With respect to the war with Iran, any member of the U.S. Armed Services who participates in any way in attacks on civilian infrastructure is obeying an illegal order, is guilty of war crimes under international law, and treasonously violating their oaths of service to the Constitution.
With Trump openly proposing a range of war crimes, this would be a good time for elected Democrats to be clear and to continue being clear that, even though the Supreme Court has given the President immunity from criminal prosecution for crimes, including presumably war crimes, that he commits in office, that immunity does not extend down the chain of command.
Anyone considering suggesting an illegal order, transmitting one, or receiving one should be well aware of that.
Only because the Supreme Court has not yet been required to rule on that question.
There is a non-frivolous argument that if the head of state has criminal immunity to allow, as SCOTUS put it, for robust executive decision making without the timidity that might be induced by concerns about future prosecution then anyone acting on his instructions must also have similar immunity since a president cannot personally carry out all the otherwise illegal acts that he might decide in his discretion are necessary in the exercise of his official powers. It worked that way in other common law derived jurisdictions prior to reforms in the modern era and SCOTUS (Thomas in particular) does seem more than a little obsessed with the idea that a US president should have the powers of an English monarch under 16th and 17th century common law (i.e. prior to the English Civil War and Glorious Revolution). They regard Blackstone (an extremely conservative monarchist who’s treated as a bit of joke by English lawyers and not considered a reliable source even in the limited context of the study of legal history) as a primary source.
ICE/DHS did appear to be making this argument after the Good and Pretti murders although they ultimately avoided the issue by simply refusing to investigate the crimes and preventing state authorities from doing so.
If I were a betting man I’d put my money on the current SCOTUS granting this wider immunity with the only questions being about the details. E.g. would it only apply to people acting on direct presidential instructions or would it also protect people who reasonably believed they were acting on presidential orders that had been conveyed to them via intermediate parts of the chain of command?
Since, at least according to SCOTUS which is the only entity the US permits to decide such matters, the US constitution does grant full immunity for official acts to the president even though it says no such thing on its face, then their oath to defend the constitution includes defending the president’s right to order the carrying out of criminal offences by obeying such orders.
In the worst case you could be right, but I think that the intense blowback from the first immunity case shocked them. If anything, I think that they'd be more likely to use a second immunity case as a wished-for opportunity to walk it back, rather than to double down. I can't see the Chief Justice or Justice Coney Barrett -- at least, and maybe Justice Gorsuch as well -- going there.
Every officer who has graduated from a Service Academy or War College is thoroughly familiar with the constraints imposed by the Law of Armed Conflict and is mindful of the Nuremberg Trials. They must refuse to obey trump's patently illegal and immoral orders.
I see the trouble being that ordinary service people--those who pull the triggers--rarely have all the facts and have little standing to get them. They have relied on the JAG corps in the past, but, as we know, Trump and Hegseth have weakened JAG.
Yes, Tom, I feel very bad for the ordinary service people, who have been trained to follow orders from their well-trained officers. I read recently that when you include women and people of color, more than half of the armed services are not white men. I wonder what they think of the overt racism and misogyny of Trump and his administration. Do they not know much about it because they get their info from Fox and right wing social media? Do they talk it about it among themselves but stay because their greatest loyalty is to their fellow service members? I would love people who have been in the trenches to comment.
I wouldn't doubt that when the commitments of minority service members have expired, many of them won't "re-up". As a white man, if I was still serving today and was "short" (IYKYK), I would be applying to civilian jobs.
I served. I know. It's a difficult situation (including the comment about the use of a civilian entity for military purposes, as claimed in so many situations when there is no way to prove otherwise--vide Gaza). It's akin to using civilian hostages as shields.
Is it really the end of the subject. It is easy for us armchair quarterbacks because we are not the soldiers, sailors, airmen and marines going through courts martial.
Indeed. The prohibition is not categorical. If the war with Iran were judged to be justified as self-defense (which it will not be); and if the Revolutionary Guard were using power plants as cover in the same way as Hamas used hospitals, etc., an attack on a power plant might be justified. If Trump follows through on his threat and if he is ever held to account, I would say his generalized threat against *all* of the power plants, etc. will count against him.
Tom - judged & held to account are the operative terms accompanying your IFs. Trump likely believes and is told by his entourage that the winner writes the history. He doesn’t self-identify as a loser. That’s what the world is dealing with
If (when) Trump orders a nuclear strike on Iran, will the military people obey that order? I'm sure Kegsbreath will be able to find some holy warrior who will do g-d's will and murder the innocents of Iran.
It doesn’t take a genius to figure out that Trump wants to be the first President post-Truman who uses nuclear weapons. That will further cement his place in history/infamy. I consider Trump using nuclear weapons before the end of his term to be highly likely.
I think it's much higher than a 50/50 chance. If he can't be famous for saving America, he'll gladly be infamous, as long as he has some kind of eternal legacy. And he probably thinks a nuke is a "good" path to take.
The fact that he does not care about such consequences for his own children and grandchildren tells you all you need to know about Trump - he has no soul.
There have been comments made by this administration in the last months that project the idea that they do not believe international laws apply.
I can see their minds saying: "who made the laws, NATO? UN? Both are useless and shouldn't dictate what the US does", "what are they going to do about it?" "We do what we feel we must to protect the US"....
This is the vibe I have gotten from this administration. I don;t think they give a crap about "international law"
This explains the concerns of senator Kelly and company in November with respect to the need to not follow illegal orders. They were condemned by MAGA as “traitors “. Of course the reality is the Trump and MAGA are the tire traitors.
"any member of the U.S. Armed Services who participates in any way in attacks on civilian infrastructure is obeying an illegal order,"
This is not technically correct.
Civilian infrastructure which is also used by military institutions CAN BE legitimate military targets, so orders to bomb bridges, power plants, etc. would have to be *proven* to be illegal.
