President-elect Donald Trump said this week he’s nominating Robert F. Kennedy Jr. — who was running for president himself not too long ago — to oversee the Department of Health and Human Services under his incoming administration.
Continue reading “RFK Jr.’s Long History Of Embracing Junk Science And Spreading Dangerous Anti-Vax Disinfo”Trump Wants To Install His Personal Lawyers In Top DOJ Posts
A lot of things happened. Here are some of the things. This is TPM’s Morning Memo. Sign up for the email version.
DOJ’s Darkest Era
Matt Gaetz as attorney general.
Todd Blanche, Trump’s personal attorney, as deputy attorney general, the second in command who runs the Justice Department on a day-to-day basis.
Emil Bove, another of Trump’s personal lawyers, installed as No. 3.
It is a crippling mix of incompetence, disregard for the rule of law, conflicts of interest, and divided loyalties that would send the Justice Department down a flawed and uncertain course seen perhaps only once before, in the darkest days of Watergate.
What Will Become Of The Gaetz Ethics Report?
The House Ethics Committee was supposed to meet privately this morning, but that meeting has reportedly now been cancelled. It leaves in further doubt whether the committee’s completed report on now-former Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) and his alleged sexual misconduct will be released either publicly or to senators considering his nomination to be attorney general.
Meanwhile, ABC News reports that the underage woman with whom Gaetz allegedly had sex testified to the House Ethics Committee she was 17 years old when their encounter happened.
Hegseth Had Previous Sexual Assault Allegation
The nomination of Pete Hegseth as secretary of defense already faced all kinds of problems, but Vanity Fair’s Gabe Sherman reports that the Trump transition team was caught off guard by an allegation of sexual assault arising from a 2017 incident in Monterey, California:
According to the transition source, the allegation is serious enough that Wiles and Trump’s lawyers spoke to Hegseth about it on Thursday. A source with knowledge of the meeting said that Hegseth said the allegation stemmed from a consensual encounter and characterized the episode as he-said, she-said.
On Thursday evening, Hegseth’s lawyer Timothy Parlatore said: “This allegation was already investigated by the Monterey police department and they found no evidence for it.”
The Trump II Clown Show Continues …
- Robert F. Kennedy Jr: secretary of Health and Human Services, which includes the CDC, NIH, FDA
- Former SEC chairman Jay Clayton: U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York
- Gov. Doug Burgum (R-ND): Interior secretary
Fun Times
TPM’s Josh Kovensky: Friend of Don Jr.’s Who Hawks Trump Merch To Run White House Personnel Office
Don’t Forget About Tulsi Gabbard
WSJ: “President-elect Donald Trump’s pick to lead powerful U.S. spy agencies has often seemed to embrace Washington’s adversaries and questioned key American intelligence judgments, raising alarm among veteran intelligence officials and the wider national-security establishment.”
Let’s Not Fool Ourselves About Senate Republicans
Is the Gaetz nomination in real trouble? Perhaps:
- WSJ: Gaetz Nomination Seen as Doomed by Some Senate Republicans
- WaPo: Republican senators say Matt Gaetz has ‘steep’ climb to nomination
But take this reporting from CBS News’ Roberta Costa:
What I’m hearing privately from a few key GOP senators: yes, they’d prefer to not have a messy fight over Gaetz. Not their favorite. But they also don’t have a lot of energy for pushing back. Trump runs the show, they say. If Gaetz can reassure them, they’re open to backing him.
Low energy! It suggests that spending the next three months on pins and needles over whether the Republican-controlled Senate will block any of Donald Trump’s nominees for his new administration seems like misspent energy on a fool’s errand. That’s true not only because GOP senators are not eager to have a showdown with Trump, but because there’s no indication that Trump’s replacements for any failed nominations will be much better.
Quote Of The Day
Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-AL), to fellow senators: “Vote with President Trump, this is the last chance we’re going to have to save this country, and if you want to get in the way, fine, but we’re going to try to get you out of the Senate, too, if you do that.”
