Keeping Signalgate in the news

 

He's doing it to himself.  But, competition with himself?  

Pete Hegseth is safe for now

Because Trump clearly likes and has publicly exonerated Hegseth, “you’re not going to hear a huge public outcry [over the Signal chat scandal],” said a senior GOP official on Capitol Hill who is close to the White House. “But, privately, there is a lot of concern about his judgment, more than with Waltz.”

  Politico

For Christ's sake, he has zero qualifications for the job he has as it is. Concern about his judgment? Where was that when they confirmed his appointment? His reputation was pretty shit back then. Did they think he'd magically grow some better judgment? He promised not to drink on the job. That was the only thing standing in his way?

Officials agree national security adviser Mike Waltz, who accidentally invited a journalist to a group chat with senior leaders, could more easily take the fall for a scandal that has embarrassed the administration — which may end up sparing Hegseth his job.

But Republican hawks, Pentagon officials and even some inside the White House now believe Hegseth also messed up by sending likely classified details from his phone.

[...]

Even for a Pentagon chief who has copied Trump’s pugilistic style — down to his Sharpie signature and campaign-style videos — Hegseth’s growing pile of mistakes are getting noticed, according to four officials and two people in touch with the administration.

“The problem is this is another example of inexperience,” said a person close to the White House, who like others, was granted anonymity to discuss a politically sensitive issue. “What happens when Hegseth needs to manage a real crisis?”

You tell me, dumbass.

Hegseth addressed the issue briefly Wednesday during a weeklong Asia trip. The information in the messages, “doesn’t look like war plans,” he said. “You know who sees war plans? I see them. Every single day.”

Really? How many countries are targeted in these daily war plans?

Senate Armed Services Committee leaders have launched a bipartisan probe into the episode.

“Intentionally putting classified info on an unclassified application is the real crime,” Rep. Dan Bacon, a Nebraska Republican and retired Air Force brigadier general, wrote in an X post.

But most top GOP lawmakers continue to publicly defend the Pentagon chief.

“No one needs to lose their job over this, but we do need to get to the bottom of it and just be assured it’s not going to happen anymore,” said Sen. Kevin Cramer (R-N.D.), a Trump ally.

And how will you know unless someone accidentally invites a journalist to listen in again?

Trump allies worry about another long battle in the Senate to replace [Hegseth]. And the Pentagon leader has largely followed the president’s own playbook, issuing angry attacks on the journalist to a pool of reporters that mostly included friendly conservative media and foreign outlets.

[...]

Democrats are skeptical that Trump will punish anyone.

“It’s part of the Trump administration ethos,” said Rep. Adam Smith of Washington, the top Democrat on the House Armed Services Committee. “There are no rules, there are no standards, there is no truth, there is no accountability."

Trump 2.0 - The arc of a national security blunder/scandal

First, it didn't happen.  Then, the journalist illegally snuck into the chat. Then, it was a mistake. 

Now, it was no big deal.  Normal.

Signalgate hearing

 I'm getting a little tired of the "-gate" thing.  How many decades until we find a new descriptor.  How many people are old enough to know why we use that term?  Or, maybe it keeps that disgrace in our history alive, which isn't a bad thing.

Anyway...

Head clown weighs in

 Hegseth just finished polishing Trump's ahole, praising his wonderfulness.

Say it with me again, Donald:  They're not supposed to be using Signal!

UPDATE 03/30/2025:

First, it didn't happen.  Then, the journalist illegally snuck into the chat. Then, it was a mistake. 

Now, it was no big deal.  Normal.

Fate can fuck with you

 

Trump 2.0 - Incompetence on top of incompetence

They pushed their luck.

From Jeffrey Goldberg

The statements by Hegseth, Gabbard, Ratcliffe, and Trump—combined with the assertions made by numerous administration officials that we are lying about the content of the Signal texts—have led us to believe that people should see the texts in order to reach their own conclusions. There is a clear public interest in disclosing the sort of information that Trump advisers included in nonsecure communications channels, especially because senior administration figures are attempting to downplay the significance of the messages that were shared.

[...]

Yesterday, we asked officials across the Trump administration if they objected to us publishing the full texts. In emails to the Central Intelligence Agency, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, the National Security Council, the Department of Defense, and the White House, we wrote, in part: “In light of statements today from multiple administration officials, including before the Senate Intelligence Committee, that the information in the Signal chain about the Houthi strike is not classified, and that it does not contain ‘war plans,’ The Atlantic is considering publishing the entirety of the Signal chain.”

We sent our first request for comment and feedback to national-security officials shortly after noon, and followed up in the evening after most failed to answer.

Late yesterday, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt emailed a response: “As we have repeatedly stated, there was no classified information transmitted in the group chat. However, as the CIA Director and National Security Advisor have both expressed today, that does not mean we encourage the release of the conversation. This was intended to be a an [sic] internal and private deliberation amongst high-level senior staff and sensitive information was discussed. So for those reason [sic] — yes, we object to the release.” (The Leavitt statement did not address which elements of the texts the White House considered sensitive, or how, more than a week after the initial air strikes, their publication could have bearing on national security.)