And that's the real problem with the "laws of war." Some 19 year old sitting at a console somewhere has no freekin' idea what might rise to the level of "war crimes" when someone barks at him or her to launch the missile. S/he WILL follow the order.
I know everyone is (rightly) focused on Trump's message on 4/5 about further attacks on Iran, but I'm even more worried/scared about Hegseth especially since he has been firing General's left and right and who will be left in the Pentagon that is reasoned and ethical. Not sure what my question is really about this other than, how to we deal with someone like Hegseth who is surrounding himself with more people like him?
The sacking of generals en masse could also be an indication of them standing up to Hegseth. If we really expect them to disobey an illegal order, but Hegseth is deadset on giving illegal orders, we might see that from the outside as discipline coming down on the heads of soldiers
I think they have added "Does President Trump have the authority to use the military against American citizens?" to the other litmus test, 'Was the 2020 election rigged?"
For decades, the Iranian regime has referred to the US as "The Great Satan," a claim much of the Iranian populace, I imagine, had received with great skepticism. It took Donald Trump to raise the claim from propaganda to credibility. The Iranian people once looked to us hopefully as a potential savior, but now that we have this beast as president, for the second time, I imagine they are fully disabused of any such illusions. Donald Trump would kill all 90 million people in Iran and not lose a wink of sleep over it.
Yes. As soon as the Daily Beast ran a story reporting that the FBI reports from Trump's 13 or 14-year old victim had been mostly left out of the Epstein Files, we see Trump escalating his calls for violence with a truly deranged post that was sure to garner all the attention and squeeze the breath out of any other story on the horizon. People may say that he is demented, but he sure knows how to lead the press around by the nose.
His edicts on climate change and basically ZERO protection of Earth's ecosystems has already started the death of this planet. When the EPA is run by people who are doing everything they can to roll back all green regulations in favor or corporate polluters, then you know we are doomed.
Many Iranian-Americans in the general area where I live were naively optimistic when Trump went after the Ayatollah and his regime. I have to think they have now been disabused of any confidence in Trump and his regime.
I echo Bill's call for impeachment. Dems should have been holding a weekly press conference presenting updated articles of impeachment tallying his Constitutional crimes since inauguration. Their feckless silence is why there is little trust for Dems either.
Although there are a lot of Dems spitting fire. You won't see them on TV though, as the Ellison media is against the Dems in general. You have to look for it because media won't show it to the People. It's very frustrating.
I don’t think there should be an impeachment. If it’s successful, we get Vance and then he will be able to run as an incumbent President. The voters wanted Trump and they should get him good and hard as H.L. Mencken famously said for the full 4 year term. Let Trump’s final term be a lesson for all future voters.
Yeah, I hear you. I'm all in with JVL's Hot Stove concept, which I call 2x4 Learning. But I'm not sure we'll survive 3 more years of this. And JD has the charisma of a dirty dishrag so I think the Cult will quickly fall apart under him. And I'm a fan of Neil Howe's "Fourth Turning" concept which requires a cataclysm to break the moronicity (aka 1929 and Depression) and move on to a new generation. We're uncharted. Good Luck America!
Or less divisive perhaps and achieving both aims at once (putting a little backbone into cabinet level appointees), threaten impeachment against Cabinet members like Pete Hegseth for committing said war crimes.
Kegseth's bloodlust is so so extreme right now I am not sure he has the mental capacity for understanding what he is doing. He is really accelerating to Trump's level of instability.
We'll have to make the impeachment case at some point. War crimes seems like a good legal point. Otherwise, we're just ignoring war crimes, which is dereliction of duty in the Senate and House.
So A. You can make that case after he is out of office. Or B. After he leaves office in an attempt to restore the US’s reputation hand him over for international war crimes tribunal. Frankly if the Iran war is still going on he could be a piece at the negotiations. I would be fine handing him to Terran for prosecution to end the war. The issue with impeachment is it is political not legal. So by pursuing it you make everything a political matter or stunt.
We have to start building the case in public. Either that or we're rolling over and playing dead IMO. Yes, it's political. It's the Presidency. It's supposed to be political.
Kate - I SO feel the dilemma here. Exactly as you say, vs the old line from 2004 election about W: you don’t change horsemen in the middle of an apocalypse. Too many voters chose stay the course. Too few may remember the lesson
Democrats can campaign on it and going after the can’t does that. Going directly after Trump turns the entire thing into a political mess and makes actual persecution harder long term. His cult will have his back and his soft supporters will rally. Impeachment without the ability to remove from office is a waste of time and political capital. It applies to a media world that does not exist anymore and a political reality that is very different from what I think Bill sees.
I suspect you're right, and I'm hoping we don't have to find out. Yet another impeachment would change the whole conversation, allowing Republicans to ignore the narrative that he is now demonstrably crazy as a loon (no disrespect to loons) and instead rally around resisting yet another Democratic attempt to, in effect, "steal the election," "ignore the will of voters," etc....
Yup that is how I see it as well. It is sad but this is the world we live in under Trump. There is only one language and it is power and the exercise of it. So unless you can exercise real power picking the fight isn’t worth it.
"The simple fact is that we have a president who is irresponsible, reckless, and indeed unhinged."
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And, please, do not forget grossly immature, crude, and classless. It matters in context.
Even on the holiest day in our culture That Man could not help putting himself first, clearly under the impression that no one else ever should be the center of attention -- even when the other person is Jesus Christ. His increasingly public profanity shows a complete disregard for longstanding societal standards, especially within the Christian community, when children read and hear these things and he effectively usurps the instructional role of the parents in service to his own emotional lack of restraint. And, no matter that he wears a suit to work every day and schmoozes with the cultural movers and shakers in our society on a regular basis, he is living proof that you cannot buy dignity and breeding and grace. He is the cow let loose among ballet dancers, unable to see that he is out of his element no matter how much wealth and power he has amassed. They cannot buy him the humanity and dignity that he craves. He is tolerated less than accepted, never a good position to be in once the winds shift and the worm turns.