More Low Energy Deference To Trump
In a first, two federal judges in DC delayed key deadlines in Jan. 6 cases in anticipation that Trump may pardon the defendants. The decisions amounted to declaring “Why bother?” even as other federal judges have declined to derail cases on the basis of speculation and conjecture about what Trump will do. How long will the two judges who ordered delays wait to see what Trump does?
This come against the back drop of attorney general nominee Matt Gaetz doing as much as anyone to rewrite the history of Jan. 6.
Elon Musk Watch
One of the most important stories to track in the Trump II presidency will be whether corporate America holds the line, which it largely did in his first term, or begins to collapse into crony capitalism. Even before Trump’s win, Elon Musk foreshadowed an erosion into corruption, favoritism, and pay-to-play:
- NYT: Elon Musk Met With Iran’s U.N. Ambassador, Iranian Officials Say
- Politico: Musk’s sway over Trump could devastate electric vehicles — except his own
- NYT: Elon Musk Helped Elect Trump. What Does He Expect in Return?
GREAT READ
For those bewildered by why so many Americans apparently voted against the values of liberal democracy, Balint Magyar has a useful formulation. “Liberal democracy,” he says, “offers moral constraints without problem-solving” — a lot of rules, not a lot of change — while “populism offers problem-solving without moral constraints.” Magyar, a scholar of autocracy, isn’t interested in calling Donald Trump a fascist. He sees the president-elect’s appeal in terms of something more primal: “Trump promises that you don’t have to think about other people.”
No Joke
WaPo: Go bags, passports, foreign assets: Preparing to be a target of Trump’s revenge
Makes You Want To Weep
The lead paragraph in this Politico story just flipped political journalism’s script on the economy, without batting an eye: “Joe Biden and Kamala Harris could not sell voters on the strength of the economy. Now, Donald Trump is poised to enter the White House with booming markets and solid growth. Expect him to reap the political rewards.”
2024 Ephemera
- PA-Sen: An automatic recount was triggered, with Sen. Bob Casey (D) trailing Dave McCormick (R) by fewer than 25,000 votes statewide.
- AZ-Sen: GOP nominee Kari Lake is still not conceding that she lost to Rep. Ruben Gallego (D).
- WI-Sen: GOP nominee Eric Hovde still hasn’t conceded to Sen. Tammy Baldwin and is considering seeking a recount.
- WaPo: Inside the Republican false-flag effort to turn off Kamala Harris voters
You Can’t Make This Up
The Onion bought Alex Jones’ InfoWars out of bankruptcy and almost immediately shut down the conspiracist website. The proceeds of the auction sale go to the families of the Sandy Hook victims who to satisfy their $1.5 billion judgment against Jones for claiming the school shooting was a hoax.
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Republicans Aren’t Exactly Going Out Of Their Way To Defend Gaetz
The House Ethics Committee was going to vote on whether to release a report on its three-year-long investigation into Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) on Friday, Punchbowl News was first to report — just days after Donald Trump announced on Truth Social that he was nominating Gaetz as his attorney general. The Florida congressman, who was investigated but not charged as part of Justice Department probe into sex trafficking, quickly “accepted” the nomination in a post on Twitter and resigned from Congress.
Continue reading “Republicans Aren’t Exactly Going Out Of Their Way To Defend Gaetz”Listen To This: Mapping Out The Future
A new episode of The Josh Marshall Podcast is live! This week, Kate and Josh discuss how Democrats can ready themselves to take back power and analyze Trump’s early Cabinet picks.
You can listen to the new episode of The Josh Marshall Podcast here.
