7913

Those people need to be subject to civil penalties, if not criminal ones.

Man, four years of Trump really did move us closer to an overthrow of our government. The nuts are all emboldened.

7914

Maybe I should rename my Civil war 2.0 thread, to Signs and precursors to the failure of our democracy.

7915

“Hey, I and many people like me have these ideas that may be batshit crazy and quite possibly dangerous to everyone, but because we live in America the ideals of Democracy, the Constitution and our Rights mean that our ideas should be heard and implemented no matter what, because otherwise Democracy is flawed and we are being oppressed!”

Bro, I think you’ve confused Democracy with Democrazy.

7916

Just call it what it is- fascism. We need to keep calling it fascist all day and all night.

7917

On the Capitol Riot, Trump Rallies, and similar stuff I agree 100%. However I don’t think the school board anti-vax anti-mask stuff happening in so many places is all out fascism so much as it’s just pants-on-head crazy people trying to drive the bus.

Although the Venn diagram of fascists and pants-on-head crazy people does contain a metric fuckton of overlap…

7918

Maybe, but the bus’s destination plaque is Fascism.

7919

Part of fascism’s rise is a disbelief of reality due to its inconvenience. It may not be a fascism, but it’s definitely a symptom of it.

7920

Am I wrong to think that some of these people — like Milley and Haspel — had an obligation to speak up? In particular in the context of impeachment? On the one hand, I thank them for their service, while on the other, WTF were they thinking?

7921

I’m pretty over the ‘adults in the room’ spilling shit to writers like Woodward after the fact.

7922

Me, too, and the fact that Pence was begging Dan Quayle (!) to give him permission to toss the electoral votes is just, well, crazy.

7923

Wow that’s a name I haven’t heard in a long time. I guess I have to give Dan Quayle more credit than I thought. He may not know how to spell potato, but at least he’s loyal to the Constitution.

7924
7925

I think that’s true of a lot of the conservatives we used to despise. They’re no longer running for office, so they don’t have to kowtow to the Republican party anymore. Which means any of them who truly believed in the rule of law have to either keep their mouths shut or become Never Trumpers.

-Tom

7926

On the other hand, about that Milley story, this is a reasonable caution.

7927

I posted this in the Trump presidency thread, but this is probably better.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2021/09/14/peril-woodward-costa-trump-milley-china/

I think this is a super hard call. If they do speak up they risked being replaced with crazy general like Michael Flynn and then we are truly fucked.

I think the obligation to speak up is far less important than, avoiding getting in a shooting war Iran and especially China.

7928

Maybe? I find it hard to believe that all branches of the service get in line behind a coup because Milley speaks out and is replaced by Flynn. I think they probably just ignore the fucker.

At the same time, Trump was being impeached for trying to overthrow the government, and Milley seems to think he had good reason to worry that Trump was trying to overthrow the government, so his testimony to that effect seems…relevant? Important?

7929

I tend to agree with this take. Comey did a decent op-ed a few years ago that described at length the situation of dealing with Trump yet wanting to remain in your position to protect it and serve the nation as best as possible.

7930

There was witness testimony at the 2nd impeachment trial? I must have missed that. Ok let say that Miley goes public with everything he told Woodward during the impeachment. What ten Republican senator switch their votes?

Intellectually, I agree with you, but practically I think Milley and many of the other trying to do damage control in the Trump White House did the right thing.

7931

I think if Milley tells Pelosi he wants to speak to the House, she lets him speak to the House. If not, there are a million newspapers in the country, and not all of them save their best bits for Bob Woodward’s books.

None of them, probably. But is that what people in positions of adult responsibility are supposed to do? Guess whether they can win, and if not, keep these kinds of secrets? I hope not.

Edit: this is very much how I feel about it

7932

I read that op-ed, and I also remember him describing in his book and how much he admired Mattis, who for instance in the famous early cabinet meeting where everyone praised Trump, instead talked about how proud he was to lead the servicemen. Standing up to the President of the United States is tough. Trump is a bully but he was also the President.

In my opinion. I’m willing to give anyone in the defense and intelligence the benefit of the doubt. It’s one thing to tell Woodward in book, how fucked up the President is. It is another to let all of our enemies and friend in real-time how bad the situation is. Plus in many cases these people couldn’t talk because what Trump did is classified.

In the case of the state and justice department, it is on a case by case basis.

For pretty much else in the Trump admin in an appointed position, I think the right thing do was resign with a year. and by 2019 just never join in the first place.

This is all from doing the right thing from a moral position. But it doesn’t take into an account pragmatic things like paying your mortgage, the kids college tuition, or your career.

There are very few of us with the courage of Jim Mattis, Alexander Vindman, or Marie Yovanovitch. On my best days, I can imagine having the courage to do what they did. There are no days, where I could have been as courageous as Alexi Navnly, or John McCain.