But that is what we collectively chose. We broke it and bought it. Now we are in the consequences stage. In some ways it says more about us than it does about him, for we had the ability to see it and dismiss it from any meaningful position of influence. The first time might have been a failure to understand and foresee. Not the second time around. We knew what we were getting when we signed a second contract to do business with him. I continue to wait on an explanation from the Christian community, among many others, why he, of all available people, was their first and best choice for the moral leadership of this nation. Their silence speaks volumes, but the screams of the many he has persecuted, tormented, and even had bombed and beaten beyond future existence are louder -- to those willing to listen and hear.
Indeed. This is who we are as a nation, and no amount of hand wringing and dry washing it will absolve us of this stench.
I look at myself and wonder what more I could have done to prevent this, and I feel like it is an impossible ask. The truth is, as a nation, we saw Trump the first time around, and after a relatively calm attempt to revert to the mean with Biden, we full throatily went all in on Trump a second time.
In the light of Trump's already high and growing number of blasphemies, just out of curiosity I did some research on Paula White, Trump's "spiritual advisor", and officially the Senior Advisor to the White House Faith Office. I specifically wanted to know what kind of seminary could have graduated someone who compares Trump to Jesus, and apparently is caretaker of his moral compass.
Fun fact: as near as I could determine, the answer is "none". No seminary is answerable for her weird takes on Christianity, because she's apparently self-ordained or, as Robert Heinlein described another religious charlatan in "Stranger in a Strange Land", "ordained by God."
It figures, and it fits well with Trump's early religious exposure to the teachings of Norman Vincent Peale.
This illustrates the total bankruptcy of so called American exceptionalism and “Christian “ evangelicals. Trump is the golden calf and the antichrist rolled into one.
In the 2016 primaries, Trump said the generals would obey his orders, even if they involved war crimes. We're apparently abt to find out.
If the MAGA had a flicker of decency and conscience, they'd balk at what he's proposing. Don't count on it from your fellow citizens. And, don't be surprised at their wretched moral equivalence since the evil Iran regime has targeted civilians directly and indirectly.
If attacking American police officers with American flags on poles isn't beneath MAGA, murdering innocent Iranians isn't either, and will likely be celebrated on Fox Nooze, et al.
We already found out that his orders will be followed when Venezuelan "drug" boats were blown up.
There are a few things that may awaken maga but I don't think it would be decency or conscience. It will be things that will impact them directly like expensive gas, economic calamity or a military draft.
Boats were war crimes problemtical, and w/o a doubt 2nd taps. Scale was much smaller. We'll see abt his proposed Iranian war crimes and the military. I'm not hopeful after IGs and high ranking purges, which means what the H have we come to as a country. Aren't they the evil regime?
Yes, the MAGA are hopeless. I spent time w one watching the NCAA semis this weekend. Econ issues far out-weighed the war, and I had to explain how Iran is not total warfare.
Trump has probably committed more than 100 impeachable offenses in the first year+ of his second term. Impeaching him might feel good but if Dems take power they should impeach the cabinet members that he’s on the outs with whenever he is feuding.
If you impeach the officials that Trump is already skeptical of you could cause some damage. I think at the start of the next Congress RFK Jr will be a good first target. He’s not helping Trump at all even with his base and Dems could impeach him on a number of his actions that are politically unpopular.
As odious as Miller is, I don't see that he's done anything criminally actionable. Suggesting hateful actions to POTUS, leaning on Noem to slander murder victims, or spewing his might-makes-right nonsense are not actual crimes. He's got influence, but no coercive legal power afaik.
I was in college with the Watergate Burglary occurred. Nixon's crimes were deep but not wide - meaning that outside of those directly involved, the government was not effected. So from the Department of Agriculture to the Weather Bureau normal people did their jobs.
Today under Trump it is now wide and deep. I fear we need a coup to stop the madness.
Actually, Nixon's involvement now seems more like that of a father who finds out his sons have stolen some bicycles and who then works to return the bicycles before anyone finds out.
Again, it is worth remembering that President Trump, who was once a close friend of Jeffrey Epstein, most likely committed the crime of raping minor girls. This crime has no statute of limitations. Pedophiles always live in fear of being exposed. They will try to destroy anyone they feel is threatening them. They especially like to go after anyone whom they feel cannot defend themselves, such as 14-year-old girls or Cuba.
Trump is now failing at everything everywhere. His tariffs, gas prices, his wars, his revenge lawsuits, and even his immigration overreach. His response repertoire is limited to doing the same thing, only harder. That is why we read of his thinking about using nuclear weapons to silence Iran. Who will stop him? Hegseth will probably ride the bomb, a la Dr. Strangelove.
Suzie Wiles might only say that "boys will be boys." John Thune? Marco Rubio? BOOM!
Suzie Wiles -I wanna shame-bomb nepo Suzie back to the stone ages. Don't be telling me she's smart, or knows how to handle the madman, or any of the other stories told to cover her complicity as she stands by while T raves. A thousand years of shame for Suzie.
I'm confused about Bill Kristol saying that, for some reason, it's unfashionable to be alarmist about Donald Trump's presidency. Every day , I read the Bulwark, Charlie Sykes, Heather Cox Richardson, Talking Points Memo, Daniel Drezner, The Atlantic, Joyce Vance's newsletter, and David French. They are all alarmed. All of my family and friends are alarmed. Is it because I don't read the Wall Street Journal, or watch Fox? Am I out of touch? Who is not alarmed?
Our dominant media institutions have been telling us for a decade that it's unfashionable to be alarmist about the Idiot King.
From the very first day he came down the escalator in front of that crowd of paid "supporters," the message from "sober institutions" has been that he's a different kind of candidate, a different kind of President, etc etc, but never once did any of them have the intellectual integrity to call him out as a senile madman.
MOST people will adopt their sense of social normality from what's presented to us by the Gods of the Copybook Headings, so they don't bother trying to resist that message.
