'Accidentally Like a Martyr'

As Pete Hegseth delivered the commencement address at West Point with all the élan of a manosphere live streamer stumping for a new brand of beef jerky, insulting the dignity of the cadets by his overt and hollow evangelical preachiness and snarky grievance politics, our nation’s press and its people played the guessing game of who will Trump attack next?

POTUS trolled both Greenland and Cuba this week, along with issuing his usual bellicose threats to further destroy Iran’s infrastructure (while disseminating a meme of an American flag superimposed over a map of Iran, labelling it ‘The United States of the Middle East’), which have become so commonplace that one almost forgets the threats themselves constitute war crimes.

Threatening to terrorize a civilian population is itself a prohibited act under the law of armed conflict.

I feel like that is worth noting on the this Memorial Day weekend; when those who are sober and serious enough to remember the sacrifice of so many, to protect the very democracy that we can all see being eroded on a daily basis by a demented bully whose only concern is enriching himself and staying in power.

We have in many ways become what we have stood against - and which the bravest among us fought so fiercely to protect.

We must honor their sacrifice by redoubling our efforts to stand up to the menace and malicious nature of the most corrupt man to ever lead our nation by a country mile.

I think of my relatives who served, as I am sure most of you do as well, this somber weekend. The gloomy rain and unseasonable cold of the East Coast provides poetic punctuation for the serious task at hand - for those of us who want to save this democracy.

In an age when we are bombarded by the silly, from Trump’s idiotic A.I. videos throwing Stephen Colbert in a trash can or his social media posts with his corpulent orange face glowering over Greenland, to the endless drivel of a thousand online pundits looking to make a buck off of this calamity - using misfortune to bilk followers without offering any particular insight or empathy - we must remember what so many stood up honorably to protect.

My paternal grandfather Harry spent much of WWII in a bomber over Germany, before dedicating his life to the U.S.A.’s intelligence and foreign service agencies.

My great uncle Paul dropped out of high school to join the Marines. He stormed Omaha Beach on D-Day, survived, and eventually went home to raise a hardworking, caring family in suburban Maryland. Never said a word about the war but let his cheerful embrace of the prosaic, middle class life do all the talking for him. He knew so many of his fellow soldiers never got that chance, so he savored it.

Paul honored their lives by living his own with humility, respect and deep appreciation of the freedoms this nation stands for, even in this ignoble hour: we would do well to remember the ideals and the stoic service of the everyday men and women who stood up when the hour of history demanded it.

As a nation, they and we were there when the world needed them - and the United States of America, sadly, can no longer make this claim. We are shifting from protector to predator under the morally corrupt leadership of Donald Trump.

Let us pray this is only a temporary catastrophe because both our aggressions and our retreats, such as the illegal war in Iran and the dismantling of USAID, have consequences that none of us can be proud of as we barrel towards more calamity led by a mendacious monster posing as a man.

Trump did not offer a single comment regarding the attacks by his pal Putin on Kyiv over the weekend. Russian missiles and drones attacked civilians in apartment buildings hospitals and schools, seemingly with the silent blessing of POTUS who has too much personal business before Vladimir’s oligarchs to offer even empty admonitions for their heinous war crimes.

Trump is a coward first and foremost - and has long been compromised by the reams of kompromat Putin holds over him, not to mention his decades of laundering Russian Mob money through his real estate holdings. Donald is a man absent of valor.

On Memorial Day I also think of a long lost great uncle I never met, my maternal grandmother’s brother, Rodger. He joined the Merchant Marines during World War II and on D-Day his assignment, along with his fellow mariners, was to sink the older ships called ‘corncobs’ that were sailing in the waters off of Normandy.

A 1,000 yards from shore they would sink ships to provide a secret breakwater for Allied amphibious landing craft; creating an artificial temporary bulwark against the waves (codename Gooseberry).

After scuttling their own vessels, they were then instructed to tread water until a fellow Merchant Marine ship rescued them. As the horrors of the D-Day invasion unfolded before his youthful, wide open eyes, my great uncle spent many hours treading water, unarmed, but that ship never came.