The Most Pernicious Anticipatory Obedience Hides in Plain Sight
In the waning days of the 2024 presidential campaign, Amazon mogul Jeff Bezos became the target of widespread and deserved disgust for nixing The Washington Post’s policy of endorsing presidential candidates to avoid antagonizing Trump. As I wrote at the time, it’s not that there’s anything magical or even necessary about newspaper endorsements. The whole concept strikes me as a bit dated. The issue was why they were being dropped. Bezos wasn’t being paranoid. There is abundant and persuasive evidence that Trump used the levers of government to punish Bezos through Amazon and his Blue Origin space delivery company during his first term. The phrase many people used to describe this behavior is “anticipatory obedience.” (I’ve been told the phrase might originate with Timothy Snyder. I don’t know if he coined it or simply brought it to wider use.) But there’s another kind of anticipatory obedience I’ve seen like a torrent in the days since Trump won the election, and it’s more paradoxical because it comes from people who feel they are the most intense of opposers.
During harrowing times some people become overwhelmed and even lose hope. It’s not a one-way progress. Almost everyone has their moments. But there’s a particular kind of militant doomerism afoot at the moment. Any discussions of next steps in the battle against Trumpism or the preservation of civic democracy, any suggestions or strategies, are met with a chorus of, “don’t you get how it worked under Hitler and Stalin!!?!” Or “don’t you know rules don’t matter to Donald Trump!?!?!”
Continue reading “The Most Pernicious Anticipatory Obedience Hides in Plain Sight”Friend of Don Jr.’s Who Hawks Trump Merch To Run White House Personnel Office
It takes all kinds to make the incoming Trump administration. You have now former Rep. Matt Gaetz, investigated but never charged on allegations of sex trafficking, the anti-China and Iran hardliner Rep. Mike Waltz, the easy-on-the-eyes TV personality Pete Hegseth, and onetime Assad sympathizer Tulsi Gabbard.
The shared quality is loyalty, and the extreme demonstration of it: unending flattery of Trump.
Continue reading “Friend of Don Jr.’s Who Hawks Trump Merch To Run White House Personnel Office”Matt Gaetz Is Trump’s Way Of Humiliating Senate Republicans
A lot of things happened. Here are some of the things. This is TPM’s Morning Memo. Sign up for the email version.
It’s Going To Get Worse Before It Gets Better
In seismic move Wednesday afternoon, Donald Trump announced the stunning decision to make the supremely unqualified, deeply compromised, and unfit Matt Gaetz his attorney general, placing in charge of the Justice Department a man who until last year was under criminal investigation for sex trafficking by the department he would lead.
I thought I had steeled myself for a series of horrific nominations that could not shock or surprise me. I was wrong.
The unfortunately named Matt Gertz, a media watchdog who is frequently confused online with Matt Gaetz, captured the whirlwind of the previous 24 hours:”Matt Gaetz pick is so crazy people have forgotten the Tulsi Gabbard pick which was so crazy people had forgotten about the Pete Hegseth pick. Who knows what tomorrow will bring.”
The selection of Gaetz, who is nearly universally loathed, including among Republicans, caused even the toadyish WSJ editorial board to blanch: “He’s a performer and provocateur, and his view is that the more explosions he can cause, the more attention he can get. … He’s a nominee for those who want the law used for political revenge, and it won’t end well.”
Trump’s pick of Gaetz presents the Senate GOP with a stark choice: either defy Trump or be humiliated into confirming the most atrocious pick for attorney general in the nation’s history.
Will Senate Republicans Roll Over?
The reaction to the Gaetz news among Senate Republicans was rich, but it’s not at all clear that they can muster the resolve to block the nomination of someone even as outrageously flawed as Gaetz. A sampling:
- “Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), a 50-year veteran of Congress, stood speechless for 30 seconds when reporters grilled him on whether the widely disliked Gaetz deserved to be confirmed.”–Punchbowl
- “‘I don’t think he’s a serious candidate,’ Senator Lisa Murkowski, an Alaska Republican who also has broken with Mr. Trump frequently, said of Mr. Gaetz.”–NYT
- On whether Gaetz can be confirmed: “That’s what I am wondering,” Sen. Kevin Cramer (R., N.D.) told the WSJ: “I need to think about that one.”