I think Bill is employing "alarmist" at a different level than even the voices you cite represent. For example, 'Trump's horrible but he's shooting himself in the foot now" expresses alarm at what he's doing, but inside a frame of conventional politics however strained. Being alarm-IST, is to inject a more apocalyptic red alert of oncoming disaster into a more business-as-usual general consensus. Chicken Little-ish. E.g. conservatives dismiss climate change modeling as "alarmist". So Bill's actually playing with words and perspectives a bit because "alarmism" would be presumed to be unfashionable among 'sensible' people.
IOW he's suggesting the sky may now actually be beginning to fall.
"“Tuesday will be Power Plant Day, and Bridge Day, all wrapped up in one, in Iran. There will be nothing like it!!! Open the Fuckin’ Strait, you crazy bastards, or you’ll be living in Hell—JUST WATCH! Praise be to Allah. President DONALD J. TRUMP”
To all of trump's Evangelical and Christian supporters - do you even remember or care what Easter symbolizes? Are you so wrapped up in bringing on the end times (which this is not), that you don't give a damn at how you desecrate what you profess to believe?
As to the GOP members of Congress and those in the military who are willing to go along with this - what the hell is wrong with you? SHAME on you.
Today’s focus must be on preventing the Cheeto Faced Fascist from dropping a nuclear weapon on Iran and not impeachment. Who is going to be the courageous person(s) to say no to him when he posts about nuking Iran and then physically take away the “keys” to the bomb? Impeachment should be on the back burner until after the midterms
On one hand, he's already been impeached twice, to, obviously, zero effect. The Dems won't get enough seats in the Senate to remove him, no matter what the House does (and, clearly, no matter what depths Trump sinks to). It wouldn't work, and would only serve to paint him as a victim again, which is the highest ambition of the whole MAGA movement. If he was removed, by some miracle, he'd still be running things from behind the scenes, since JD has no political cache or direction of his own. Forcing Trump to finish his term, as his mental and physical conditions continue to deteriorate would show the world (and his minions) just what they voted for. We'd be better off impeaching his cabinet one by one and letting him watch his power and leverage dwindle slowly over the next two years.
On the other hand, as JVL has pointed out, if this president doesn't meet the impeach-and-remove threshold, nobody ever has or ever will. It will be proven a completely ineffective tool, and future administrations can just ignore it as any real threat. Plus, there's no Mitch McConnell there to whip the Rs in the Senate to block removal. With Trump as a lame duck who can't really hurt them anymore, will Rs listen to a case laid out by the House (as Raskin did so eloquently in the first two impeachments) and still think Trump is innocent of the charges, and capable of continuing to do the job? Hopefully, the damage Trump has done to the party (if not to the nation) will get their attention, and how it will effect their hopes in 2028 in both the WH and the Senate. Even if he's impeached and not removed, having a record for posterity of his crimes and the fact that people stood up to him is worth something.
I'm conflicted on a call for impeachment for a totally different reason. But I do want to say: once he's removed from POWER, the senile game-show host absolutely 100% will NOT be "running anything" from behind the scenes anymore.
He's actually not running anything NOW other than picking whichever suggestion from his henchmen likes the sound of the most. He has no idea what's going on in the world other than what his courtiers spoonfeed him, and he has no real INTEREST.
The problem I have with the impeachment idea is that if he were removed from office, JD whathisname is smart enough to make a few minor changes to policy and declare that he's undone the gross overreach by the guy, and too many voters could easily go back to sleep and continue voting for the candidates of the party that's been working to destroy the Constitutional order for the past decade.
With respect to the war with Iran, any member of the U.S. Armed Services who participates in any way in attacks on civilian infrastructure is obeying an illegal order, is guilty of war crimes under international law, and treasonously violating their oaths of service to the Constitution.
Full stop. End of subject.
With Trump openly proposing a range of war crimes, this would be a good time for elected Democrats to be clear and to continue being clear that, even though the Supreme Court has given the President immunity from criminal prosecution for crimes, including presumably war crimes, that he commits in office, that immunity does not extend down the chain of command.
Anyone considering suggesting an illegal order, transmitting one, or receiving one should be well aware of that.
I have so indicated to my Senators.
j2
Only because the Supreme Court has not yet been required to rule on that question.
There is a non-frivolous argument that if the head of state has criminal immunity to allow, as SCOTUS put it, for robust executive decision making without the timidity that might be induced by concerns about future prosecution then anyone acting on his instructions must also have similar immunity since a president cannot personally carry out all the otherwise illegal acts that he might decide in his discretion are necessary in the exercise of his official powers. It worked that way in other common law derived jurisdictions prior to reforms in the modern era and SCOTUS (Thomas in particular) does seem more than a little obsessed with the idea that a US president should have the powers of an English monarch under 16th and 17th century common law (i.e. prior to the English Civil War and Glorious Revolution). They regard Blackstone (an extremely conservative monarchist who’s treated as a bit of joke by English lawyers and not considered a reliable source even in the limited context of the study of legal history) as a primary source.
ICE/DHS did appear to be making this argument after the Good and Pretti murders although they ultimately avoided the issue by simply refusing to investigate the crimes and preventing state authorities from doing so.
If I were a betting man I’d put my money on the current SCOTUS granting this wider immunity with the only questions being about the details. E.g. would it only apply to people acting on direct presidential instructions or would it also protect people who reasonably believed they were acting on presidential orders that had been conveyed to them via intermediate parts of the chain of command?
Since, at least according to SCOTUS which is the only entity the US permits to decide such matters, the US constitution does grant full immunity for official acts to the president even though it says no such thing on its face, then their oath to defend the constitution includes defending the president’s right to order the carrying out of criminal offences by obeying such orders.
In the worst case you could be right, but I think that the intense blowback from the first immunity case shocked them. If anything, I think that they'd be more likely to use a second immunity case as a wished-for opportunity to walk it back, rather than to double down. I can't see the Chief Justice or Justice Coney Barrett -- at least, and maybe Justice Gorsuch as well -- going there.
