Vomitaurguarion Day will challenge half the country to find something else to do, by Hal M. Brown

What is happening in Israel may bump some of the coverage of tomorrow's inauguration off non-stop TV coverage. Even if it does, somewhere around the half of the country who might be inclined to watch at least the high point of any inauguration would find watching Trump sworn in too upsetting.

The actual hand on the Bible with Trump uttering a tissue of lies when he takes the oath is so historic that only a 9.6 Richtor Scale earthquake just off the California coast would force the networks to cut away.

That is with the possible exception of Fox News. They probably don't think that the biggest natural disaster since the Chicxulub impactor, the plummeting asteroid or comet that is said to have killed all the dinosaurs and 75% of life on earth, destroying California is a tragedy.

Trump's entertainment line-up certainly won't draw viewership in the evening the way the star-studded cast Kamala Harris would have had would.

Our plan is to treat Monday as a mostly normal day. As far as TV watching goes we'll watch some of the comedy series Younger alternating with a crime series we've yet to decide on after just finishing watching Dalgliesh. I expect we'll check in periodically with the commentary being offered online by The Contratian. This is the new substack started by Jennifer Rubin and Norm Eisen which is off to an amazing start.

The inauguration, for so many of us, will be like what I depicted in the AI cartoon illustration of Trump surrounded by vomit. Watching it might lead us to our own medicine cabinet to find some Pepto Bismal.

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Because I have had quite a few new subscribers based on yesterday’s post (thank you!!!) I am reposting it here:

Hegseth is wrong, There is no thin line between legality and lethality.

The titles of the same Sabrina Haake essay about Pete Hegseth have a different emphasis.RawStory's title emphasized his lack of qualifications. On her substack,The Haake Take, the author focuses on his view about when it is permissible to use lethal force even if it might not be legal.

Hegseth may not be the least qualified Trump nominee. I'd give that "honor" to the just defeated one term member of the House, Lori Chavez-DeRemer, who has been nominated to be Sectretary of Labor. She was mayor of Happy Valley, a city in the Portland suburbs with a population of about 26,000. Critics said this was an example of someone falling upwards in their career.

Hegseth was a reserve Army major. Army majors usually serve as specalized executive or operations officers for battallion-sized units of 300 to 1,200 soldiers. His being promoted to someone with authority over generals is a far bigger example of falling upwards than Chavez- DeReemer.

I point this out because RawStory published this with the title "The least qualified Trump Cabinet pick ever." They should have used the HaakeTake title, "Hegseth's thin line between lethality and legality." Sabrina Haake's title in HaakeTake was "Hegseth's thin line between lethality and legality." Heseth is unqualified, but what is important is that he is a danger to democracy. He wants to turn the miliary into a version of the SS.

Hegseth said he “thought very deeply about the balance between legality and lethality,” and that when it comes to “destroying the enemy,” i.e., killing people, the law “should not be getting in the way” should have led to Democrats and any Republicans with integrity on the committee saying "well, this hearing is over and walking out.

There is no thin line between legality and lethality in the military. Adding the word "line" to the two words make a nice alliteration. However, only with Hegseth and other itchy trigger fingered soldiers like him, some of whom have been convicted of war crimes, is that this line is thin to the point of being nonexistent. The military addressed the "line" in overseas combat when it comes to deliberately killing civilians. When it comes to targeting civilians when engaged in operations in the United States there are rules too. They are similar to the rules of police and other law enforcement.

It is both instructive and chilling to read "The DoD quietly reissues Directive 5240.01 expanding the use of lethal force against U.S. citizens. "

Quick Summary

• New provisions: The updated directive expands the circumstances under which the DoD can assist law enforcement, including the use of lethal force.

• Assassination explicitly forbidden: While assassination is banned, the new language allows for lethal actions under “imminent threats.”

• Concerns about civil liberties: The expanded definition of “national security threats” is raising alarms, particularly given DHS’s broader definition of domestic terrorism threats.

• High-level approval required: Any intelligence-sharing that could lead to lethal force must be approved by the Secretary of Defense, but Component Heads can act immediately for up to 72 hours before obtaining approval.

Hegseth should have been asked about his familiarity with this directive and pressured to reveal what he thought about it. He should have been confronted with the possiblity of civilians being mowed down by machine guns only the military are able to use.

It should go without saying that the weapons that the U.S. military can deploy were never meant to be used against civilians whether foreign or domestic. In addition to this, as has been pointed out by others, the military has no training in domestic law enforcement.

I post my blogs on Stressline.org where you can subscribe (for free everywhere) and on Substack where, if you want to submit your email, you can be notified of all new blog posts. I also post them on Medium because this enables them to be easily found on internet searches.

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