told Trump to tell the widow “he knew what he was getting into”. Well, I guess Kelly and Trump were meant for each other, the two soulless bastards. This also begs the question; how did Kelly begot his son because it’s unbelievable that any man could says stuff like “— when he died, he was surrounded by the best men on this Earth: his friends.” to a grieving wife could convince any woman to marry him.
I mean seriously, that’s one messed up statement, basically telling her that she never mattered to her husband.
FlipYrWhig
@debbie: I have been waiting for someone in Big Media to say this is “Trump’s Benghazi” for two weeks. Unless I’ve missed something, I’m still waiting.
Elizabelle
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: But Harvey Weinstein, specifically?
Mnemosyne
@MomSense:
I’m mostly joking, but maybe not. ?
d58826
@MJS: I read it to mean military only
Elizabelle
You know, I think Trump is horrible with language and really mangled what he meant to say. I don’t think he meant it to come out as badly as it did, because his language was callous.
I’d have to look at a transcript, but there was the ghost of Kelly and Trump previously having a conversation about the risks of serving in the military, and I think that stayed with Trump and was a go to thought when he was faced with this terrible duty. Which was:
To make a phone call THAT FUCKING DAY because he’d gotten himself into political jeopardy once again. With his own damn mouth.
And it is curious, very curious, that there was very little mention made by the WH, previously, about the failed Niger patrol.
efgoldman
@Gin & Tonic:
Goes back at least to WW2, and maybe WW1. Parents (= “mothers”) who lost kids in combat, put paper stars (“gold stars”) in their street-facing windows.
They may also have hung stars just foir kids who were serving, My paternal grandmother, for instance. sent five sons to WW2; all came back whole.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Elizabelle: yeah, didn’t Kelly say something about “as we’ve seen recently”?
Gretchen
@debbie: Call was on speaker in the car while family was driving to airport to meet the body. Wife and mom were both in the car so of course both wanted to listen. Wilson couldn’t have avoided listening if she’d wanted to. Ridiculous criticism.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Elizabelle: the idea that it’s incumbent on the widow to give trump the benefit of the doubt about what he meant to say is pretty offensive, too. Wasn’t the family on their way to retrieve the body, having just been told it would have to be a closed casket funeral? What idiot thought that was a good time for a call?
Also, the next day trump said he had a “nice conversation” with “the woman”. Kinda affirms he had no respect for her, her loss and no human understanding of what he was doing.
Elizabelle
@Gretchen: I think CNN might have to resort to doing a courtroom style drawing of what really happened; who was in the car.
Fox will have the congresswoman darting over, because with her magical negro powers she deduced it might be POTUS on the phone, and she threw herself into that limo or whatever the vehicle was. Big enough for the sergeant with the phone, presumably a driver, the widow, her two kids, the mother …
This should not be an occasion for alternative facts, but with TrumpWorld, here we are.
dogwood
I certainly hope the Johnson family gave the ok to Rep. Wilson to go to the press because they are now thrown into a big mess.
debbie
@Quinerly:
Thank you. That makes sense. I couldn’t figure out how a military person figured into it.
AMM
@FlipYrWhig:
Here’s the headline from a newsweek.com article posted last night :
IS NIGER TRUMP’S BENGHAZI? FOUR U.S. SOLDIERS DIED AND IT TOOK HIM 12 DAYS TO RESPOND
debbie
@FlipYrWhig:
Stephen Colbert said it. But I’ve heard nothing from Major Serious Outlets.
Mnemosyne
@dogwood:
She had apparently been a mentor to Sfr Johnson since he was a kid.
And people who decide to attack the widow of a US soldier killed in action are miserable assholes who were just looking for an excuse to make everyone else as miserable as they are, so fuck them.
Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes
@Enhanced Voting Techniques:
Kelly is a piece of fucking shit.
I’m done fetishizing The Troops. They’re not keeping me free, they’re not dying for me. They’re doing a fucking job that they’re getting paid for, and in many cases, pretty decently. Their deaths are no different than the deaths of blue collar workers, miners, loggers, fishermen or cops.
dogwood
@Mnemosyne:
I know she was a mentor. Nonetheless, the call was to the Widow. I just hope Mrs. Johnson got the opportunity to approve Wilson’s actions ahead of time.
