After John McCain’s death in 2018, Trump continued his ugly, petty, spiteful hate campaign, as we have seen already. (See Part One.) Trump’s obsession with McCain was such that Trump even resented the flags being at half staff for the fallen war hero. Trump’s almost infinite vindictiveness was also expressed in his childish insistence that the ship named after the late Senator be hidden during Trump’s visit to Japan.
And although Trump denied ever calling John McCain a loser, he is on record as having done so.
Trump also called former President George H. W. Bush a “loser” for being shot down by the Japanese during World War II.
McCain isn’t the only war-hero-turned-Republican-politician Trump is described as having attacked as a loser:
On at least two occasions since becoming president, according to three sources with direct knowledge of his views, Trump referred to former president George H.W. Bush as a “loser” for being shot down by the Japanese as a Navy pilot in World War II.
Again, the “I like people who weren’t captured” quote applies here. (Bush wasn’t captured; Trump’s comments suggest he also might not respect people being shot down.) A former senior administration official confirmed to The Post that Trump frequently derided soldiers who were captured and missing in action as “losers.”
Trump has repeatedly
disrespected, insulted, harmed, and misused those who serve in our armed forces. One is reduced to listing his transgressions, as
John Fugelsang was earlier this year. I’d like to elaborate on his list, and those of others.
ITEM: In 2016, Trump
brutally insulted the parents of
Humayun Khan, who was killed in Iraq in 2004.
Donald J. Trump belittled the parents of a slain Muslim soldier who had strongly denounced Mr. Trump during the Democratic National Convention, saying that the soldier’s father had delivered the entire speech because his mother was not “allowed” to speak.
Mr. Trump’s comments, in an interview with George Stephanopoulos of ABC News that will air on Sunday, drew quick and widespread condemnation and amplified calls for Republican leaders to distance themselves from their presidential nominee. With his implication that the soldier’s mother had not spoken because of female subservience expected in some traditional strains of Islam, his comments also inflamed his hostilities with American Muslims.
Khizr Khan, the soldier’s father, lashed out at Mr. Trump in an interview on Saturday, saying his wife had not spoken at the convention because it was too painful for her to talk about her son’s death.
Mr. Trump, he said, “is devoid of feeling the pain of a mother who has sacrificed her son.”
ITEM: In 2016, Trump lied about having given $1 million to a veterans charity. Media pressure was needed to make Trump actually donate money
ITEM: In 2016, Trump claimed to know more about ISIS than the generals.
ITEM: In October 2017, four U.S. soldiers were killed in an ambush in Niger. There were serious errors made in the planning of the mission. (Strangely, there were not nine investigations into this tragedy, as there were about the Benghazi incident.) Trump couldn’t remember the name of one of the soldiers when he called the man’s widow, Myeshia Johnson. And naturally, he lied about it later.
"I heard him stumbling on trying to remember my husband's name, and that's what hurt me the most, because if my husband is out here fighting for our country and he risked his life for our country, why can't you remember his name?" said Johnson, who had known her husband since she was 6 years old.
"That's what made me upset and cry even more, because my husband was an awesome soldier."
After Myeshia Johnson's interview aired, Trump argued on Twitter today that he said La David Johnson's name "from the beginning" and "without hesitation."
Then Trump added insult to injury:
MIAMI (AP) — President Donald Trump told the widow of a soldier killed in an ambush in Niger that her husband “knew what he signed up for,” according to a Florida congresswoman who says she heard part of the conversation on speakerphone.
Rep. Frederica Wilson said she was in the car with Myeshia Johnson on Tuesday on the way to Miami International Airport to meet the body of Johnson’s husband, Sgt. La David Johnson, when Trump called.
When asked by Miami station WPLG if she indeed heard Trump say that she answered: “Yeah, he said that. To me, that is something that you can say in a conversation, but you shouldn’t say that to a grieving widow.” She added: “That’s so insensitive.”
ITEM: From 2018, via Independent:
The US Army has been abruptly discharging immigrant recruits and reservists who enlisted through a programme that promised them a path to citizenship, it has emerged.
Some of the recruits said they were given no reason for their discharge. Others, after pressing for an explanation, were told they were considered security risks because they have relatives abroad or because the Defence Department had not completed background checks on them…
It is unclear how many service members who enlisted through the immigrant recruitment programme have been thrown out of the army because of their status.
However, immigration lawyers said they were aware of more than 40 enlistees who have been expelled from the forces in recent weeks, jeopardising their futures in the US.
More than 5,000 immigrants were recruited into the programme in 2016, with an estimated 10,000 currently serving. Most enter the army, but some also go into other military branches.
You want a bet who was behind that? And Military Times added this:
As many as 11,800 currently serving in the U.S. military are dealing with a spouse or family member who is facing deportation, a national immigration advocacy group announced Friday.
Again, can you smell the stench of Stephen Miller?