Other GOP senators were much more circumspect about Gaetz. In the declaration by Sen. Susan Collin’s that she was “shocked” lay the seeds of so many previous capitulations.
One of Gaetz’s detractors in the House was practically gleeful about the prospect of Gaetz going through a Senate confirmation vetting. “I’m surprised that Matt would do this to himself,” Rep. Max Miller (R-OH) told the NYT. “I want to go get a big bag of popcorn and pull up a front-row seat to that show.”
The Reaction To Gaetz At DOJ
You won’t be surprised by the internal dismay over the Gaetz pick at the Justice Department, which was already braced to be broken, undermined, and eroded by a Trump II presidency.
NBC News has an excellent rundown of some of the reaction:
- “OMG”
- “truly stunning”
- “insane”
- “What the f— is happening?!” asked a senior Justice Department official.
- “How many other prospective attorneys general had previous experience as the subject of a criminal investigation?”
- “absolutely unbelievable”
A quick civics reminder: The attorney general doesn’t just oversee Main Justice and the 94 U.S. attorneys but also the FBI, DEA, ATF, U.S. Marshalls, Bureau of Prisons, and host of other units and programs. Gaetz would be helming the bulk of federal law enforcement.
Gaetz Abruptly Resigns From Congress
Adding to the tumult of the afternoon, Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) immediately resigned his seat, apparently to try to short circuit a House Ethics Committee report on his alleged misconduct that was expected to be released within days. The committee, which is evenly split between Republicans and Democrats, doesn’t have jurisdiction over non-members, but the consensus appears to be that it could still vote to release its completed report on Gaetz. That would take at least one Republican joining with committee Democrats.
Tulsi Gabbard As DNI?!?!
The U.S. intel community was separately reeling over Trump’s pick of former Hawaii Rep. Tulsi Gabbard, the Democrat-turned-Republican with a soft spot for conspiracy theories and Russia.
A senior former intelligence official told Politico the choice was a “left turn and off the bridge.”
Among Gabbard’s many strange comments and moves over the years was that trip to Syria she took in 2017.
The brain worms are real with this one.
Don’t Forget Pete Hegseth!
Before Wednesday afternoon, Pete Hegseth as defense secretary looked like the Trump pick most likely to run into Senate Republican headwinds. The Pentagon was stunned by the pick, too.
TPM’s Hunter Walker took a dive into Hegseth’s writings while an undergraduate at Princeton, where he crusaded against the “glorification of diversity” and “the homosexual lifestyle.”
House Officially Remains In GOP Control
Enough House races were called to determine that the House majority will be narrow but remain in Republican hands.
Thune Elected New Senate Majority Leader
Senate Republicans elevated the current No. 2, Sen. John Thune (R-SD), to the lead spot.
Jack Smith Seeks To Pause MAL Appeal
Special Counsel Jack Smith has asked the 11th Circuit to pause his appeal of the dismissal of the Mar-a-Lago criminal case until Dec. 2 while the Justice Department figures out next steps in light of Trump’s election. This follows Smith’s similar move in the Jan. 6 case in DC and comes as Smith is expected to wind down the cases and step down as special counsel before Trump’s inauguration.
House Chair Detained For Public Intoxication
“House Foreign Affairs Committee Chair Michael McCaul was detained by police at Dulles International Airport earlier this month in an incident that he described as ‘the result of a poor decision’ to mix Ambien and alcohol.”–Semafor
The Toll Of Florida’s Book Ban In Public Schools
WaPo:
“Florida school districts axed about 700 books from school libraries in the 2023-2024 school year, according to a Florida Department of Education list. …
Some of the removed titles that are works of classic literature, including “A Clockwork Orange” by Anthony Burgess, “Slaughterhouse-Five” by Kurt Vonnegut and “I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings” by Maya Angelou, according to PEN America’s online tracker.
