Jeff Tiedrich writes a funny, scatologial post about the Pete Hegseth hearings. As he says, it’s going to be a long four years. You should subscribe to his blog so he can continue to write. In the last line of his post, not included here:

Donny Convict is what would happen if Dunning and Kruger had a baby, and then dropped it on its head. he’s too fucking stupid to know just how fucking stupid he is. he has these moronic ideas, and then blurts them out like he’s the biggest genius who ever lived. and the MAGA yokels are right there to gobble it all down. yay, Donny! yay, External Revenue Service

Wikipedia: The Dunning-Kruger effect is a cognitive bias that causes people to overestimate their abilities in a specific area, particularly when they have low ability in that task. 

Jeff writes:

the Confederacy of Sewer Clowns Big Top Confirmation Circus rolled into DC yesterday, and the first jester to summersault into the ring was Pete Hegseth.

Pete is, of course, the ahem allegedly publicly drunk, ahem allegedly sexual-abusing goon who Donny saw on Fox News and then picked to head the Department of Defense.

here are a few things we learned about ahem allegedly Piss-Drunk Pete.

Pete is catastrophically unprepared and unqualified for the job.

Senator Duckworth: “…you’re unqualified to do that. you can’t do the acquisition and cross-servicing agreements, which essentially are security agreements. you can’t even mention that. you’ve done none of those. you talked about the Indo-Pacific a little bit, and I’m glad that you mentioned it. can you name the importance of at least one of the nations in ASEAN, and what type of agreement we have with at least one of those nations, and how many nations re in ASEAN, by the way.”

Hegseth: “I couldn’t tell you.”

Senator Duckworth: “no, you couldn’t, because you couldn’t bother to—”

Hegseth: “I know we have allies in South Korea, Japan and Australia.”

Senator Duckworth: “none of those countries are in ASEAN. I suggest you do a little homework before you prepare for these types of negotiations.”

this is the crux of the matter. take away Pete’s ahem alleged predatory behavior towards women. take away the ahem alleged public drunkenness. Pete Hegesth utterly lacks the skills and knowledge required to head the Department of Defense — a massive bureaucracy that employs over 2.91 million people. 

as a member of the Minnesota National Guard, Pete rose to the rank of Major. after that, he became a Fox News morning chat-show bobblehead. there’s a reason that Defense Secretaries are almost always lifetime military officers: it takes a lifetime of experience to acquire the skills necessary to do the job. Pete has none of that.

Pete’s only real qualification for the job — the only qualification that matters to Dear Leader — is that he’ll willingly carry out any order. for instance, Pete seems totally cool with shooting American civilians.

Senator Hirono: “in 2020, then-President Trump directed former Secretary of Defense Mark Esper to shoot protestors in the legs in downtown DC — an order Secretary Esper refused to comply with. would you carry out such an order from President Trump to shoot protesters in the legs?”

Hegseth: [dodges the question]

Senator Hirono: “that sounds to me that you would comply with such an order. you will shoot protesters in the legs.”

Hegseth: [silence]

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Pete believes the Geneva Conventions are an intrusive annoyance.

Senator King: “I want to be clear. are we going to abide by the Geneva Conventions and the prohibitions on torture or are we not?”

Hegseth: “what an America First national security policy is not going to do is hand its prerogatives to international bodies.”

oh, that’s lovely. we’re going to ignore a decades-old human rights agreement that almost every other nation on the planet abides by, because AMURRIKKKA FIRST. does Piss-Drunk Pete not realize that the Geneva Conventions also protects American soldiers and civilians? treaties only work when all countries abide by them. Pete should have learned this working well with others crap in kindergarten.

Pete seems totally cool with invading our allies’ territory.

Senator Hirono: “would you carry out an order from President Trump to seize Greenland, a territory of our NATO ally Denmark, by force?” 

Hegesth: “President Trump received 77 million votes—”

Senator Hirono: “we’re not talking about the election. my questions is, would you use our military to take over Greenland, an ally of Denmark?”

Hegesth: [refuses to answer the question]

Senator Hirono: “that sounds to me like you would contemplate carrying out such an order.”

Pete has a real problem with women in the military, and is also a willing firehose of right-wing propaganda.

Hegseth: “commanders meet quotas to have a certain number of female infantry officers or infantry enlisted. and that disparages those women—”

Senator Gillibrand: “commanders do not have to meet quotas for the infantry. commanders do not have to have a quota for women in the infantry. that does not exist. It does not exist. and your statements are creating the impression that these exist. because they do not. there are not quotas.”

Pete absolutely does not want women serving in the combat. he wrote a book about it. he thinks women serving in the military is just more DEI crap that the commie Democrats cooked up to make America weak. and Pete’s willing to lie and claim that female combat soldiers are being forced upon commanders.

this ‘women can’t do a man’s job’ nonsense is the same misogynistic bullshit we’re hearing from the screech monkeys, about how Los Angeles is burning to the ground because the LA fire chief is a lesbian.

in Donny Convict’s America, only white men should be in positions of authority.

now let’s ask a Republican why he’s on Team Piss-Drunk Pete.

Senator Rounds: “he wants to bring lethality back in.”

here’s the dictionary definition of lethality: the capacity to cause great harm, destruction, or death — basically, what the United States Military already has.

so, why is Senator Rounds so excited to have the military “restored” to its current state? because MAGA Republicans have been brainwashed into believing that commie-marxist Democrats have turned the US armed forces into a bunch of emasculated sissiex who can’t fight. it’s why Esteemed Senator Fidel Cancun practically orgasmed over Russian army propaganda — because he believes this shit, too.

Donny Convict buys into this nonsense as well. he claims that when he took office in 2017, the army didn’t have any bullets.

it’s a lie so patently dumb that only a MAGA would believe it — but it’s why Republicans are so hot to have Pete come in. he’s going to bring back lethality — and brutality — against our allies, against American protesters, against anyone Dear Leader tells him to.

what could possibly go wrong?