The problem with only using words to solve a problem is that other people will ignore or re-work your prose. The answer is action. Everyone filling one of the DEI billets and everyone that silently ignored their re-worded titles needs to be excised from the Navy.
As you point out, the Navy has no seat at the table. If we think there will be a focus on the Navy over the next four years, we are fooling ourselves. I’m not going to fight the DEI war here, but imagine if all this effort and energy were applied to better manning, training and equipping our Sailors and Ships. I want to see an EO that will eliminate undermanned ships, subhuman living conditions in the shipyard, and build more ships.
Imagine if all the personal and professional capital that Admiral Guilday expended defending that racist Kendi was spent doing all the things you just mentioned.
I "quit" on the Navy when Ray Mabus decided to name the second John Lewis unrep ship as the "Harvey Milk" and the CNO didn't walk into Mabus' office and declare "over my dead body".
We've had gutless, spineless leadership far too long, and as my Mother used to tell me "the best way to lie is to tell half the truth, you can always remember the truth, but the lie will leave your memory quickly". USNA just lied and think SecDef office is too dumb to realize "the truth".
I had a medically retired FC2, who kept her bucket cover, as she saw it as a link back to the WAVES. Wants it to be at her funeral, and the family knows.
Well, for the first few days. Then the Air Force will take over the fight while the navy is trying to find what contractor will send their ocean going tugs into a war zone and trying to convince the civilians on unarmed logistics ships to sail into the battle zone.
The plan is to subcontract the Japanese Navy to assist in SAR ops to pick up our folks (pilots and sailors) from the sea using its excellent ShinMaywa US-2.
Apparently our Navy refuses to purchase any of the US-2's so we keep kicking that can down the road.
Nothing is resolved or repaired until the CNO is fired. Whether for cause or not is debatable. Then every single flag officer both USN and USMC need to put in their papers, retire. Stalin did it the violent way (was expensive) but until you pull this bunch of cowards and politicans wearing OUR uniforms out and off the line it doesn’t get fixed. These admirals and generals are not part of the problem they ARE the problem.
Charles you are absolute correct. I am wondering why Hegseth hasn’t cleaned out the JCS or fired the superintendent of USNA. No midshipman would make it past an honor board if they behaved like their sup.
While its easier to cut-off the head and let that serve as an example, I think we all know that there's a lot of roots and stems that need removal verses just a simple head-lopping.
The CO is responsible for the organization. If there are parts that are out of control and they don't act in a timely manner once they learn of it (or are too dense to discover it), then that's grounds for loss of confidence by the senior command levels.
I'm cool with giving her a chance. A mere 3.5 weeks from the ultimatum is not much time to get through the OODA loop. But this is clearly a command priority from the top so some focus needs to be applied. How long is long enough? Don't know, let's say by end of May.
The head of the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis, Maryland, says the school is "taking steps to close all agency Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Accessibility (DEIA) offices and end all DEIA-related contracts in accordance with President Trump’s executive orders," Why isn't the CNO axing the head of the USNA? "Taking steps" is weasel-wording, when what needed to be done was for the Head of the USNA to swing the ax right-effing-now. I have no confidence that the USNA can or will fix their OODA loop. Time for punishment drills on the grinder?
Let’s not forget the other service academies in New London and Kings Point. Even though they are not a part of DoD they are infected with the DEI virus.
I've heard rumors that Kings Point still has rainbow fingerpaintings hanging on some of the walls, presumably as motivational artwork. This, while that famous mural of Jesus touching the struggling sailors remains in a storage room, courtesy of the current Super. Just rumors, though... Have not set foot on site in a few yrs.
Any bets on who is gonna by the next cno? I’d love to see a public ucmj with sec def and potus presiding. Insubordination by a flag officer is not only insidious, it’s something that needs to be publicly punished, just like tailhook, only better.
If he is retired, and I'm sure that's the case, he still has obligations. Recall him to active service, convene a GCM, bust him to E1, forfeit all pay and allowances and toss him in Leavenworth for 20 years.
except that SCOTUS previously ruled that GCMs were FEDERAL COURTS and that resulting verdicts were FEDERAL Felonies. And Biden already Pardoned him from all FEDERAL Prosecutions during that period.
States could bring charges for State crimes, and DOD could recall him and conduct some hearings and admonishment, but not Convict him for a Federal crime during that period.
