On Monday, the Trump administration stumbled into a truly unfortunate PR debacle described by some in the intelligence community as — and I’m paraphrasing here — the stupidest f-cking thing they’ve ever seen.
Long story short, Pete Hegseth accidentally leaked the Pentagon’s war plans for Yemen to Jeffrey Goldberg prior to bombing Houthi targets in the country earlier this month.
That’s problematic because, despite being a highly accomplished individual, Goldberg, as the editor in chief of The Atlantic, isn’t someone who should’ve been invited to a Signal group chat which included JD Vance, Marco Rubio, Stephen Miller, Tulsi Gabbard and Mike Waltz, who sent Goldberg the invite initially.
On the chat, Vance and Miller debated the merits of the bombing runs and the implications for diplomacy with Cairo and Brussels, among other things.
If you’re wondering whether it’s common for a who’s who of top US government officials to discuss the specifics of an imminent military operation on Signal, the answer’s absolutely not. There’s protocol for these sorts of chitchats, and it mandates the use of secure, government communication networks.
Goldberg spent days in the chat observing the discussion, which he said was more or less boring right up until Hegseth posted “operational details of forthcoming strikes on Yemen” at a quarter to noon on March 15, indicating the attacks would begin in a couple of hours. Not wanting to miss anything, Goldberg sat in a grocery store parking lot and waited for the fireworks, which began on schedule, at five minutes to two.
His account, which The White House begrudgingly acknowledged as authentic, is replete with cringeworthy moments, including Hegseth declaring, unironically, that, “We are currently clean on [operational security]” — in a chat room were a member of the press was hiding in plain sight, not because he infiltrated the group, but rather because Trump’s national security adviser inadvertently sent him an invite.
Stating the obvious, Goldberg said that if America’s enemies — in this case the Houthis — had been privy to the same information, it would’ve severely jeopardized not just the mission, but America’s interests in the region more generally. There was some suggestion that this boondoggle might’ve run afoul of the Espionage Act, where that means Democrats might have cause to ask if Hegseth accidentally broke the law.
Not to put too fine a point on it, but this is exactly the sort of thing I mean when I say, as I often do, that if you insist on putting unserious people in these kinds of positions, you shouldn’t be surprised if and when disaster strikes. That’s not to say the “serious” people are much better, it’s just to state what’s obvious to everyone who’s any semblance of honest: This administration’s overtly clownish, hence clownish outcomes.
The Trump supporters among you can spare me the “everyone makes mistakes” line. The Secretary of Defense posted US war plans in a commercial group chat where, as Bloomberg noted in their coverage, “officials text[ed] fist bump and fire emojis after the attacks occurred.” These are children, apparently.
Susie Wiles was in there too, handing out “kudos” and God’s blessings to all involved, including, unbeknownst to her, a member of the media.
As with a lot of Trumpland debacles, it’s hard to know how to satirize this beyond what’s inherent in the facts of the story, but Brian Hughes, a spokesman for Trump’s National Security Council, took a stab at it. The chat messages, he said, in a statement to the Times, are “a demonstration of the deep and thoughtful policy coordination between senior officials.”
I’m sorry but I just cannot with the emojis, and especially not by fully grown men with death afoot.
And in the everyone makes mistakes department, I highly doubt a Saturday morning go-time was Hegseth’s idea of optimal, at least for HIS operation, if not THE operation. That timing seemed more geared toward lining up with Trump’s hitting the 19th tee that day.
Honestly not even sure how to react anymore. This won’t move the needle for “otherwise reasonable” Trump supporters, nor will it result in any meaningful opposition or even resistance to this clown show. Getting harder every day to continue justifying living in the states. Somebody please remind me why I don’t just move to Cozumel…??
I’m genuinely curious how you can think moving to a narco state is an improvement over the U.S.? I have a friend who is adamant he wants to leave the U.S. for Italy or Turkey and I’m equally baffled at his logic. Don’t you want to trade up in democracy by going somewhere like Switzerland?
Mountain economist, I feel the same way.
Better back up the Brinks truck if you want to move to Switzerland.
I was being facetious. Not about leaving the country, but about landing in Cozumel. That said, I think there is an argument to be made for saying f*ck it all and moving to the beach. I don’t see a ton of western style democracies tracking well over the next 20 years or so.
Does it even matter anymore? Batman and Gabbard are themselves Russian assets, and the “Boy Blunder” is beholden to China where he only theoretically “owns” one of his main factories.
