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Normally a loyal idiot has job security with Trump: Is Hegseth too dumb even for that? [1]

['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.']

Date: 2025-03-31

When an unpopular administration's popularity starts heading south, expect sacrificial lambs. The Signalgate scandal has promoted two Trumpers as candidates for the role. National Security Advisor Mike Waltz is the early favorite. He's the potato brain who invited a journalist to share in a 'private' high-level confab among senior Trump chest-thumpers. Nobody knows who he is. And Trump will find it easier to dismiss him as a 'coffee boy' whose hiring was someone else's fault.

However, a growing consensus in DC is that Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth is a better fit for the frame. Trump has publicly supported his mini-me — Pete has adopted his boss's pugilistic style right down to his Sharpie signatures. Still, there are rumblings in the White House and the Pentagon, and reverberating around the DC cocktail circuit, that the tattooed inebriate is too dumb to even fake being smart.

Trump-fluffing Hegseth apologists have excused Signalgate as a peccadillo that did not involve classified information or war plans. However, the real issue is not the content of the revelations but the incompetence that allowed them to happen. Trump does not care how qualified his department heads are. In fact, ineptitude is an asset when trying to tear down the American experiment. But he does care that his appointees' unforced errors will make him look like a dumbass talent scout.

All but his most fervent fans have discarded the discredited notion Trump hires "only the best." Yet there is a limit to how much bungling the base will sweep under the rug. And that limit might be sharing sensitive information with a lefty journalist. The rookie mistake would have remained in-house if it were a Fox Newser errantly included on the chat. But it was the Editor-in-Chief of the Atlantic who received Hegseth's texts detailing the attacks on the Houthis.

Hegseth got approved for his job when VP Vance broke the tie in the Senate after three GOPers voted 'no' on his nomination. Now, some of the Senators who voted for Pete — apparently on the mistaken assumption he was going to be a figurehead with competent staffers actually running DOD — are having buyer's remorse. A feeling familiar to people who have bought what Trump was selling.

Sen. Kevin Cramer (R-ND) took a nuanced approach to the scandal.

"No one needs to lose their job over this, but we do need to get to the bottom of it and just be assured it's not going to happen anymore."

Translated from politispeak to English, this reads, "Someone needs to lose their job over this. This shit cannot happen again."

Sadly this shit will happen again. Hegseth is a toxically aggressive idiot, too moronic to realize he's not smart enough to manage a Subway shop. He has already repeatedly screwed the pooch. His stupidities include a walkback of his February remarks about Ukraine war negotiations in Brussels and an ill-fated effort to send thousands of detained migrants to Guantanamo Bay.

Hegseth would still be out of his depth even if he stayed sober, focused on the military's strategic goals, and stopped yessing the boss. But even that self-improvement is not in Pete's nature. There will be cases of liquor. He will remain obsessed with trans troops. And Hegseth will push back against Trump with the force of a fart in a hurricane.

Sen. Cramer is not alone among DC GOPers questioning Hegseth's continued employment. The Senate Armed Services Committee leaders have launched a bipartisan probe into the episode.

And it is not just in the Senate. While Cramer spoke in code, Rep. Dan Bacon, a Nebraska Republican and retired Air Force brigadier general, didn't equivocate. He wrote on Twitter .

"Intentionally putting classified info on an unclassified application is the real crime."

Luckily for Hegseth, in a Trump administration, no one — as long as they are kissing orange ass — needs to worry about being held legally accountable. However, that immunity only lasts as long as Trump and any like-minded-successor remain in office. Bearing that in mind, I hope to see a Democratic President nominate Jack Smith as Attorney General on January 20, 2029. By 2028, crime by Trump officials will be a significant campaign issue.

Whether that campaign will be 'according to Hoyle,' remains unknown. Either Trump will have strong-armed the judicial branch and fixed the vote to ensure his third term. Or the Democratic candidate will be in an even better position to win than Obama was in 2008. If the Democrat does prevail, Hegseth will break his personal intoxication records.

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[1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2025/3/31/2313689/-Normally-a-loyal-idiot-has-job-security-with-Trump-Hegseth-may-be-too-dumb-even-for-that?pm_campaign=front_page&pm_source=latest_community&pm_medium=web

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