Beyond that, and I'm not a JAG, I don't think Officers can get a "bust him to E1"?
So yeah, you appear to be correct. Nor will a special or summary work.
Looks like the most you could do is make it a nuisance and give him a letter of reprimand (at least I think you can do that without a CM).
Probably can't mess with his retirement pay either.
Though I suppose you could send him out to command Thule or Adak weather stations for a couple years.
Without dragging out my textbooks, I'm pretty sure a GCM has the full gamut of options including death, but more notably reduction to E-1 for anyone, full forfeiture of pay and benefits, and imprisonment for years prior to dishonorable discharge. Penalties are codified in the UCMJ so limit the court as to punishment. And recalling someone to active duty just to send them to a CM is likely to be contested in itself. SFAIK, it's never been done.
In several Navy related groups on Facebook I’m in there has been much wailing and gnashing of teeth over the end of the diversity programs. For some, it’s been the loss of the eval/fitrep bullet points. Others, the responses have been it does not affect the leadership requirements and charges. I’m in the don’t start the fight camp online, so just keep scrolling.
The current administration is not beholden to DC, and is firmly committed to knocking over rice bowls. Keep that in mind.
Yeah there is one particularly insufferable guy I keep stumbling across who uses words like "Trumpenproletariat" (as if that's a bad thing) and acts like the known world is about to come crashing down upon our heads because of the damage being done... we are headed for absolute ruin, he says! I roll my eyes and scroll on by. But the absolute contempt for those who believe differently and the rank condescension is appalling. And he is probably not alone.
In a macabre sort of way, I'm kind of glad that remnants of the True-Believer Left are still out & about, banging their tired old drumbeat. No... It's not admirable, not by a long shot. By comparison, at least those old Japanese jungle soldiers -- the ones who never surrendered and lived in caves for many decades -- presented a sense of duty and honor about them. But with Lefties? At this point they're just sorry husks, or call them absurd artifacts of another era, who remind us all of what our culture has finally transcended, and is now leaving behind.
I suspect many of the screeching DEI people were getting baksheesh from the USAID money laundry machine in the form of payments and their anger is because the spigot to that rancid flow is being shut off. So when I see people screaming about Elon and his DOGE cuts, I just assume those opposed to stopping the money waste are on the take. Those who don't see the poison of DEI but who made rank as a white male whatever seem to be fine with closing the gate after themselves. Yet they whine that Trump is ruining everything. No, he is fixing it before it is too late. DEI is a cancer that was killing our military. It will take a generation and a half to fix the damage. If at all.
I have not read of anyone rallying around either Bolton or Cheney. Both seem to be regarded as lepers by each side of the aisle. Maybe Billy Kristol has taken them under his wing.
I suspect Cheney will be running for the hills when DOGE gets to the DOD. My guess is that as much waste and corruption we have seen between dems and the various DOS affiliates we're going to see between the GOP and DOD.
Hmmmm… Trumpenproletariat? Might it be the same fellow who the weekend before the election wrote “That half the country will vote for a terrible human being [Trump] says more about voters than it does him.” His contempt and condescension is for that part of America that provides most of our warriors. He must be appalled by the recent surge in military recruits since Trump was elected.
Maybe.. lol. Like, read the room, dude! Must be nice to be that lofty. Has he ever gotten his fingernails dirty? Was he ever passed over for anything for being a FWM?
I've been saddened to see (and hear, in some cases directly) that a number of my classmates, many who served well and honorably, have completely succumbed to TDS. NOTHING this administration does will be perceived as useful, good, or even legal. Some have even encouraged (online) "resistance" by federal employees.
Those disgust me. My legitimate military authority is derived from obedience to lawful orders issued under Article II, Section 2. All executive branch authority is derived from the Office of the President.
If you can be enthusiastic about putting women on ships, a long term bad idea that I've accepted, than you can accept it when the bureaucracy is in the sights of an elected official who has good reason to consider the leadership plotted against him.
Maybe they believe that the separation of the sovereign’s powers into three distinct branches of government allows individual freedom and personal liberty to flourish, and that a stronger executive is the road to tyranny. Cf. Charles I.
The number of departments and personnel in the Executive Branch is set by Congress. The Executive is to "faithfully" execute the laws passed by Congress.
If Congress wants to send condoms to Hamas, and they pass a Bill, then the President can either Veto the Bill or send condoms to Hamas.