ICYMI
From over the weekend: “A group of people carrying Nazi flags demonstrated outside a community theater performance of ‘The Diary of Anne Frank’ in Livingston County, Michigan, in a display of antisemitism.”–CNN
Keeping An Eye On This …
The FBI raided the home and the seized the phone Wednesday of the founder and CEO of Polymarket, the election-betting site where a French national put down tens of millions of dollars on a Trump win. It’s not clear what the FBI is investigating.
Happy Anniversary To TPM!
Josh Marshall started TPM on Nov. 13, 2000, during the Florida recount.
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Let The Nepotism Begin (Continue)
While he may have irreparably embarrassed himself with his ill-fated run for president, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) might soon get a little consolation prize for clearing the way for Trump’s inevitable presidential nomination: the honor of choosing a new senator for the state of Florida should Trump actually follow through with formally picking Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) to be secretary of state. (Trump affirmed that Rubio would be his pick today, though some of his MAGA friends are trying to convince him to reconsider.)
That is, of course, if Trump’s political allies in Congress don’t elbow their way into making the decision for DeSantis.
Continue reading “Let The Nepotism Begin (Continue)”Trump’s Pick For Defense Sec Spent His College Years Crusading Against ‘Glorification of Diversity’ And ‘The Homosexual Lifestyle’
Pete Hegseth, the Army National Guard veteran, and former Fox News weekend host and President-elect Donald Trump’s pick to lead the Department of Defense, experienced a political awakening at Princeton University.
Hegseth detailed his journey to self-discovery in one of the many pieces he wrote as publisher of The Princeton Tory, a conservative magazine at the Ivy League school.
“When I first arrived at Princeton, I honestly didn’t know the fundamental differences between Republicans and Democrats,” Hegseth wrote in a September 2002 publisher’s note. “That being said, I was raised with a general appreciation for government, patriotism, and small-town values, but most importantly, my parents instilled in me a thorough understanding of right and wrong—and an unwavering faith in an almighty God. Needless to say, when I arrived at Princeton, my eyes were opened quickly and they’ve been wide open ever since.”
TPM reviewed Hegseth’s youthful writings, including one year of columns for the Tory. They represent some of his earliest forays into political commentary, as Hegseth highlighted aspects of campus life that evidently turned him into a conservative firebrand. In pieces for the Tory, Hegseth and the team he oversaw railed against efforts to promote diversity on campus and what they described as the immoral “homosexual lifestyle.” Hegseth also cheered the Iraq War, wondered whether Princeton was too laudatory of Martin Luther King Jr., and advocated for children receiving “strong discipline” from their parents “in the form of spankings, moving next to soap-in-the-mouth.”
Hegseth and Trump’s transition team did not respond to requests for comment on this story.
Prior to Princeton, Hegseth’s activities in his home state of Minnesota were not particularly political. According to the 1999 yearbook from Forest Lake High School, Hegseth played football, basketball, and was a member of the concert choir. He submitted a senior biography that described his dreams to “go to a college (maybe military academy), marry a beautiful wife … roll in the dough, have Pete Jr. and teach him hoops.”
After he arrived at Princeton in the fall of 1999, Hegseth continued his athletic career. However, an article in the school’s newspaper noted he was a “recruiting afterthought” for the basketball team, who “toiled in obscurity” and was “mired to the bench” without ever starting a game prior to a notable clutch performance in a game against Columbia in 2003, his senior year.
Hegseth made much more of an impact in the school’s political scene. He won an election to be class senator his freshman year after campaigning on a promise to “get the job done and get the job done right.” And, in March 2002, he began a stint as publisher of the Tory that lasted through the end of that year. In his first publisher’s note, Hegseth said his goal for the magazine was to highlight the “traditional core to the Princeton experience” amid what he described as the “liberal noise” on campus.