I very much hope you’re right.
You and me both. Either way, it will be a near thing.
Richard - Grim. JVL level grim. Which is to say, well reasoned & with considerable probability
Any way you look at Trump’s proposal to destroy all of Iran’s infrastructure is a war crime per international law.
Every officer who has graduated from a Service Academy or War College is thoroughly familiar with the constraints imposed by the Law of Armed Conflict and is mindful of the Nuremberg Trials. They must refuse to obey trump's patently illegal and immoral orders.
I see the trouble being that ordinary service people--those who pull the triggers--rarely have all the facts and have little standing to get them. They have relied on the JAG corps in the past, but, as we know, Trump and Hegseth have weakened JAG.
Yes, Tom, I feel very bad for the ordinary service people, who have been trained to follow orders from their well-trained officers. I read recently that when you include women and people of color, more than half of the armed services are not white men. I wonder what they think of the overt racism and misogyny of Trump and his administration. Do they not know much about it because they get their info from Fox and right wing social media? Do they talk it about it among themselves but stay because their greatest loyalty is to their fellow service members? I would love people who have been in the trenches to comment.
I wouldn't doubt that when the commitments of minority service members have expired, many of them won't "re-up". As a white man, if I was still serving today and was "short" (IYKYK), I would be applying to civilian jobs.
I know. We all know. But . . . will they refuse, en masse?
As happened in Germany?
doubt it. It's easy for us outside of the military to say they need to refuse the orders. Much harder when one is in the military.
I served. I know. It's a difficult situation (including the comment about the use of a civilian entity for military purposes, as claimed in so many situations when there is no way to prove otherwise--vide Gaza). It's akin to using civilian hostages as shields.
Is it really the end of the subject. It is easy for us armchair quarterbacks because we are not the soldiers, sailors, airmen and marines going through courts martial.
Of course it's not 'the end.' It's simply a naked statement of the current situation. Where this now goes is up to the participants.
Indeed. The prohibition is not categorical. If the war with Iran were judged to be justified as self-defense (which it will not be); and if the Revolutionary Guard were using power plants as cover in the same way as Hamas used hospitals, etc., an attack on a power plant might be justified. If Trump follows through on his threat and if he is ever held to account, I would say his generalized threat against *all* of the power plants, etc. will count against him.
Tom - judged & held to account are the operative terms accompanying your IFs. Trump likely believes and is told by his entourage that the winner writes the history. He doesn’t self-identify as a loser. That’s what the world is dealing with
If (when) Trump orders a nuclear strike on Iran, will the military people obey that order? I'm sure Kegsbreath will be able to find some holy warrior who will do g-d's will and murder the innocents of Iran.
It doesn’t take a genius to figure out that Trump wants to be the first President post-Truman who uses nuclear weapons. That will further cement his place in history/infamy. I consider Trump using nuclear weapons before the end of his term to be highly likely.
I think it's much higher than a 50/50 chance. If he can't be famous for saving America, he'll gladly be infamous, as long as he has some kind of eternal legacy. And he probably thinks a nuke is a "good" path to take.
Plus he has one foot in the grave already, so he does not care about the fallout.
The fact that he does not care about such consequences for his own children and grandchildren tells you all you need to know about Trump - he has no soul.
And should be disciplined militarily or prosecuted to the full extent of the military code or law.
Orrrrrr more likely they will be pardoned and celebrated as heroes and made rich by MAGA and their media moguls.
There have been comments made by this administration in the last months that project the idea that they do not believe international laws apply.
I can see their minds saying: "who made the laws, NATO? UN? Both are useless and shouldn't dictate what the US does", "what are they going to do about it?" "We do what we feel we must to protect the US"....
This is the vibe I have gotten from this administration. I don;t think they give a crap about "international law"
Ah yes, another card-carrying member of Cynics-'R'-Us. Welcome to the club.
Remember my definition of a cynic: a closet idealist longing to be surprised.
j2
This explains the concerns of senator Kelly and company in November with respect to the need to not follow illegal orders. They were condemned by MAGA as “traitors “. Of course the reality is the Trump and MAGA are the tire traitors.
Traitors, Kelly and company? Nonsense. They were/are patriotic truth-tellers.
"any member of the U.S. Armed Services who participates in any way in attacks on civilian infrastructure is obeying an illegal order,"
This is not technically correct.
Civilian infrastructure which is also used by military institutions CAN BE legitimate military targets, so orders to bomb bridges, power plants, etc. would have to be *proven* to be illegal.
And that's the real problem with the "laws of war." Some 19 year old sitting at a console somewhere has no freekin' idea what might rise to the level of "war crimes" when someone barks at him or her to launch the missile. S/he WILL follow the order.
I know everyone is (rightly) focused on Trump's message on 4/5 about further attacks on Iran, but I'm even more worried/scared about Hegseth especially since he has been firing General's left and right and who will be left in the Pentagon that is reasoned and ethical. Not sure what my question is really about this other than, how to we deal with someone like Hegseth who is surrounding himself with more people like him?
Heather, we can all call —relentlessly — for Kegsbreath to be fired or impeached.
I know that it’s not a satisfying course of action, but it has more chance of affecting change than remaining silent and seething in private.
Perhaps I’ll tell my 3 useless GOP stooges in Congress that I’m mad that his Secretary of war is making trump look bad…
Marcia - that’s been in my calls too! Bondi, Bovino, Patel. Not claiming credit just observing 2 of 3 gone. Keep dialing for dodos 😉
The sacking of generals en masse could also be an indication of them standing up to Hegseth. If we really expect them to disobey an illegal order, but Hegseth is deadset on giving illegal orders, we might see that from the outside as discipline coming down on the heads of soldiers
Hegseth is truly pure evil. A man totally lacking any morals. Of course he purports to be “religious “.
A interesting counterpoint is Pope Leo.
