WTF 10/24/2024

Even his generals call him a damn fascist… 

Personally I’m pretty much anti-war. I mostly don’t believe in killing no matter what the reasons for. Yes, I just stole a John Prine line, but it fits how I feel about war.  

And it also follows I pretty much don’t like people who wage war for a living regardless of how smart or likeable they might be. Mind y’all, there is a difference between the young men and women who get snookered into enlisting and becoming possible “expendable pawns” for one group of uber-rich oligarchs to gain control of the source of the wealth of another group of uber-rich oligarchs and those who wage war for a living… those peeps in the top echelon… the generals. The generals who sit in the planning rooms with key politicians and businessmen and send those young men and women into horrific and deadly situations than no person should ever need to experience essentially over power and control of wealth in whatever capacity it can be imagined.

The history of humanity and how we have progressed through time is littered profusely with violence and seemingly never ending wars of one sort or another. While I might not like it I understand that ending war and the necessity for countries to have armed forces at the ever ready to do the bidding of whoever to get control of whatever is not gonna happen overnight and that we still have a long road ahead to get to the point that where all hate will be vanquished and peace and the welfare for all peoples will endure.  

So on Wednesday (10/23) when I go to my two main media sources for my national and international news I see headlines informing me that John Kelly, Trump’s former, and longest-serving, White House chief of staff chief, said that  Donald Trump meets the definition of “fascist.”

That caught my attention for a variety of reasons but mostly for the fact that while there a whole host of folks out in America who  have no problem calling Trump a fascist it’s an entirely other issue for a high ranking person, with a very conservative military background, who had the personal ear of the former president and was part and parcel to his policies (at least to the point he held his position before it was announced he would be leaving “at the end of the year”) to say that Trump “certainly falls into the general definition of fascist, for sure.”

Coming on the heels of other top politicians and business folks, including Vice President and the Democratic nominee of president Kamala Harris, former vice president Mike Pence who have issued warnings that Trump cannot be trusted with the power of the presidency again, the former commander of U.S. Southern Command John Kelly and one time top Trump advisor adds a potential game changing voice to the chorus calling out Trump for the political punk and hack that he is.

Adding even more importance to Kelly’s word is those words follow a similar pronouncement made by retired Gen. Mark A. Milley… Trump’s former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff… in Washington Post associate editor Bob Woodward’s new book, “War,” that the former president is “fascist to the core” and “the most dangerous person to this country.”

In a story published Tuesday (10/21) Kelly a New York Times reporter that he felt compelled to denounce Trump publicly in the weeks leading up to the 2024 election because of comments Trump has repeatedly made about harnessing the power of the executive branch, including the military if necessary, to eliminate the “enemy from within.”

Specifically he said, “… this issue of using the military on — to go after — American citizens is one of those things I think is a very, very bad thing — even to say it for political purposes to get elected — I think it’s a very, very bad thing, let alone actually doing it.”

This is not the first time Kelly has been outspoken regarding Trump’s outspoken opinions as well as his distaste for Trump’s extremely right-wing politics…

In an October 2023 interview with CNN, Kelly confirmed various past pieces that said that Trump had told him… told Kelly personally… that military personnel who had been seriously wounded or tortured as prisoners of war were “suckers” and those who died in combat were “losers.”

And also on Tuesday, besides what Kelly told the Times, the Atlantic confirmed that a White House conversation that the then chief of staff Kelly had with Trump where Trump asked him “Why can’t you be like the German generals?” In their book The Divider: Trump in the White House, Peter Baker and Susan Glasser wrote that when Trump asked him that question Kelly responded by telling Trump that are number of those German generals “tried to kill Hitler three times and almost pulled it off.” To which, Kelly said, Trump told him, “No, no, no, they were totally loyal to him.”

Kelly goes further in the Times story then he has ever gone before…

Among his more salient and especial critical and condemning comments included…

• “Certainly the former president is in the far-right area, he’s certainly an authoritarian, admires people who are dictators — he has said that. So he certainly falls into the general definition of fascist, for sure.”
• Trump “certainly prefers the dictator approach to government” and he “never accepted the fact that he wasn’t the most powerful man in the world.”