“As conservatives it is our duty to present the other side of the story—the right side,” Hegseth wrote.
A photo of the Tory staff published in that issue featured Hegseth in a “Sore Loserman” t-shirt mocking the unsuccessful 2000 presidential campaign run by former Vice President Al Gore and ex-Connecticut Senator Joe Lieberman.
At the time Hegseth took over the Tory, which was founded in 1984, America was grappling with the aftermath of the September 11th attacks and the beginnings of the Global War on Terror. Hegseth contributed to that debate in a March 2002 issue with a column where he blamed the case of “American Taliban” John Walker Lindh and other terrorist sympathizers in the country on the “absence of a male disciplinary figure.”
“While mothers often do play the role of family disciplinarian, no phrase has been more responsible for keeping American kids awake at night than ‘wait until your father gets home,’” Hegseth wrote before making his case for “spankings” and “soap-in-the-mouth.” He went on to suggest that, along with a lack of fatherly discipline, “free expression,” and public schools were to blame.
“More and more parents are ushering their kids to public schools at the tender age of three or four, expecting them to not only learn arithmetic, but also right from wrong. Unfortunately, atheist public schools, long stripped of any redemptive moral value, have outlawed God and related discussions of moral absolutes,” Hegseth wrote. “Don’t expect your local teacher to train up a moral child, because they are obligated to encourage any and every lifestyle your child embraces…even those of little Johnny, the Al-Qaeda sympathizer.”
In the following issue, which was published in April 2002, Hegseth focused on what he described as the “gratuitous glorification of diversity” in academia, which, he argued, diminishes focus on “excellence and truth.”
“Diversity does have value, but it can be overstretched,” wrote Hegseth, later adding, “Conservatives feel that the Western tradition, embodied today by America, deserves the most analysis. As the publisher of the Tory I strive to defend the pillars of Western civilization against the distractions of diversity.”
The following academic year, in September 2002, Hegseth wrote a lengthy column advocating for former President George W. Bush’s push for war in Iraq. Those comments are particularly notable — Trump made criticizing Bush and his own flip flopping on the handling of Iraq a cornerstone of his campaigns. Trump’s exaggerated opposition to the Iraq War became a key part of his questionable “anti war” branding.
While Hegseth noted the Bush administration’s efforts to connect former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein to the 9/11 attacks had “floundered,” he argued this “should not deter the United States from its goal of regime change.”
“I believe, if done correctly, eliminating Saddam and liberating Iraq could be the ‘Normandy Invasion’ or ‘fall of the Berlin Wall’ of our generation,” Hegseth said. “Not only will a victory in Iraq rid the world of a brutal dictator, but it will also provide an opportunity for democratic principles to gain favor in surrounding Arab polities.”
The next month, Hegseth’s Tory publisher’s note declared that he was “not encouraged” by the “educational principles … guiding our generation.” Among other things, he cited the “encouragement and support” for “homosexuality.”
During the course of his time at the Tory, Hegseth’s various writings made him something of a lightning rod on campus. He inspired at least five letters and columns that were published in the school’s newspaper, the Daily Princetonian, by critics.
Along with Hegseth’s own notes and columns, the Tory published a feature called “The Rant” that ran in the front of each issue. These columns did not have an individual author and they were identified as being “compiled by the Tory editors.”
In March 2002, for Hegseth’s first issue as publisher, the “Rant” asked the question, “Is Martin Luther King Really More Important than Lincoln?”
“We find it absurd that the University spends so much time celebrating the life of Dr. King without even mentioning the original champion of minority rights, Abraham Lincoln. Martin Luther King deserves extensive study and praise, but only alongside Lincoln,” the column said.
That issue’s “rant” also contained more cheerleading for the Iraq War.
“Can we please go to Iraq already?” the ranters asked. “We’ve established that Saddam is evil and that he has biological and chemical weapons of mass destruction at his fingertips. What further evidence is needed? Let’s take him out, and his crazy son with him.”
