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THE VIEW FROM HERE - Since the time of Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle, Western Civilization has been discussing the two qualities necessary for good government. intelligence and integrity. Pete (Pig) Hegseth, Trump’s Secretary of Defense, is embarrassingly stupid, and Senate Majority Leader is devoid of integrity. This is not new news. Sen. Thune’s betrayal of his constitutional duties was explored in Thune Imperils Free World Briefly, when Sen. Thune sought to be Senate Majority Leader, he promised GOP Senators that he would protect them from political retaliation by Donald Trump who along with Elon Musk was threatening to “primary” any Senator who did not vote for Trump’s nominees. After being elected majority leader, Thune did the opposite. He demanded the GOP approve all nominees or else.
Blackmail and extortion are way out of bounds as means to coerce Senators to violate their constitutional duties, e.g., the duty to approve or reject the President’s nominees (US Const. Art II, Sec 2, Clause -- Advise and consent). Extortion and blackmail to intimidate an official into not doing his duty are criminal offices under federal law (and under all state laws). The US Supreme Court, however, has given President Trump immunity for his engaging in criminal behavior. See Trump vs. United States, 603 U.S. 593 (2024).
As a result, GOP Senators were forced to choose between correctly rejecting Trump’s most egregiously unqualified nominees such as Hegseth, Gabbard, Patel, and RFK, Jr or face primary challenges funded by multi-billion Elon Musk. There is safety in numbers, but as they saw Sen. Joni Ernst, individuals who stand up are quickly gunned down. When a critical mass sticks together, however, there are too many for Musk-Trump to attack. In addition, Trump would be deprived of henchmen like Patel to retaliate against dissenters in the short term. Let’s be 100% clear. No President has any right for any of his nominees to be approved! His right is to nominate and then it is the constitutional duty of the Senators to accept or REJECT each nominee.
Incompetents Imperil Trump’s Presidency
There is a far more vital reason for each Senator to vote Yea or Nay based on each nominee’s qualifications: Donald Trump has some excellent policies which will greatly benefit the United States, e.g., (1) ending the racist Woke DEI which has crept into each aspect of American life, and (2) deporting criminal aliens. Donald Trump, unfortunately, suffers from two serious mental disorders. Trump has a DSM histrionic personality disorder and a DSM narcissistic personality disorder plus he suffers from a form of paranoia, i.e., systematic delusions of grandeur and persecution. His paranoia became much worse after his loss in the 2020 Presidential election and the near miss on his life at the Pennsylvania rally. These liabilities made it overwhelmingly vital that his worse cabinet nominees be rejected. These incompetent, 100% ass kissers will never constrain Trump’s most harmful tendencies. The GOP should be alarmed that America First has become America Alone.
Rather than protect the Senators so that they could REJECT Trump’s worst nominees, especially Hegseth, Sen. Thune turned upon the GOP Senators and violated his oath of office by insisting that they all vote Yes on each Trump nominee. Sen. Thune’s rational was disgraceful; he falsely asserted that the President was entitled to have all his nominees approved. While Hegseth is dumb enough to believe such claptrap, Sen. Thune knew that it was total garbage. Winning an election entitles a President to nominate whoever he wants, but winning grants no right to have anyone approved.
Sen. John Thune knows the reasons for the Senate’s duty to advise (approve or reject). The framers’ main fear was that too much power would accumulate in one place. For this reason, they rejected forming monarchy or a democracy. Rather, they created a Republic. A republic, however, has three features: (1) The rule of law is supreme, (2) it limits power because power tends to corrupt, and (3) it is extremely complex.
A democracy, however, rejects the rule of law but instead at each election the laws may change as the winner of the election may chose. That is because in a democracy the Will of the People, as expressed in elections, is the supreme law of the land. There are no enduring inalienable rights. Although Americans are unaware, the term “constitutional democracy” is an oxymoron. When the Will of the People is supreme, each President implements whatever laws he wishes including ignoring the Constitution. Thus, democracies are simple – whoever wins the election gets to do whatever his wishes by declaring a mandate.