And… maybe the pièce de résistance was when Kelly told the Times…

• “He commented more than once that, ‘You know, Hitler did some good things, too.’”

And here is the rub…

The criticism of Trump by people who served under him during his presidency has been growing and is becoming more loud and intense as the November election moves ever closer but now it appears that the most pronounced voices seem to be a growing number of folks with some serious and high ranking military background and credentials.

Among the who’s who list of big shot military peeps.. besides Kelly… now dissing their former commander in chief big time…

The aforementioned comments by Gen. Mark Milley and a Trump former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff where he told Bob Woodward that Trump was… “fascist to the core” and “the most dangerous person to this country.”

Trump’s former defense secretary, Gen. Jim Mattis… “Donald Trump is the first president in my lifetime who does not try to unite the American people — does not even pretend to try.”

Former Trump defense secretary Mark Esper who when he was asked for comment regarding from the Times and or Atlantic said he agreed with Mattis and Kelly. 

And what might be most striking of all the comments are these words by Kelly…

“What’s going on in the country that a single person thinks this guy would still be a good president when he’s said the things he’s said and done the things he’s done? It’s beyond my comprehension he has the support he has.”

And to an extent it’s beyond mine as well. 

But I understand this about the some nearly 75 million of we the people…  74,223,369 voted for Trump in 2020… who in some way or fashion supported Trump and his policies…

One of Donald Trump’s most effective and most useful tactics in rebuffing criticism has been to insist that anyone who dares to criticize him or any of his policies is operating in bad faith… you bitch about the (cough, cough) former president then it means you are not loyal to the (cough, cough) former president and whatever you have to say is made void due to your anti-Trump bias.

And his most loyal supporters buy into it.  Those folks assume Trump is speaking for them for them from position of righteousness and that anyone skeptical of Trump’s self-serving assertions about the world needs to be driven out of town on a rail and probably.. if they had they preferences… tarred and feathered.  

All the evidence in the world telling we the people that Trump has previously embraced fascistic beliefs and is currently continuing doing so, wants to implement authoritarianism upon day one of his re-election to the White House, has disparaged the military and its most decorated personnel and has admitted being an admirer of Hitler as well as other dictators and despots both past and present by as many former top former Trump advisors or political appointees and the most probable reaction from an ardent and loyal Trumpist… You’re an anti-Trump hater.

It goes like this in TrumpWorld…

Kelly doesn’t think Trump deserves the job of being the country’s president because he says Trump is a dictionary-definition fascist. But since Kelly is badmouthing Trump as being a fascist, Trump peeps see that as being anti-Trump and therefore Kelly’s… or anyone else’s of a similar bent… criticisms (of Trump being a dictionary-definition fascist) are therefore invalid and wrong. Regardless of the truth.

You can’t argue with that logic.

When asked by the Atlantic for a statement regarding Trump and some of the recent comments from some of his very vocal former generals a Harris spokesperson said, “The people who know him best are telling us Trump is unhinged and pursuing unchecked power that would put us all at risk. We should all listen.”

We should all  listen, indeed.

And we should all spread the word…

Out of those almost 75 million folks who voted for Trump last time out.. the Trumpists, his most loyal followers, (unfortunately  there are quite a lot of them out there) they’re a lost cause. Nothing is going to change their minds.  

But for those folks who were straddling the fence back then and who are now hearing his mouth spouting out even more ultra-conservative and despotic stuff than he has ever spouted out previously and then hearing how totally to the dark side of the far right he wants to take the country from some of the highest ranking and most decorated military people this country has had in the past 30 to 40 years.. military people that even those folks would call patriots and true blue Americans…

It’s a fair bet a fair number of those 74,223,369 who formerly voted for Trump in 2020 can be convinced he ain’t worth their vote now.

Another thousand words…