Cue the panic attacks of the Democrat-media complex!
Left-wing tears have been flowing strongly since Trump shocked the world by winning every single swing state in last Tuesday’s election loss.
But those tears turned into waterfalls after Trump turned to Army veteran and Fox News host Pete Hegseth to clean out the Augean stables in the bloated and befuddled Pentagon.
“When I saw (the news of Hegseth’s nomination), I thought the AP must have been hacked,” lamented former failed CNN anchor Don Lemon. “But Pete Hegseth?” The weekend morning host on Fox News? Come on.’
Democratic Representative Dan Goldman said: “Being in the military does not qualify you to run the Department of Defense and have access to our nuclear weapons.”
So says the man whose greatest credential is being heir to the Levi Strauss & Co fortune…. and a television expert.
Well, since you brought it up, Congressman, let’s talk about those qualifications, shall we?
Liberal tears turned to waterfalls after Trump tapped Army veteran and Fox News host Pete Hegseth to clean out the Augean stables in the bloated, befuddled Pentagon.
Hegseth received his BA in Politics from Princeton and earned a Master of Public Policy from Harvard’s John F. Kennedy School of Government.
In 2003, after being commissioned into the Minnesota National Guard and then serving as a platoon leader at Guantanamo Bay, he volunteered for the U.S. Army infantry at the height of the Iraq War.
Hegseth completed tours in both Iraq and Afghanistan, earning two Bronze Stars in the process.
After returning home, he served as executive director of Concerned Veterans for America, a formidable conservative organization that (correctly) opposes reckless military waste and advocates a narrow (one might say ‘America First’) approach to politics. abroad.
He has also advocated for a long-overdue overhaul of the sclerotic Department of Veterans Affairs, an agency he would later be seen as leading during the Trump administration.
At 44, he is close to the age of many men and women now serving abroad or recovering from wounds from wars at home. And only someone from a younger generation, like Hegseth, might be able to reverse our military’s anemic readiness.
Last year was the worst on record for recruiting, with the Army, Navy and Air Force missing their goals by double-digit percentages.
Do you want more young people to join the military?
Ditch the assigned readings of Ibram And he is right.
Hegseth’s attack on destructive progressive ideologies and the threat they pose to military readiness is all-encompassing.
“My trust in this military is irrevocably broken,” he wrote in his best-selling book, “The War Against Warriors: Behind the Betrayal of the Men Who Keep Us Free,” published earlier this year.
“The so-called elites who run the military today are not only lowering standards and focusing on the wrong enemy: they believe power is bad, merit is unfair (and) targets are yesterday,” he said.
In 2003, after being commissioned into the Minnesota National Guard and serving as a platoon leader at Guantanamo Bay, he volunteered for the U.S. Army infantry at the height of the Iraq War and completed tours in both Iraq and in Afghanistan, earning two Bronze Stars in the process.
Hegseth’s attack on destructive progressive ideologies and the threat they pose to military readiness is all-encompassing. (Above) Hegseth and his wife Jennifer Cunningham Rauchet
Many of her critics were clutching their pearls Tuesday over Hegseth’s public opinion of women in combat roles.
While he supports women joining the military, he does not believe they should be assigned “physical, labor-intensive jobs.” That, he maintains, undermines military preparedness.
For many Americans, it’s also a matter of common sense.
“Any general, any admiral… who has been involved in diversity, equity and inclusion programs or woke up shit needs to go,” he told a podcaster last week. And, he stressed, that includes members of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
Most importantly, Hegseth has demonstrated an understanding of Trump’s pragmatic approach to foreign policy: that the United States has overextended itself in too many proxy wars.
He has identified that communist China is, without exception, the United States’ main civilizational threat in the 21st century and that, in the Middle East, Iran is a threatening actor and Israel is our closest friend.
Most importantly, Hegseth has demonstrated an understanding of Trump’s pragmatic approach to foreign policy: that the United States has overextended itself in too many proxy wars.
Maybe the best for him? His nomination has activated all the right people.
A Politico article quoted an anonymous defense industry lobbyist (someone whose only job is to scam billions of dollars from taxpayers) exclaiming, “Who the fuck is this guy?”
In fact, Hegseth’s number is not in any of his rolodexes. And if that means less corporate slush funds for overbloated defense contractors like Northrop Grumman, that sounds like an endorsement to me.
At a time when America’s failed military general class prizes wokeness and too often deploys our young warriors to unwinnable conflicts overseas, appointing an “outsider” to the Pentagon bureaucracy deserves enthusiastic support. of the United States.
Yes, Hegseth’s biggest knock is that he lacks significant experience maneuvering through the bloated federal bureaucracy.
But those skills have failed to prevent the United States – and its brave fighters – from being trapped in decades of unnecessary and pointless conflict or humiliated in Afghanistan.
Maybe it’s time to try something else?
Josh Hammer is the syndicated host of ‘The Josh Hammer Show’ and senior editor at large for Newsweek.