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Pete Hegseth -The Felon's Favorite Incompetent

The Iran war debacle continues with oil prices inching higher every day as the Felon issues threats - including against an American ally - and growing reports of horrible conditions on Navy ships stationed around the Persian Gulf and surrounding areas get more and more news play.  Pete Hegseth's response has been to basically accuse servicemembers and their families of lying and the Felon stated that the deployment of the carrier Abraham Lincoln was not long enough.  With the Felon's war of choice going badly and very unpopular on the home front, one has to wonder how Hegseth remains in the Felon's good graces, indeed within the Felon's favored inner circle.  A piece at Salon suggests Hegseth remains in favor with the Flon for several reasons, not least among those are (i) his willingness to lie to and attack the news media, (ii) his ability to flatter the Felon's delicate ego and to tell him what he wants to hear, and (iii) his relentless attacks on female and minority military officials and officers.  Hegseth with his flattery of the Felon and bluster  over rides the counsel of generals and admirals.  One is left wondering how bad things need to get before Hegseth is shown the exit.  Here are article highlights:

The tale of Donald Trump sneaking off Air Force One in a catering truck captured public attention for many reasons. It was a reminder that, for all his tough talk, the president harbors a sense of fear. Hiding away in a glorified ice chest would also have been a blow to the 80-year-old’s dignity. But the charade, which was first revealed by the Washington Post, also gave us insight, as political scientist Scott Lemieux wrote, “into who he considers his actual inner circle.”

Left behind on the decoy plane were Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, White House deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller and other administration officials and aides. The only people deemed worthy of saving from Iran’s reported threat were people whose full-time jobs are tending the president’s body and, more importantly, his ego: Natalie Harp, who writes Trump love letters, and whose main job is showing him flattering social media posts. Body man Walt Nauta. Dan Scavino, Trump’s former golf caddie. Oh yeah, and Pete Hegseth. 

The defense secretary’s inclusion on this list does not suggest he is an especially well-regarded or important person, especially when other prominent Cabinet members — not to mention White House reporters — were left vulnerable to the rumored assassination threat. On the contrary, his inclusion in Trump’s flock of flatterers is another sign that Hegseth’s main skill is fluffing up the narcissist-in-chief. It helps explain how Hegseth — unlike former Cabinet members such as former Attorney General Pam Bondi or former Homeland Secretary Kristi Noem, who recently lots their jobs — seems in no danger of losing his job, even as his manifest incompetence is a big part of the reason Trump is losing the war with Iran. He may be bad at running the military, but Hegseth is good at lying to (and attacking) the press and stroking his boss’s ego, which are the only skills that count in Trump’s White House. 

Recent news about the ongoing disaster aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln is another reminder of why Hegseth may indeed lead the highly competitive race to be the most hated man in Washington. Both Stars and Stripes and the Military Times reported that multiple service members had attempted to jump off the aircraft carrier, which has been deployed for over eight months without any real breaks. Sailors are reportedly “struggling with exhaustion and declining morale, including reports of suicidal thoughts,” explained Alison Bath of Stars and Stripes.

The details coming from family members offer a chilling illustration of how little regard Hegseth has for the actual well-being of service members, even as he releases videos implying they have low testosterone levels or berates them for being “fat” or “beardos.” Sailors have reported being fed “rotten” food or barely being fed at all, and desperate family members have been begging the Navy for relief.

Hegseth, though, is shrugging off the concerns, telling reporters the issue is “completely misrepresented” and that the service members have “everything we can provide them at every single moment.”

Trump was even more callous and dishonest about the suffering of the sailors, saying that the deployment was “not nearly long enough,” even though, at over 260 days, it has set a record for the longest deployment.

Trump and Hegseth clearly share a disregard for the lives of the very service members they are asking to wage war on Iran. But the debacle also reveals how Hegseth’s twisted priorities appear to have endeared him to his boss, seemingly above every other sycophant surrounding the president. Beyond operating in the Northern Arabian Sea to aid in logistics and serve as a deterrent to Iran, it seems like the reason the USS Lincoln is being held in this Kafkaesque hell is to shore up the illusion — or perhaps even Trump’s delusion — that the war with the Islamic Republic will be over soon.  

The president, desperate to keep stock markets afloat and MAGA voters on the hook, has been playing a game for months where he announces a “deal” with Iran to end the war, usually timed to the market’s opening bell, buoying stock prices. But the news invariably turns out to not be true. The danger for Trump is that investors might finally wise up and stop falling for false promises.

Swapping out a major aircraft carrier deployed in the Middle East, as the Pentagon is now planning to do, could blow the whole game up, as it is a tacit admission that the war is not ending in the next few days, as we’ve been told is happening for months. Sunday’s news, reported by the Wall Street Journal, that Iran is secretly planning to “escalate the war” will also not help matters.

This pattern suggests Hegseth is far more concerned about his boss’s fixation on stock prices and media coverage than he is about listening to the advice of admirals, who have been bearing the brunt of complaints from families of service members over the USS Lincoln. Even by the low standards of Trump appointees, Hegseth has shown an eagerness to back up the president’s every lie and delusion, not matter the cost.

The secretary may be in Trump’s good graces, but in the real world, his reputation — which was never good to begin with, since he was comically unqualified for this job — is in the toilet. The American public loathes Hegseth. As CNN’s Harry Enten recently explained, at 22 points under water, Hegseth’s approval ratings are “the lowest of the low.” 

Hegseth is likely to stay, though, even as Trump posts on Truth Social that he’s “extremely happy with the job that Pete Hegseth is doing,” including “getting rid of DEI.” Sure, the secretary has mismanaged the military to the point that sailors are reportedly attempting suicide. But he has blocked the promotions of talented leaders who annoy MAGA by being women or Black, and that’s what really counts.

One sailor who reportedly jumped overboard is only 19 — practically still a kid. The terror and trauma Hegseth is inflicting him and his fellow service members in this losing war points to a man with no moral character at all. No wonder Trump loves him. 

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Iran Threatens Expanded Conflict Abroad

The supposed cease fire between the USA and Iran has ended and the price of oil has moved higher over night to the highest level in over a month.  Meanwhile, a new poll shows the Felon's approval has fallen to an all time low:

[The Felon's] Trump's approval rating fell to the lowest level of his presidency, ‌with an overwhelming majority of Americans concerned the U.S. war with Iran will last a long time, according to a Reuters/Ipsos poll that concluded on Monday. Just 33% of respondents in the four-day survey said they approved of Trump's performance in the White House, while 64% disapproved. Trump's approval rating, down from 35% in a poll that closed earlier this month . . . 

In this setting, Iran is threatening to expand the war and the Felon, in another insane move, has threatened to bomb Oman, an America ally. As noted numerous times, there is no face-saving exit for the Felon from a debacle of his own making even as the mid-term elections bear down on a panicked Republican Party. It would seem the Iranians fully recognize that the war has become toxic in the minds of most voters and that perhaps the best way to drive the Felon either back to the negotiating table or into simply walking away.  They recognize that either an expanded war or one involving US ground troops will only drive the Felon's approval level even lower as other Republicans fear a blood bath in November.   A piece in the New York Times looks at Iran's calculations:

After almost six months in hiding, Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Mojtaba Khamenei, has offered the clearest window yet into his vision for ruling the country, appointing a string of hard-line, veteran military commanders to top security roles.

The overhaul, which took place this month, signals that he plans to keep the nation on a war footing, analysts say — ready for open-ended confrontation with the United States and for keeping a lid on dissent at home among Iranians suffering the economic brunt of the conflict.

The appointments also reflect a leadership that is still struggling to devise a sustainable strategy for deterring Washington, analysts noted, as Tehran seeks a way to end the war without giving up the strategic leverage it has gained, most notably through control over the Strait of Hormuz.

The new security leaders will first have to navigate a period of limbo in the conflict. . . . The overhaul also included a new general staff of the armed forces, a new head of the Revolutionary Guards and a commander of the Revolutionary Guards’ naval forces — a critical role as the Strait of Hormuz has become so important.

Moderates in the government, like President Masoud Pezeshkian, say Iran should take advantage of its effective control over the Strait of Hormuz and reach a deal.

Hard-liners, however, want to hold out for more concessions and prefer maintaining an aggressive stance that would discourage the United States from launching new military interventions. They note that the last two wars launched by the United States and Israel, in June 2025 and in February this year, began while they were in negotiations with the Trump administration. They also point to the 2015 nuclear deal that Iran agreed with Washington, which President Trump withdrew from in 2018. . . . “The hard-liners gained immense traction, arguing — and history seems to have backed them — that the West is fundamentally untrustworthy.”

Ayatollah Khamenei, observers say, has surrounded himself with figures who seem as ready to negotiate, if they deem conditions right, as they are willing to prolong the war when they do not. That is a break with the approach of his father and predecessor, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. . . . . Ayatollah Mojtaba Khamenei has shown a greater willingness to initiate conflict with Washington, some analysts say, pointing to Iran’s decision to start the last round of military skirmishes.

“Iran is willing to engage in negotiations to end the war,” he added, “but is also prepared for a long conflict rather than accept an incomplete or temporary settlement that leaves it vulnerable to renewed U.S. pressure or attack.”

The Iranian leadership is apparently gambling that it can do that because Tehran can withstand the economic pain longer than [the Felon] President Trump can endure the fallout of the war in the United States.

This strategy has serious implications for Iran’s roughly 90 million people, who are struggling with an economy in free-fall and trapped by the constant risk of a return to all-out war.

Ayatollah Khamenei called on Mr. Taeb to strengthen the Basij’s “public intelligence network” when he announced his appointment last week, a move that experts say indicates that the group will have an expanded role in domestic surveillance and repression.

“Mojtaba may be willing to take risks in confronting the United States that even his father avoided in his final years,” Mr. Memarian said. “The question is whether Iran’s political system — and, more important, Iranian society — can absorb the consequences of that gamble.”

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Trump Punishes South Korea For His Iran Humiliation

The Felon continues to demonstrate on a daily basis his unfitness for office and daily erodes the United States' standing in the world and by the time his misrule ends the nation and the world will be far more unsafe.  Meanwhile, at home medical research has been canceled, health initiatives ended, and environmental protections and safe water and clean air are threatened, in the case of the latter to benefit the fossil fuels lobby.  On the international front, the Felon has no face-saving way to exit from the Iran war that he chose to launch despite warnings that he would face the exact situation that now confronts both the US and the global economy.  And with the Felon, one thing that is certain is that he will never take responsibility for his own actions and foolish decisions.  Someone else is always to blame, be they American citizens accused of vandalizing the Reflecting Pool rather than admit the Felon's crony who did the work was incompetent to blaming allies for the Felon's own Iran debacle. His ego and narcissism will never let him accept responsibility. The latest target in the Felon's blame someone else effort is South Korea which wisely opted to decline the Felon's after the fact request that South Korea somehow bail the Felon's ass out in Iran. A piece at The Atlantic looks at the Felon's destructive actions:

Last winter, Donald Trump plunged recklessly into war with Iran. The United States is now losing that conflict. Iran remains defiant, much of the world economy is more threatened now than it was six months ago, U.S. military resources are overextended, and munition stores are dangerously depleted. Trump and the United States have suffered one embarrassment after another; last week, he had to sneak away from the region on a backup plane because of a possible assassination threat from Tehran.

And so the [Felon] president of the United States has taken the logical next step: He is punishing South Korea, a loyal American friend, and tempting U.S. enemies to doubt America’s will to defend its allies.

Early Sunday evening, Trump instructed the Defense Department to “substantially reduce” its participation in an annual joint military exercise with the South Koreans. He did this, he said in a post on Truth Social, in part because such activities are expensive, but worse, they are insulting to his friends in North Korea, a country that has been “unthreatening and respectful” while he’s been in office.

More to the point, he complained that the South Koreans have not helped him defeat Iran: While somewhat unrelated (?), I recently asked the President of South Korea if they would like to join us in the Denuclearization of the Islamic Republic of Iran, and they said, “No thanks!”

When Trump makes the effort to say something is “unrelated” to his actions (and then adds a coy question mark) it usually means it is completely related—and probably his central motivation.

Scaling back the exercise is, of course, an insane decision, which does nothing but hurt an ally, and tempt an adversary to think—correctly—that American leadership is feckless. You could be forgiven for wondering why South Korea and the rest of the free world must pay for Donald Trump’s failures. Such confusion is understandable, except that in Trump’s world, every loss, every defeat, is a personal insult. When things go wrong, someone must be held responsible—and that someone is never Donald Trump.

America and the rest of the world are now witnessing a public exhibition of narcissistic rage. Trump embarked on a war for personal glory, and what he got instead was ongoing humiliation. He clearly finds it all unbearable.

Trump both fears and respects the autocrats who rule Russia, China, and North Korea, and so he dares not cross them. Instead, he is seeking to assuage the psychic injury of his loss in Iran—including the American public learning of the shameful conditions to which he has subjected U.S. forces—by kicking America’s allies, the nations he can punish without fear that they will kick him back.

The Iran war was not the president’s failure, you see. Others failed the president. . . . . because Trump is unable to subdue Iran, unable to replenish stocks of U.S. weapons he should never have expended in this war, unable to take care of the service personnel he has put in harm’s way, someone is going to pay. The most convenient target he could find, at least for the moment, was South Korea.

At a better moment in American history, an enraged Congress would step in and demand answers about such dangerous idiocy. They would rush to the White House, talk to the press, hold hearings, and in general act like responsible stewards of American power. Those days, at least among legislators of the president’s party, are long past.

Our allies might for the time being similarly ignore Trump’s tantrums, but they have power and agency of their own, and even now are likely planning for a world in which the Americans are no longer men and women of principle who stand by their word and by their friends.

The Chinese and the Russians and the North Koreas are certain to draw the appropriate lessons from this deranged policy. They have been shown, yet again, that when Trump fails, he hurts those he feels safe hurting. Already, North Korea is dispatching missiles and thousands of soldiers to aid Russia in its war on Ukraine. If a conflict should break out in the Pacific or on the Korean peninsula, or if the war in Europe spreads further West, the world’s dictators might well count on Trump to focus American wrath not on the enemies of the free world, but on the nations that have always pledged to stand side by side with the United States in a mutual defense of freedom.

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