ITEM: (From Ian Shapira, via Twitter):
Trump also gave speech in 2017 at one of most sacred gov spaces — @CIA Memorial Wall at Agency HQ — but bragged [about] his TIME covers, raged against reporters, & never recalled sacrifices of operatives whose deaths are signified by black stars etched into the ivory marble wall.
ITEM: Trump used American service personnel as a political prop in his racist “anti-Caravan” nonsense in 2018, causing them to miss a treasured brief holiday with their families:
...Trump on Tuesday said people should not feel bad for U.S. troops who are spending Thanksgiving at the southern border because they are “tough people” who are proud to defend the country.
"Don’t worry," Trump told reporters at the White House regarding the troops, adding, "these are tough people."
"You're worried about the Thanksgiving holiday for them, they're so proud to be representing our country on the border," he said.
ITEM: In November 2018 TRUMP CANCELED HIS VISIT to Aisne-Marne American Cemetery and Memorial near Paris, a visit meant to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the end of the First World War.
He canceled because it was raining. (The cemetery was only about an hour away by car if Trump didn’t want to fly there.) Trump’s decision was not well-received:
Saturday's rainout of President Donald Trump's visit to a World War I cemetery is drawing catcalls from critics, including Winston Churchill's grandson.
"They died with their face to the foe and that pathetic inadequate Donald Trump couldn’t even defy the weather to pay his respects to The Fallen," said Nicholas Soames, Churchill's grandson and a member of British Parliament.
The White House said it canceled Trump's trip to Aisne-Marne American Cemetery and Memorial near Paris "due to scheduling and logistical difficulties caused by the weather."
Despite the rain, an American delegation led by Chief of Staff General John Kelly and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Joe Dunford still attended the event.
Critics pointed out world leaders like Emmanuel Macron of France, Angela Merkel of Germany, and Justin Trudeau of Canada managed to attend events Saturday despite the rain.
This is the cemetery that Trump said was full of “losers”. Can you imagine—CAN YOU IMAGINE—what Fox “News” and the rest of the Radical Right propaganda machine would have said had Barack Obama done that?
By the way, Trump is trying to lie his way out of this—as usual:
ITEM: On 12 November 2018 Trump blew off the traditional trip to Arlington National Cemetery to mark Veterans Day. The excuse again? Light rain. Trump didn’t want to look disheveled.
But that doesn’t mean Trump was idle. No, no! He kept busy:
Instead of spending his Monday marking Veterans Day, Trump has instead been tweeting conspiracy theories about the midterm elections, baselessly claiming that Democrats are forging ballots in a closely watched Florida recount.
That’s right, folks! He spent the day tweeting. AGAIN: Can you imagine the uproar if Barack Obama had done that?
ITEM: On Thanksgiving 2018, Trump called deployed American troops to express how thankful he was for himself:
The US president called American troops deployed overseas and took the opportunity to congratulate himself on what a great job he had done in running the country so far.
He told them that “the country is so much stronger” now that he is in office - so much so that “people don’t believe it".
When asked what he was thankful for, he said "his family", but added: “I made a tremendous difference in this country.
A newly released report by the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) has once again made several suggestions on reducing the national budget, and some of the budget cuts would affect over 240,000 disabled veterans. According to many budget pundits, it appears the cuts will take place starting in 2020.
The new CBO report proposes dropping over 240,000 disabled veterans from the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) Individual Unemployability (IU) compensation program by 2020. The cuts could save $47.6 billion in the next 10 years.
At a briefing in 2017, U.S. military leaders were attempting to educate Trump on the basics of foreign and defense policy in various areas of the world. Among those present were Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis, Director of the National Economic Council Gary Cohn, and Secretary of State Rex Tillerson. At one point Trump erupted:
“I want to win,” he said. “We don’t win any wars anymore . . . We spend $7 trillion, everybody else got the oil and we’re not winning anymore.”
Trump by now was in one of his rages. He was so angry that he wasn’t taking many breaths. All morning, he had been coarse and cavalier, but the next several things he bellowed went beyond that description. They stunned nearly everyone in the room, and some vowed that they would never repeat them. Indeed, they have not been reported until now.
“I wouldn’t go to war with you people,” Trump told the assembled brass.
Addressing the room, the commander in chief barked, “You’re a bunch of dopes and babies.”
For a president known for verbiage he euphemistically called “locker room talk,” this was the gravest insult he could have delivered to these people, in this sacred space. The flag officers in the room were shocked. Some staff began looking down at their papers, rearranging folders, almost wishing themselves out of the room. A few considered walking out. They tried not to reveal their revulsion on their faces, but questions raced through their minds. “How does the commander in chief say that?” one thought. “What would our worst adversaries think if they knew he said this?”
There will be much more tomorrow. In all honesty, this has been really angering and depressing.
But the worst is yet to come.