A CIA spokesperson asked us to withhold the name of John Ratcliffe’s chief of staff, which Ratcliffe had shared in the Signal chain, because CIA intelligence officers are traditionally not publicly identified. Ratcliffe had testified earlier yesterday that the officer is not undercover and said it was “completely appropriate” to share their name in the Signal conversation. We will continue to withhold the name of the officer. Otherwise, the messages are unredacted.

[...]

Let us pause here for a moment to underscore a point. This Signal message shows that the U.S. secretary of defense texted a group that included a phone number unknown to him—Goldberg’s cellphone—at 11:44 a.m. This was 31 minutes before the first U.S. warplanes launched, and two hours and one minute before the beginning of a period in which a primary target, the Houthi “Target Terrorist,” was expected to be killed by these American aircraft. If this text had been received by someone hostile to American interests—or someone merely indiscreet, and with access to social media—the Houthis would have had time to prepare for what was meant to be a surprise attack on their strongholds. The consequences for American pilots could have been catastrophic.

  Atlantic

Continue reading.

They weren't "clean" on ANY security.

Can't wait to see how they - and their proxy newscasters - spin this.

UPDATE 08:48 am:

Pretty sure she was on that chat herself.  Gonna be hard to pretend she was just repeating what somebody told her.

UPDATE 09:05 am:

They have no choice, Ron.  It's all they've got.

UPDATE  02:20 pm:

UPDATE 03/30/2025:

First, it didn't happen.  Then, the journalist illegally snuck into the chat. Then, it was a mistake. 

Now, it was no big deal.  Normal.

Mainstream media bending the knee

 

Houthi PC SMall Group - The Daily Show

 

Spinning the scandal

 

Obviously he is not, because he didn't report any details of the war plan.  He was more concerned about national security than the administration's idiots on the chat.  And if he WERE scum, why the fuck did you invite him onto the chat, you pathetic, despicable, incompetent shitbag?

Did he know Goldberg is a journalist?  Was it actually Jeffrey Goldberg he thought he was inviting, or somebody else named Goldberg?  The GOP seems to be full of people - including the Orange One -  who get the wrong person on social media.  These are not careful, thoughtful people.*

And then along comes Trump and steps all over their dicks.

Probably the coffee boy.

*UPDATE 03/25/2025:

UPDATE 08:44 am:  The money quote:

Jeffrey Goldberg interview

 

Fucking amazing.

This begs the question:  Who did Mike Waltz think he was inviting?

UPDATE 04:59 pm:

War plans chat group

[T]he Trump administration’s national security principals hold highly sensitive military planning discussions on Signal, the encrypted text-messaging app. And we know this because Donald Trump’s national security adviser, Michael Waltz, accidentally added Jeffrey Goldberg, the editor of the Atlantic, to a Signal group chat including JD Vance, Pete Hegseth, Marco Rubio, Scott Bessent, Tulsi Gabbard, Susie Wiles, and others. Without realizing a very prominent journalist was mistakenly added to the group, the principals breezily planned strikes on Houthi targets in Yemen. Hegseth even sent the group highly detailed attack plans that turned out to be perfectly accurate.

[...]

Trump is likelier to order an investigation of Jeffrey Goldberg, or to raid his home, than to allow an investigation of his own national security principals.

House Speaker Mike Johnson has already blown the whole story off as a harmless oopsie, suggesting Republicans in Congress won’t be looking into this either (not that we should have expected them to)

  Off Message

 (See background post here.)

Ho-hum. No biggie. Nothing to see here. Move along.

This is, thus, yet another story that’s principally about Republican enablement and complicity.

[...]

Instead of getting genuinely mad about Republican scandals, and trying to turn them into liabilities for Trump and Republican leaders, the way Republicans did with Hillary Clinton’s emails, they say “BUT HER EMAILS,” and then move on.

[...]

The lesson of the Clinton emails debacle is that the public can be made to care about many, many things more than they care about the price of eggs.

  Off Message

But not for any length of time.

Democrats: useless as tits on a boar.

And Republicans are furiously whitewashing, massaging the conscience of their MAGA followers who will mindlessly absorb and repeat.

How utterly ridiculous.  Typical D'Souza.  Can anyone help him out with this question of why Goldberg didn't share actual war plans publicly?

Trump Homeland Security Advisor and lackey Stephen Miller understood the issue in '22.  What's he saying now?

But here we are.

UPDATE 08:18 am:

I guess being able to monitor in real time IS better than waiting for them to fill you in after the fact.

And he knows he's safe making that claim because Goldberg isn't as corrupt, feckless, and incompetent as Hegseth.

Howard Nutlick.  

UPDATE 08:49 am:

UPDATE 01:23 pm:

Next up:  Trump claims to have declassified the war planning info shared on Signal.

UPDATE 04:59 pm:

From the Senate hearing on national security threats:

Narrator:  They can, and they will.

Narrator:  It doesn't just seem that way.  

Yep.  But only if Dems don't just walk away and "move on."

Or to admit ignorance like this:

Assume they'll get it from Goldberg.  

UPDATE 03/26/2025:  The money quote: