General Mark Milley is the general and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff who, when Trump was drawing attention to the crimes of and problems with China, bragged about telling his Chinese counterpart that he would give a warning if Trump ordered an attack. General Milley was also in charge of the Joint Chiefs of Staff when the disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan was conducted.
Specifically, Milley said he told Gen. Li Zuocheng of the People’s Liberation Army that he would “call” the Chinese if Trump ordered a nuclear attack, saying, ”I said, ‘hell, I’ll call you. But we’re not going to attack you.‘” Milley justified that by saying that the Chinese were worried about Trump’s mental stability and that he saw it as being his responsibility to de-escalate.
Trump saw things a good bit differently at the time and still does. Posting about Milley on Truth Social, Trump said that Milley is incompetent and a traitor. In his words, “Mark Milley, who led perhaps the most embarrassing moment in American history with his grossly incompetent implementation of the withdrawal from Afghanistan, costing many lives, leaving behind hundreds of American citizens, and handing over BILLIONS of dollars of the finest military equipment ever made, will be leaving the military next week. This will be a time for all citizens of the USA to celebrate! This guy turned out to be a Woke train wreck who, if the Fake News reporting is correct, was actually dealing with China to give them a heads up on the thinking of the President of the United States. This is an act so egregious that, in times gone by, the punishment would have been DEATH! A war between China and the United States could have been the result of this treasonous act. To be continued!!!”
Predictably, the usual suspects clutched their pearls over that and accused Trump of trying to encourage the assassination of US political figures, ignoring that he was referring to the crime of treason and its traditional punishment, which was death.
But MSNBC’s talking heads ignored that in their attacks on Trump. MSNBC analyst Clair McCaskill, speaking on the issue, said, “Where is the chairman of the Armed Services Committee in the United States, the ranking member of the Armed Services Committee in the United States Senate? Where is he? Where where is Joni Ernst, who served in the military? Where where are the Republicans that say they care about the military?”
Continuing, McCaskill added, “The idea that he would get away with saying this without being totally lambasted by every Republican elected official is stunning to me. This is one of the worst things he’s ever said. And imagine how high that bar is.”
Her counterpart on the show, “Morning Joe” host Joe Scarborough, did the same pearl-clutching routine, saying, “When you’re talking, you’re asking where these Republican senators are on the horrible things that are being said about General Milley. Well, you could ask the same question about where were they when Donald Trump attacked Mitch McConnell back in the fall of last year because Mitch McConnell supported bipartisan legislation. And Trump Truth Socialed then that he did it because he hates me so much. And then he put in all caps. “He has a DEATH WISH,” all caps.”
He then used Trump to attack Republicans generally, saying, “That’s not a dog whistle. That is an invitation. Just like “come on January 6, it’s going to be wild,” when he says things like Mitch McConnell has a and then an all caps, a DEATH WISH, that is an invitation for his people to step up and assassinate Mitch McConnell, or General Milley. And you can ask the question and we’ll get where are these Republicans? Why aren’t they critical of Donald Trump for saying that about General Milley? I’d ask the same thing about Mitch McConnell. There should have been a press conference with every Republican senator saying “they’re putting our leaders life and his family’s life in jeopardy.”. But silence, always silence.”
Watch that here:
Featured image credit: screengrab from the embedded video
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