I think they have added "Does President Trump have the authority to use the military against American citizens?" to the other litmus test, 'Was the 2020 election rigged?"
L
For decades, the Iranian regime has referred to the US as "The Great Satan," a claim much of the Iranian populace, I imagine, had received with great skepticism. It took Donald Trump to raise the claim from propaganda to credibility. The Iranian people once looked to us hopefully as a potential savior, but now that we have this beast as president, for the second time, I imagine they are fully disabused of any such illusions. Donald Trump would kill all 90 million people in Iran and not lose a wink of sleep over it.
Donald Trump would kill most of this planet and not lose a wink of sleep over it. As long as he gets to hang out with billionaires and play golf.
And have his name on whatever stuff is left.
And rape 12 year old girls.
Yes. As soon as the Daily Beast ran a story reporting that the FBI reports from Trump's 13 or 14-year old victim had been mostly left out of the Epstein Files, we see Trump escalating his calls for violence with a truly deranged post that was sure to garner all the attention and squeeze the breath out of any other story on the horizon. People may say that he is demented, but he sure knows how to lead the press around by the nose.
And, more importantly, he gets to think he was right. Bkz dead Iranians.
Ballroom! Arch!
His edicts on climate change and basically ZERO protection of Earth's ecosystems has already started the death of this planet. When the EPA is run by people who are doing everything they can to roll back all green regulations in favor or corporate polluters, then you know we are doomed.
Many Iranian-Americans in the general area where I live were naively optimistic when Trump went after the Ayatollah and his regime. I have to think they have now been disabused of any confidence in Trump and his regime.
When Gaza was going on hot and heavy, Iranian trolls and bots online were easily identifiable by their apocalyptic tone.
trump has proven the Iranian regime right. We are the Great Satan.
I echo Bill's call for impeachment. Dems should have been holding a weekly press conference presenting updated articles of impeachment tallying his Constitutional crimes since inauguration. Their feckless silence is why there is little trust for Dems either.
Although there are a lot of Dems spitting fire. You won't see them on TV though, as the Ellison media is against the Dems in general. You have to look for it because media won't show it to the People. It's very frustrating.
I think there should be an impeachment document in process; as well as an Article 25 one.
I don’t think there should be an impeachment. If it’s successful, we get Vance and then he will be able to run as an incumbent President. The voters wanted Trump and they should get him good and hard as H.L. Mencken famously said for the full 4 year term. Let Trump’s final term be a lesson for all future voters.
Yeah, I hear you. I'm all in with JVL's Hot Stove concept, which I call 2x4 Learning. But I'm not sure we'll survive 3 more years of this. And JD has the charisma of a dirty dishrag so I think the Cult will quickly fall apart under him. And I'm a fan of Neil Howe's "Fourth Turning" concept which requires a cataclysm to break the moronicity (aka 1929 and Depression) and move on to a new generation. We're uncharted. Good Luck America!
If the dearth of learning is off the charts, it's sometimes necessary to go 4x4.
Or less divisive perhaps and achieving both aims at once (putting a little backbone into cabinet level appointees), threaten impeachment against Cabinet members like Pete Hegseth for committing said war crimes.
Kegseth's bloodlust is so so extreme right now I am not sure he has the mental capacity for understanding what he is doing. He is really accelerating to Trump's level of instability.
This right here. Impeaching Trump only to fail at removing him only rallies his base. You either utterly defeat Trump or you avoid direct conflict
We'll have to make the impeachment case at some point. War crimes seems like a good legal point. Otherwise, we're just ignoring war crimes, which is dereliction of duty in the Senate and House.
So A. You can make that case after he is out of office. Or B. After he leaves office in an attempt to restore the US’s reputation hand him over for international war crimes tribunal. Frankly if the Iran war is still going on he could be a piece at the negotiations. I would be fine handing him to Terran for prosecution to end the war. The issue with impeachment is it is political not legal. So by pursuing it you make everything a political matter or stunt.
We have to start building the case in public. Either that or we're rolling over and playing dead IMO. Yes, it's political. It's the Presidency. It's supposed to be political.
Kate - I SO feel the dilemma here. Exactly as you say, vs the old line from 2004 election about W: you don’t change horsemen in the middle of an apocalypse. Too many voters chose stay the course. Too few may remember the lesson
Democrats can campaign on it and going after the can’t does that. Going directly after Trump turns the entire thing into a political mess and makes actual persecution harder long term. His cult will have his back and his soft supporters will rally. Impeachment without the ability to remove from office is a waste of time and political capital. It applies to a media world that does not exist anymore and a political reality that is very different from what I think Bill sees.
I suspect you're right, and I'm hoping we don't have to find out. Yet another impeachment would change the whole conversation, allowing Republicans to ignore the narrative that he is now demonstrably crazy as a loon (no disrespect to loons) and instead rally around resisting yet another Democratic attempt to, in effect, "steal the election," "ignore the will of voters," etc....
Yup that is how I see it as well. It is sad but this is the world we live in under Trump. There is only one language and it is power and the exercise of it. So unless you can exercise real power picking the fight isn’t worth it.
"The simple fact is that we have a president who is irresponsible, reckless, and indeed unhinged."
-----
And, please, do not forget grossly immature, crude, and classless. It matters in context.
Even on the holiest day in our culture That Man could not help putting himself first, clearly under the impression that no one else ever should be the center of attention -- even when the other person is Jesus Christ. His increasingly public profanity shows a complete disregard for longstanding societal standards, especially within the Christian community, when children read and hear these things and he effectively usurps the instructional role of the parents in service to his own emotional lack of restraint. And, no matter that he wears a suit to work every day and schmoozes with the cultural movers and shakers in our society on a regular basis, he is living proof that you cannot buy dignity and breeding and grace. He is the cow let loose among ballet dancers, unable to see that he is out of his element no matter how much wealth and power he has amassed. They cannot buy him the humanity and dignity that he craves. He is tolerated less than accepted, never a good position to be in once the winds shift and the worm turns.