Gretchen
@AMM: Exactly! We had years of whining that Susan Rice didn’t say exactly the right thing on the Sunday shows 2 days later, but Trump admin saying nothing at all for 12 days is no biggie. Both lost 4 soldiers in Africa, huge problem for Obama, no problem for Trump. And we knew we had troops in Libya and why. Rachel Maddow thinks this to-do is to keep us busy so nobody asks what they were doing in Niger and whether they were properly protected.
Another Scott
@Chris: The Wayback Machine has archived copies of LGM.
HTH.
Cheers,
Scott.
(“The Internet never forgets…”)
d58826
@debbie: So they made 4 hurry up calls on Monday so that they could check off a box. This now has been reduced to an exercise in bean counting.
Der Fuhrer is a man who has trouble saying the alphabet let alone construct a coherent message of condolence. If that was the only thing then I would save give Der Fuhrer a pass. But it isn’t the only thing and it hasn’t been for the past two years. He certainly found the words to attack the Khan family and John McCain’s war record. And maybe the family did misunderstand, what with on a speaker phone, moving car, on the way to the airport to met the coffin.
And heavens knows the GOP was never willing to give Hillary the benefit of the doubt that the Benghazi family members may have misheard what she said. They dragged it out at the convention and practically accused her of leading the mob of terrorists.
Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes
@Enhanced Voting Techniques:
Do we need to go back to “spitting on soldiers in airports”?
SiubhanDuinne
@efgoldman:
I’m very glad your dad and his brothers all returned home intact after their WWII service. But my heart wrings for your grandmother. Can’t imagine what she must have gone through every day of that war.
ETA: I assume she kept a banner with five blue stars in her front window?
d58826
@AMM: OH FSM I hope not. Look, if they put Der Fuhrer on a bbq spit I would contribute a ton of charcoal but he isn’t the only one involved. The families will have to live with these hearings. I don’t know what the families of the two CIA operators felt about Obama and Hillary in the immediate aftermath of the attack, but by 2016 one mother was accusing Hillary of murder at the GOP convention. The political system will have top live with the hearings and their aftermath.
Now that doesn’t mean the Congress should not ask questions. One joint committee in the House and one in the Senate conduct hearings once the DOD investigation is complete. We have done this before. After the Marine compound was bombed in 1983 the Congress held hearings, published a report, and passed some legislation. I think it took 6 months, start to finish and it didn’t turn into Reagan’s ‘Benghazi’.
Elizabelle
Whoa. A reader comment, on the FTF NYTimes story on Kelly’s press conference: Kelly Speaks About Son’s Death and Criticizes Congresswoman Wilson
MomSense
@Mnemosyne:
The thing is, Russia has been engaged in serious interference in Macedonia for at least 10 years – maybe longer. Some of what has come out about Russian activities in Ukraine, US and elsewhere is because of Macedonians who have been countering Russian active measures all these years. And of course there are pro Russian Macedonians so I may go look at some of his comments to see if there is anything interesting.
Gvg
I think it’s very human ti like being told we are special. The military and the police force have been told for decades now they are special. They like it. They may start off modest but if they get closed off and don’t hear other voices, it corrupts anybody. It’s also a motivational tool to keep going even when you are afraid. The military uses it deliberately. They have to and it’s ancient.
The problem is we all aren’t hearing the balancing stories. First no particular group is without flaws, police, soldiers, priests, whomever. Second all other people are also worthy and many of them are hero’s when the occasion arises. Any group judged better, gets corrupted and then we have a period of scandals, and reaction and clean up. We may be headed for that. I know the police need some cleanup, in some places a lot. Some fools just like making heroes too much and have gone too far IMO.
I also think a lot of gun fondlers really like thinking of themselves as defenders of freedom. They aren’t the kind to go attack crowds, they just like the fantasy they are more important than an ordinary citizen.