LGBTQ rights were a particular focus for “The Rant.” In April 2002, the Tory’s ranters noted the growing effort to legalize gay marriage.
“The movement to legitimize the homosexual lifestyle and homosexual marriages is strong and must be vigorously opposed,” the rant said. “Homosexuals themselves should not be demonized; however, their lifestyle deserves absolutely no special legal status.”
Five months later, in September 2002, the Tory ranters expressed concerns about newspaper coverage of gay weddings.
“The New York Times recently announced that homosexual ‘marriage’ announcements would start appearing in its pages. Other regional papers have also followed suit. The basic logic is that if individuals love each other, and want to get married, then it is sufficiently newsworthy to warrant an announcement in the papers. (Last time we checked, homosexual marriage was illegal, but that’s beside the point.) The explanation sounds nice on the surface, but its logic is dangerous,” the column said. “At what point does the paper deem a ‘relationship’ unfit for publication? What if we ‘loved’ our sister and wanted to marry her? Or maybe two women at the same time? A 13-year-old? The family dog?”
The next month, the ranters criticized some of their fellow students who participated in a gay and lesbian “kiss-in” demonstration.
“Unfortunately, the truth is that all of you who participated in the ‘Kiss-In’ only managed to draw attention to yourselves. You didn’t change any existing stereotypes, or force people to alter their pre-existing notions of homosexuality,” the ranters wrote. “And, in failing so miserably, you helped to remove more credibility from the homosexual movement and made its cause seem even more irreverent, illegitimate, and irrelevant.”
That column concluded with a blunt statement.
“Hey, boys can wear bras and girls can wear ties until we’re blue in the face, but it won’t change the reality that the homosexual lifestyle is abnormal and immoral,” it said.
While the various “Rant” pieces didn’t have a single author, that quote inspired a backlash that made clear Hegseth personally supported the column’s anti-LGBTQ views. Nina Langsam, who was the president of Princeton’s undergraduate student government at the time, emailed the Tory to say that, even as a Republican, she was “very offended” by the sentence describing gay life as “abnormal and immoral.” Langsam’s letter was published in the November/December 2002 issue of the Tory along with a response from Hegseth and the magazine’s editor in chief, Brad Simmons. The pair defended what they described as the publication’s perspective on “the ethics of homosexuality.”
“Overwhelming majorities of Americans agree with the notion that homosexuality and heterosexuality are not moral equivalents,” Hegseth and Simmons wrote.
That issue was also Hegseth’s last as publisher of the Tory. He summed up his tenure in a note wherein he suggested his time at the magazine had only hardened his views.
“I’ve learned a great deal over my twelve months as Tory publisher,” Hegseth wrote. “I’ve been asked to defend my views, renege numerous opinions, and have been personally confronted, both in person and in print. But after all that, I’ve come to one conclusion: the conservative worldview holds water.”
The Trump Cabinet Comes Into View
I’ve been mulling a post on Trump’s Cabinet appointments and had planned to share some thoughts about them this afternoon. Today’s appointments, which not surprisingly are of a different character, allow me to add a bit more.
Let’s start with everything up until today. I said the first-thing announcements were different from what many expected. They were mainly not ideologues. They were mostly ride-or-die Trumpers. They had shown Trump they’re 100% loyal and up for anything. In many cases, they had shown little or no Trumpiness before Trump came on the scene. And they were people who if you watch closely don’t actually show that much today that is coming from them organically. They’re just 100% on board for anything Trump tells them to do. There are a few who are ideologues but they’re mainly hawks. Some of those you wouldn’t have been surprised to see in a Mitt or Jeb administration. So in a very Trumpy way, those choices all appear to be totally about loyalty. The White House makes the call to this or that department and it’s “You got it, boss” from any of these people. Yes, some of them are true believers. But they’re true believers in Trump.
Continue reading “The Trump Cabinet Comes Into View”