But that is what we collectively chose. We broke it and bought it. Now we are in the consequences stage. In some ways it says more about us than it does about him, for we had the ability to see it and dismiss it from any meaningful position of influence. The first time might have been a failure to understand and foresee. Not the second time around. We knew what we were getting when we signed a second contract to do business with him. I continue to wait on an explanation from the Christian community, among many others, why he, of all available people, was their first and best choice for the moral leadership of this nation. Their silence speaks volumes, but the screams of the many he has persecuted, tormented, and even had bombed and beaten beyond future existence are louder -- to those willing to listen and hear.
Indeed. This is who we are as a nation, and no amount of hand wringing and dry washing it will absolve us of this stench.
I look at myself and wonder what more I could have done to prevent this, and I feel like it is an impossible ask. The truth is, as a nation, we saw Trump the first time around, and after a relatively calm attempt to revert to the mean with Biden, we full throatily went all in on Trump a second time.
Ergo: It is who we are.
"We have met the enemy and he is us."
In the light of Trump's already high and growing number of blasphemies, just out of curiosity I did some research on Paula White, Trump's "spiritual advisor", and officially the Senior Advisor to the White House Faith Office. I specifically wanted to know what kind of seminary could have graduated someone who compares Trump to Jesus, and apparently is caretaker of his moral compass.
Fun fact: as near as I could determine, the answer is "none". No seminary is answerable for her weird takes on Christianity, because she's apparently self-ordained or, as Robert Heinlein described another religious charlatan in "Stranger in a Strange Land", "ordained by God."
It figures, and it fits well with Trump's early religious exposure to the teachings of Norman Vincent Peale.
This illustrates the total bankruptcy of so called American exceptionalism and “Christian “ evangelicals. Trump is the golden calf and the antichrist rolled into one.
In the 2016 primaries, Trump said the generals would obey his orders, even if they involved war crimes. We're apparently abt to find out.
If the MAGA had a flicker of decency and conscience, they'd balk at what he's proposing. Don't count on it from your fellow citizens. And, don't be surprised at their wretched moral equivalence since the evil Iran regime has targeted civilians directly and indirectly.
If attacking American police officers with American flags on poles isn't beneath MAGA, murdering innocent Iranians isn't either, and will likely be celebrated on Fox Nooze, et al.
We already found out that his orders will be followed when Venezuelan "drug" boats were blown up.
There are a few things that may awaken maga but I don't think it would be decency or conscience. It will be things that will impact them directly like expensive gas, economic calamity or a military draft.
Boats were war crimes problemtical, and w/o a doubt 2nd taps. Scale was much smaller. We'll see abt his proposed Iranian war crimes and the military. I'm not hopeful after IGs and high ranking purges, which means what the H have we come to as a country. Aren't they the evil regime?
Yes, the MAGA are hopeless. I spent time w one watching the NCAA semis this weekend. Econ issues far out-weighed the war, and I had to explain how Iran is not total warfare.
Trump has probably committed more than 100 impeachable offenses in the first year+ of his second term. Impeaching him might feel good but if Dems take power they should impeach the cabinet members that he’s on the outs with whenever he is feuding.
If you impeach the officials that Trump is already skeptical of you could cause some damage. I think at the start of the next Congress RFK Jr will be a good first target. He’s not helping Trump at all even with his base and Dems could impeach him on a number of his actions that are politically unpopular.
This was the case in the Nuremberg trials. Hitler was gone but his lackeys stood trail. The excuse that they were just following orders did not fly.
Miller should be first in the dock. A present day Hermann Göring.
I'm pretty sure Miller cannot be impeached since he does not hold a confirmed position.
Does not matter in the case of war crimes. It would be a criminal trial, not an impeachment.
As odious as Miller is, I don't see that he's done anything criminally actionable. Suggesting hateful actions to POTUS, leaning on Noem to slander murder victims, or spewing his might-makes-right nonsense are not actual crimes. He's got influence, but no coercive legal power afaik.
Guessing there's criminal corruption pretty much anywhere in this administration anyone feels like turning over some rocks.
"Open the Fuckin’ Strait, you crazy bastards"
Meanwhile, the anti-anti's will earnestly debate whether Trump proposes to do meets the technical definition of a war crime
And Susan Collins will be concerned and Thom Tillis will feel brave in interviews.
The seriousness of this matter may achieve the "very concerned" rating from Susan Collins!!
I look forward to her return to the private life for which she is clearly so well qualified.
And they will parse this statement to try to divine what, what, exactly, the President meant.
"He didn't really say what he said."
"The President was taken out of context, once again, by the Liberal media."
"How dare they quote Trump verbatim!"
They're supposed to report what he meant, not what he said...
The problem is, he really meant it.
I was in college with the Watergate Burglary occurred. Nixon's crimes were deep but not wide - meaning that outside of those directly involved, the government was not effected. So from the Department of Agriculture to the Weather Bureau normal people did their jobs.
Today under Trump it is now wide and deep. I fear we need a coup to stop the madness.
Letting Russell Vought run the Project 2025 playbook with so little supervision and pushback it is stunning.
the destruction of the US government by this admin based on the Project 2025 playback is unreal.
Actually, Nixon's involvement now seems more like that of a father who finds out his sons have stolen some bicycles and who then works to return the bicycles before anyone finds out.
Bill: "as one does"
I have nothing to add about our nightmare. Just THANKS for this on a bleak morning.
Agreed! Thankful for one tiny smile today.
Again, it is worth remembering that President Trump, who was once a close friend of Jeffrey Epstein, most likely committed the crime of raping minor girls. This crime has no statute of limitations. Pedophiles always live in fear of being exposed. They will try to destroy anyone they feel is threatening them. They especially like to go after anyone whom they feel cannot defend themselves, such as 14-year-old girls or Cuba.