Self image is important to people. It’s just a problem when it means cutting down other people or unrealistic hero worship. I actually do admire soldiers and cops to a point, I just know there is a limit and I expect respect back for myself plus all kinds of other people.
J R in WV
@Quinerly:
Hi Quinerly, glad to hear from you.
My old kitties with kidney problems would NOT touch the special kidney diet. Would have died of starvation, so I gave them what they loved. They eventually aged out of the world. Probably pushing 20, first the orange and white big guy, then a little while later the all orange little skinny former alley cat. Sweet guys, they would sneak into bed and curl around my head when it got cold.
Wife was in the hospital, so I just did it on the way in to be with her, didn’t say a word until she asked how they were. She was much better by then. I can’t lie worth a damm. So I don’t, ever. Sometimes that’s hard…
Take care, let us know when you leave NC for home.
debbie
@Elizabelle:
Especially this, from that post:
The fact the General Kelly visited the dead to console himself rather than consoling the survivors speaks volumes.
I think it was more to assuage his guilty conscience over sending young men and women to war, but why quibble?
By the way, has anyone asked Trump to produce this “proof” he has that will prove the Congresswoman wrong? Didn’t think so.
Quinerly
@J R in WV:
Thanks for the sweet story. I’ll hit Charleston, W VA for my halfway stop either 11/3 or 11/4. That’s your neck of the woods, isn’t it? Been making that trek for over 30 years, to and from St. Louis.
Vhh
@schrodingers_cat: GC holders? Jargon alert.
schrodingers_cat
@Vhh: Green Card holders, officially known as Legal Permanent Residents.
Chris
@Gvg:
This. The military and police aren’t unlike CEOs in that for decades now they’ve been stewing in a culture of sycophants that idolizes them, constantly tells them that they’re the only ones holding the nation together, and constantly telling them how persecuted and disrespected they are by unworthy commoners. They draw the obvious conclusions.
I saw this all the time with ROTC cadets at my university enraged by all the “disrespect” they had to endure on a liberal campus. It only took me a couple months walking around in an ROTC uniform to realize: no one was actually showing them any “disrespect.” What a lot of people were doing was saying things that the ROTC cadets disagreed with, both WRT the war and more generally by not being the Southern/Midwestern all-white cocoon that most of these people thought was normal. But they had no interest in engaging the people whose opinions they found so annoying, and society provides with all those ready-made “goddamn hippies spitting on the troops” self-righteous narratives to comfort themselves with, which they were happy to make use of. Most of these people are now officers and I have no doubt they loved every minute of Kelly’s speech.
J R in WV
@Quinerly:
Good job rescuing him, then. We rescued a literal alley cat from the west side of Charleston, all orange. He had a pink collar from when he was a little girl’s kitten, I took it off with a razor knife, verry carefully. A wonder he could swallow, he always ate very slowly, chewed everything totally.
When I brought him home in a cardboard box and let him out, he ran into the basement, and we didn’t see him for a couple of weeks. We knew he was ok because the food and water was going. When he finally showed up on the living floor, we named him Harvey after the giant rabbit Jimmy Stewart could see (Pooka?) that was invisible to everyone else.
He was a great tiny cat, no BS from anyone else, gave no one any BS. Would sneak into bed with me once I fell asleep, he didn’t really need to wait.
I’m glad you can have this time with your little guy. They deserve the love they get because they give so much!
And don’t worry about dead threads ,I comment on dead threads all the time… sometimes they come back to life, sometimes they don’t.
J R in WV
@Quinerly:
I have a good Samsung phone. I always put it on speaker when I make any call, or answer a call. Always. At home too.
I have excellent hearing, wear hearing protection when I use power equipment or shoot, or go to a ZZ Top show. But I like to not have a phone against my head.
But that means everyone in the car heard it all.
J R in WV
@dogwood:
Somehow I got the impression that the Congresswoman was a personal family friend, and that was why she was in the car. Trump may have bitten off more than he can chew here.
J R in WV
@Quinerly:
We need to get together when you stop here. We’ll take you out to dinner…
pinacacci
@J R in WV: I thank you for this lovely story illustrating what love is