Since America is still technically a Republic with an extraordinarily complex system of checks and balances, the Constitution is not dead . . . yet. In order for the checks and balances to protect us, the men and women in key elected roles must have both the intelligence and the moral integrity to perform their constitutional duties. Essentially, the masses have no comprehension of the checks and balances. Thus, the Democrats have also spent decades trashing the Republic with its checks and balances. Biden habitually called our republic a “democracy” because the Dems were imposing the Woke DEI policies on businesses, the government, in education with rampant cultural cancel for any dissenters. Similarly, Donald Trump ignores the Constitution and claims that since he won the election, the courts may not nullify decisions his decisions and any judge who opposes him should be impeached, or better yet, Congress should abolish the judicial system beneath the US Supreme Court. Trump supports Elon Musk’s current attempt to buy the Wisconsin Supreme Court.
Back to Dumb, Dumber and Dumbest Pig Hegseth
Hegseth’s lack of intellectual prowess was evident during the nomination process. While denying that he had a drinking problem, he promised he would stop drinking if approved. He has not! Unaware of his own alcohol problems, he repeated almost very cliche of an alcoholic. Hegseth could not run even small veteran organizations without running them into the ground (or perhaps embezzling their funds). When it came to women, he was the epitome of the male chauvinist pig.
Sen. Thune’s Allowing Hegseth’s Approval as Secretary of Defense Was Unforgivable Recklessness
As the world has seen with the use of SIGNAL, a communication’s app which for years has been nixed for sensitive government matters, Hegseth used SIGNAL to divulge classified information to the enemy about the strike on the Houthi’s. Hegseth had a greater duty than anyone else on the SIGNAL app to protect American servicemen since he heads the Pentagon. Yet, he did not object to the use of SIGNAL. All he had to say, was “Stop, no discussions on SIGNAL.” Not only did Hegseth not stop the use of SIGNAL, but he was the only one who actually gave out classified information. In advance of the planes taking off, he divulged when they would take off and where they were going. He also betrayed our most valuable ally by providing classified information from which Israel’s informant in Yemen could be identified and the summarily executed.
Hegseth’s low intelligence is emphasized by the absurdly transparent lies he told in an attempt to over-up his wrongdoing by attacking Jeffrey Goldberg, who had not disclosed the sensitive details. Hegseth’s lying that no classified data had been disclosed on SIGNAL left Goldberg no alternative but to publish the texts of the chats. Hegseth’s stupidity is a lethal danger to national security.
There is No Cure for Stupid
Stupid people cannot behave intelligently, just as a man with no legs cannot win the 100 yard dash. From start to finish, Hegseth’s conduct with the SIGNAL disaster shows that he is too dumb to remain in office. Think of all the really dumb things he may have been doing when Jeffrey Goldberg was not listening! Hegseth is so dumb, that the Pentagon has no system to ascertain who is on its group chats! With all the bigwigs, it would be SOP to make certain all the proper cabinet members had been contacted and such a check would have shown that Jeffrey Goldman had been invited and had accepted the invite. Hegseth is so dumb that he uses an app which the government had said for years “Not to Use.” What part of “No” did Hegseth not understand? How many other chats have been on SIGNAL? The fact that no official on the Houthi Chat objected is evidence supporting the conclusion that the use of SIGNAL is common. On how many occasions have Russia, China, and Iran been listening? Unlike Jeffrey Goldberg, Putin is not going to tell the Pentagon that he has been listening to our secret conversations including JD Vance’s comment that Trump does not know what he is doing! Now we find out that Hegseth has appointed his totally unqualified younger brother to a high post in the Pentagon and brings his wife to classified meetings; she has zero security clearance.
Obviously, no one in the American intelligence community has any idea what vital data our enemies have gathered from the seemingly constant use of SIGNAL, or what other breaches of security Hegseth has allowed. This nightmare could have been avoided if Sen. John Thune had had the integrity to protect GOP Senators from Trump’s retribution if they rejected nominees like Hegseth, Patel, JFK, Jr and Gabbard. Thune could have protected Trump from himself.
(Richard Lee Abrams has been an attorney, a Realtor and community relations consultant as well as a CityWatch contributor. You may email him at [email protected].)