Can’t quite place it, but wasn’t there a months long campaign of news coverage of a political leader’s use of an unofficial email server? Said stories having a not insignificant effect on the outcome of a rather important election.
Did they blame a DEI texter yet?
As H said above, these ppl do not appreciate the “seriousness” of their jobs and related responsibilities.
Good grief. An example of “thoughtful policy coordination”? They’re handing SNL a script.
How long until someone gets killed b/c of these idiots? Unfortunately, I expect Kent State 2.0 before it’s all over.
Stephen Miller reminds me of Gollum.
They are already killing the poor, sick and starving in Africa with Musk’s chainsaw. If they were lighter complexioned though, they might have been spared.
I was driving a week or so ago with Sirius radio on and they played “Ohio” by Stephen Stills.
And I thought:
“Yup, Kent State 2 is right around the corner!”
At the moment of the killings at Kent St I was in my last semester as a PhD student at the OSU. We were in full lock-down by fully armed teenagers from the Ohio National guard and the State police. At that time there were 45,000 students on campus and all of the administrative functions of the university were locked into one building with all the doors locked but the front tiny airlock. Two fully armed troopers were at the door with both long and short guns and clubs … and me alone, next in line to be allowed in. While I was standing there the troopers got the real-time news of the killings. Both looked at me and, shouldered their rifles and one said they should shoot all those f***ing protestors. I had gotten a $5000 grant complete my dissertation and I could only get the money in that building. I was stuck with those guys in a tiny space, virtually when those poor unarmed students were mowed down. A week or two later I was in my office (95 with no air conditioning) when a huge protest exploded across the biggest campus street. The armed guards tear-gassed the crowd and the gas came in all the windows in mine and my colleagues offices. What a tragic zoo.
It’s been reported that the CIA has been experiencing an otherwise unexplained but sustained loss (death) of informants, that is, at least among the experts willing to comment, most readily explained by a compromise in security that started a little less than a decade ago. Not sure what else happened in that time frame …
Maybe Hillary can lead us in a, “Lock Them Up” chant.
This what happens when you elect a non serious person, who hires non serious people.
Unfortunately we are the patient they’re performing brain surgery on.
I’ve faced my share of temptation in life. I’m strong willed. I quite smoking cold-turkey like it was nothing. But being a fly on the wall when Hegseth declared, “We are currently clean on opsec,” might have broken me.
The hardest part would be deciding what response to go with.
“Can confirm!”
“Are you sure about that?”
“Define ‘clean'”
“Don’t worry, I won’t tell anyone. Pinky swear.”
Or my personal favorite, “Alahu Akbar!”
“LEEERROOOOOOYYY JENKINS!”
Funny man…Alahu Akbar, wish there was a god to same us!
As has been noted quite often, including in the above note — treat government as a joke, you get joke government. Unfortunately for all concerned, the drooling, knuckle-dragging, banjo-picking, oxycontin-munching, cousin-fucking, tinfoil-MAGA-hat-wearing hordes that would happily shine Trump’s shoes with the oil off their collective noses won’t realize they’ve been had until it’s way, way, way too late. If ever.
And if you think that’s too harsh a judgment, I make it because I’m one of them. I grew up with the folks that Bruce Springsteen sings about, that Raymond Carver wrote about. And I’d love to endow them with the same tragic nobility as has Messrs. Springsteen and Carver, but I’ve seen too much of the bigotry, self-pity and ignorance that made my former friends and relatives ripe for a con artist like Trump.
And if you can’t be bothered to accept a certain amount of responsibility for your own life, and try and parse out the reasons for your situation and perhaps do something about it — other than post a load of bigoted, bullshit memes on Facebook, most of which were probably written by Russian AI bots — I have no sympathy for you whatsoever.
Good comment. Having lived my entirety in the flyover Midwest my perspective has shifted rapidly toward seeing the preponderance of tin pan corn bread eatin’ MFer’s differently.
But her emails? Anyone……anyone? Oh right, that was the wrong party so of course it was horrible because “THEY” did it and not we did it. Now it’s totally just an NBD whoopsie. Cognitive Dissonance rules!
Where’s Jim Comey when we need him?
Definitely lookin like amateurs are in charge
It just keeps getting better. From a Congressional hearing today:
Sen. Michael Bennet: “Did you know that the president’s Middle East adviser was in Moscow on this thread while you were as director of the CIA participating in this thread? Were you aware of that? Are you aware of that today?”
C.I.A. Director John Ratcliffe: “I’m not aware of that today.”
I wonder if Bennet was on Russian WiFi at the time.