Pictured is Retired General Mark A. Milley, formerly the 20th Chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. President Trump has indicated that he believes that Milley "colluded with China," and that this would have once warranted death. Given Trump's remark, which came before Trump officially took office, former president Joe Biden gave Milley a "preemptive pardon."
If you are following the news, you will know that the president, now that he is in office, has recently fired General C.Q. Brown, Jr. from his role as Chair of the Joint Chiefs. New Jersey Senator Cory Booker has correctly said that this action sends “a dangerous message to the military” on political loyalty to the president.
A few days ago, I spoke on the telephone with a local (Santa Cruz County) activist, who urgently wanted to discuss some information that had come to his attention. This activist is a veteran, and has maintained contact with people who are still in, or involved with, the military, and the activist told me that he has heard reliable infomation from people close to the upper echelons of the armed forces that there is a very significant and growing discussion within the military that it is time to take action to "relieve the president of his duties." That information is concerning.
As we all know (again, if we are following the news), our president is acting as though he thinks he should be treated as a democratically-elected dictator, or even as a "king." According to the activist who contacted me, many leaders in the armed forces have been disturbed by this executive overreach, and are considering taking some kind of preemptive action (action by the military) to displace president Trump.
I am not sure exactly why the activist who told me this wanted me to know, but he was rather positive about the idea. Though I am quite disturbed about what's happening in our government today, and have no love for Mr. Trump, I was not and am not happy with the idea that our problems with the president should be "solved" by military action aimed at the president.
Our president is acting as though he can tell anyone in the federal government what to do, and I think that many of his actions are illegal and unconstitutional. Those in the armed forces are certainly right to think ahead, and to be concerned that the president might soon be asking our armed forces to take illegal and unconstitutional actions on the president's behalf - actions like using military force to prevent large demonstrations against the president and/or his policy pronouncements. Military leaders should definitely NOT take unconstitiutional and illegal actions. They should refuse to obey illegal and/or unconstitutional orders, and they should make any such refusal public, so we know what is happening.
However, having the armed forces take preemptive action against the president, as a way to derail any unconstitutional action by the president, does not seem, to me, to be the right way to preserve and protect democratic self-government in the United States.
If there is any truth to this information from my activist friend, it ought to be a "heads up" to our elected representatives in Congress - and to all of us, as citizens. Under the Constitution, the legislative branch is supposed to set the rules, and make the laws. The president is not an elected dictator, and he is definitely not a "king." The president's job, as outlined in the Constitution, is to "take care that the laws are faithfully executed." The failure of the Congress, so far, to take effective action to counteract the president's unconstitutional overreach, needs to be corrected - but by the Congress and the Courts - and ultimately by us, by "we, the people." That the armed forces might be considering taking things into their own hands is concerning information indeed.
We are in a genuine governmental crisis, as I have been pointing out in my recent blog postings - and as others have been pointing out, too - but having the armed forces jump in to run the government is not the right solution - not if we want democratic self-government, as outlined in the Constitution, to continue to define the way that we decide what happens in this "political world" of ours!
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