I cannot imagine the death and destruction he witnessed; the sights and sounds of abject horror as he struggled to stay afloat in the salty water, and the helpless nature of his circumstance. Watching so many fellow countrymen cut down as soon as they hit the beach, along with our Allied partners who fought as mightily and sacrificed just as profoundly.

All he could do was to keep from drowning - and bear witness to the infernal operation, the largest amphibious invasion in world history. He also unwittingly saw the frightful beginning of the end of the Nazi takeover of Western Europe.

Hard fought hope, springing and sprinting forth from hell itself.

The brave young men who kept storming those beaches that infamous day, and who served in the skies above, in wave after wave of lethal determination, did so knowing most of them would not come home. All it takes is a visit to the fields above Omaha Beach to realize the enormity and finality of their sacrifice.

The rows of white crosses seem endless at the Normandy American Cemetery; 9,389 graves in Colleville-sur-Mer, France. Another 1,557 names inscribed on the Walls of the Missing. They were climbing those hallowed cliffs into eternity. This is the true cost of freedom.

My great uncle was eventually pulled from the roiling and bloody waters later that evening and made it back home after the war ended.

He spent his first year back in Springfield, Massachussets sleeping in a graveyard every night, with a horse as his only companion, before eventually drifting away from my grandmother’s family altogether.

She would get a call from him out of the blue on Christmas Day sometimes, but as the years wore on those calls eventually stopped coming. My great uncle never got over that fateful day. He may have carried his own demons into battle, which would only have been amplified in the horror. As we know all too well now, the costs of war lasts long after the shooting stops.

That is why it is so insulting and dangerous to have such unworthy men in charge of our nation’s military actions.

Pete Hegseth is a pampered Ivy League prick whose greatest sacrifice is being hungover in the makeup chair at Fox News. He was pulled from his DC National Guard assignment (covering Joe Biden’s inauguration) for being an ‘extremist threat’ due to his ‘Deus Vult’ tattoo, as well as the Crusader’s cross emblazoned on his chest.

Now those Christofasct values are being actively promoted in our military. The same military that Trump skipped out on service in the Vietnam War by receiving five deferments, stemming from his infamous ‘bone spurs’ diagnosis.

Which was written up by a podiatrist who rented office space in one of Fred Trump’s Queens properties - who was threatened with a rent increase if he didn’t help the real estate developer’s temperamentally challenged playboy son dodge the draft.

I often think about how many less fortunate sons went to war in Donald’s place, while he used his time at home indulging in his character defects and ne’er-do-well ways.

No man has ever gotten away with more or given less to his country than Trump. It is never too late to change that: holding him accountable is no longer just about ending one awful criminal’s lifelong spree, it is about saving our republic and honoring those who gave all for this once great land.

DJT is not only not worthy of the office he holds, he isn’t fit to shine the shoes of those he punishes and attacks with his rhetoric and awful policies. The only thing substantial about Donald Trump is how much damage he has caused.

Which of course is not by accident, but the strategy behind his rise to power. He represents what a few who have exorbitant wealth would prefer in place of democracy.

An oligarchy run by bizarre tech bros and tasteless billionaire bozos like Jeff Bezos who looks like he shops in a Caesar’s Palace clothing boutique; he is an overstitched back pocket on Vegas jeans come to life.

The sort of paunchy, middle-aged freak that bedazzled ‘Von Dutch’ t-shirts and Chrome Hearts jewelry were created for - so their rubber-lipped, face-tuned companions could say they look virile in a hotel elevator mirror. The type of wannabe-cool billionaires who have their eyebrows sculpted and use the term ‘manscaped’ unironically.

We can take back this country from his ilk, but will only do so when we recognize who is really pulling the strings. Greed is motivating both this Cabinet and the Wall Street brokers making a fortune from this calamity.

Any corporation that gets in bed with Donald Trump’s administration should be boycotted and shunned. This includes CBS, who could not have beclowned themselves more in their desire to suck up to our mad king.

Whom we must dethrone.

Turn off the TV, put down the phone and realize you are not alone.

The future is right outside of our front door - we cannot allow these men and women to drag us into the past.

For what lies behind us was paid for in heartbreaking, immeasurable loss and tremendous sacrifice.

What lies ahead is up to us.

We honor our everyday heroes by marching forward this Memorial Day. No matter the cost.

I wish you peace.

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