Trump is now failing at everything everywhere. His tariffs, gas prices, his wars, his revenge lawsuits, and even his immigration overreach. His response repertoire is limited to doing the same thing, only harder. That is why we read of his thinking about using nuclear weapons to silence Iran. Who will stop him? Hegseth will probably ride the bomb, a la Dr. Strangelove.
Suzie Wiles might only say that "boys will be boys." John Thune? Marco Rubio? BOOM!
Susie is a traitor, as is the entire cabinet.
Suzie Wiles -I wanna shame-bomb nepo Suzie back to the stone ages. Don't be telling me she's smart, or knows how to handle the madman, or any of the other stories told to cover her complicity as she stands by while T raves. A thousand years of shame for Suzie.
Great scene w Slim Pickens riding the bomb down. Just a classic movie.
I'm confused about Bill Kristol saying that, for some reason, it's unfashionable to be alarmist about Donald Trump's presidency. Every day , I read the Bulwark, Charlie Sykes, Heather Cox Richardson, Talking Points Memo, Daniel Drezner, The Atlantic, Joyce Vance's newsletter, and David French. They are all alarmed. All of my family and friends are alarmed. Is it because I don't read the Wall Street Journal, or watch Fox? Am I out of touch? Who is not alarmed?
I sadly think most normal people don’t care that a war is happening other than gas prices going up.
Our dominant media institutions have been telling us for a decade that it's unfashionable to be alarmist about the Idiot King.
From the very first day he came down the escalator in front of that crowd of paid "supporters," the message from "sober institutions" has been that he's a different kind of candidate, a different kind of President, etc etc, but never once did any of them have the intellectual integrity to call him out as a senile madman.
MOST people will adopt their sense of social normality from what's presented to us by the Gods of the Copybook Headings, so they don't bother trying to resist that message.
You may be reading Heather Delaney Reece or seeing her YouTube videos. If not, I suggest a look and listen.
https://heatherdelaneyreese.substack.com/
Thanks, I'll check it out.
I think Bill is employing "alarmist" at a different level than even the voices you cite represent. For example, 'Trump's horrible but he's shooting himself in the foot now" expresses alarm at what he's doing, but inside a frame of conventional politics however strained. Being alarm-IST, is to inject a more apocalyptic red alert of oncoming disaster into a more business-as-usual general consensus. Chicken Little-ish. E.g. conservatives dismiss climate change modeling as "alarmist". So Bill's actually playing with words and perspectives a bit because "alarmism" would be presumed to be unfashionable among 'sensible' people.
IOW he's suggesting the sky may now actually be beginning to fall.
"“Tuesday will be Power Plant Day, and Bridge Day, all wrapped up in one, in Iran. There will be nothing like it!!! Open the Fuckin’ Strait, you crazy bastards, or you’ll be living in Hell—JUST WATCH! Praise be to Allah. President DONALD J. TRUMP”
To all of trump's Evangelical and Christian supporters - do you even remember or care what Easter symbolizes? Are you so wrapped up in bringing on the end times (which this is not), that you don't give a damn at how you desecrate what you profess to believe?
As to the GOP members of Congress and those in the military who are willing to go along with this - what the hell is wrong with you? SHAME on you.
It appears there may be enough "holy warriors" in the military who will carry out Trumps orders, regardless of their legal or moral implications.
I fear you're right!
Today’s focus must be on preventing the Cheeto Faced Fascist from dropping a nuclear weapon on Iran and not impeachment. Who is going to be the courageous person(s) to say no to him when he posts about nuking Iran and then physically take away the “keys” to the bomb? Impeachment should be on the back burner until after the midterms
If (when) he orders a nuclear strike, it will be before the midterms. Hell, it'll probably be before Wednesday.
We all know Paul Tibbets' name. Whoever actually presses the button will have a name that is cursed for centuries.
I'm torn on the impeachment thing.
On one hand, he's already been impeached twice, to, obviously, zero effect. The Dems won't get enough seats in the Senate to remove him, no matter what the House does (and, clearly, no matter what depths Trump sinks to). It wouldn't work, and would only serve to paint him as a victim again, which is the highest ambition of the whole MAGA movement. If he was removed, by some miracle, he'd still be running things from behind the scenes, since JD has no political cache or direction of his own. Forcing Trump to finish his term, as his mental and physical conditions continue to deteriorate would show the world (and his minions) just what they voted for. We'd be better off impeaching his cabinet one by one and letting him watch his power and leverage dwindle slowly over the next two years.
On the other hand, as JVL has pointed out, if this president doesn't meet the impeach-and-remove threshold, nobody ever has or ever will. It will be proven a completely ineffective tool, and future administrations can just ignore it as any real threat. Plus, there's no Mitch McConnell there to whip the Rs in the Senate to block removal. With Trump as a lame duck who can't really hurt them anymore, will Rs listen to a case laid out by the House (as Raskin did so eloquently in the first two impeachments) and still think Trump is innocent of the charges, and capable of continuing to do the job? Hopefully, the damage Trump has done to the party (if not to the nation) will get their attention, and how it will effect their hopes in 2028 in both the WH and the Senate. Even if he's impeached and not removed, having a record for posterity of his crimes and the fact that people stood up to him is worth something.
I'm conflicted on a call for impeachment for a totally different reason. But I do want to say: once he's removed from POWER, the senile game-show host absolutely 100% will NOT be "running anything" from behind the scenes anymore.
He's actually not running anything NOW other than picking whichever suggestion from his henchmen likes the sound of the most. He has no idea what's going on in the world other than what his courtiers spoonfeed him, and he has no real INTEREST.
The problem I have with the impeachment idea is that if he were removed from office, JD whathisname is smart enough to make a few minor changes to policy and declare that he's undone the gross overreach by the guy, and too many voters could easily go back to sleep and continue voting for the candidates of the party that's been working to destroy the Constitutional order for the past decade.
Doing the right thing never has no effect. If anything, it foregoes the considerable effect of NOT doing the right thing.