Our system of government arose when folks threw off the yoke of a Monarch; both in 1776, but more importantly in 1642. Limiting the power of the sovereign led to the flourishing of humanity. Trump is trying to claw back power which Parlement determined belonged to the people on January 30, 1649. I believe that there are many conservatives who think Trump's decisions to unilaterally stop funding and administering programs which Congress determined should be funded and administered is wrong. Real conservatives honor the constitution. Article II, Section 3. explicitly provides that the President, “shall take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed.” "Shall," not "may," or "might," or "if he likes the Laws." Shall.
I'd like to see where Congress passed a law specifically allocating these expenditures.
That said, it is nonsensical to claim the executive is expanding its power by decreasing its personnel and spending. The DoGE initiative is the only potential for this Republic to escape the abyss
"The Engagement, Retention, and Equal Opportunity directly supports the Naval Academy's Strategic Imperative One: To recruit, admit, and graduate a diverse and talented Brigade of Midshipmen.”
Very sad. Those idiots didn't even have the sense to change the words on the web page to avoid scrutiny, just changed the title of the page and republished.
I'm trying to remember, are there yardarms on the mast from the USS Maine?
More useless desk jockeys vying for 'spending more time with their families'. Identify these clowns and either post them to Thule or offer them retirement
What happens when one extreme causes an opposite extreme? Sure, some of the rhetoric and programs got out of hand, especially after George Floyd.
DOD recognition of Black History Month on the other hand has been around since I first joined in 1974. Mostly it meant some posters going up on base and maybe a mention in the Plan of the Day. If it made some Black servicemembers feel welcome and that the team had their back, great.
Now we see an oppressive wipe-out and hunting down of anyone who participated these programs. Someone mentioned zampolit - this is looking like true ideological purging.
This week's insanity were the recruiting commands withdrawing from the Black Engineer of the Year awards because "black" Trumps "engineers" I guess. Why might they want to have visibility among a group of engineers and engineering students? Moronic.
I disagree. This is about eliminating policies that cause division in the ranks. First thing we learned in OCS and Bootcamp is that no one is special. "There is no racial bigotry here. I do not look down on niggers, kikes, wops or greasers. Here you are all equally worthless. And my orders are to weed out all non-hackers who do not pack the gear to serve in my beloved Corps. Do you maggots understand that?” ~ Gunnery Sergeant Hartman, USMC
One could quibble with that. Lift Every Voice and Sing was composed 125 years ago. So well predates the current issues.
That's more like dredging up something Wagnerian for the occasion. Though nothing comes to mind that would be fitting, per se. But I'm by no means conversant on Wagner.
A Defense Intelligence Agency memo went out last week "pausing all events, activities . . and Special Observances" for two federal holidays, MLK Day and Juneteenth. These are federal holidays passed by the House and the Senate and signed into law by presidents.
There are some who oppose the MLK holiday because of MLK's personal peccadillos. Some oppose Juneteenth because they say Juneteenth is an arbitrary date out of several possible, even though it has had significance for black Americans for years. Other droolers oppose them because they oppose any civil rights or infringement on owning people or are virulent racists.
It was the judgment of our representative government that MLK's leadership, eloquence and heroism and the end of slavery in the USA were worthy of commemoration, like Memorial Day or Presidents' Day.
When you pick out two federal holidays which can't be acknowledged only because they involve black people, that's racism. Perhaps this is malicious or overenthusiastic compliance, but as far as I know the memo hasn't been amended. This is the extremism of which I speak.
Yes, I understand you want every particular identity an American might hold should be homogenized into some uniform American allegiance, but that's not how others feel about their own identity. Within the lives of tens of millions of Americans there was segregation, denial of voting rights, and Jim Crow. That creates allegiances and resentments that the polity felt it had to acknowledge. You were always opposed to Black History Month, ok I get it. But for most, it was either an comfort, an inspiration, an amusement, or a passing irritation. Personally, I was ok with all of it until the rhetoric strayed into collective guilt of white people, eg "white supremacy/privilege." But with doing things like banning official observation of MLK Day and Juneteenth, I'm seeing the point of Kendi and the "white supremacy" rhetoric.
Is black engineering different from white engineering? Do they have different standards to get a prize? What is going on here that they need their own special room to pat each other on the back?
I don't particularly see a problem with canvassing at these events. However, the vast majority of blacks with in demand STEM degrees realize the juice ain't worth the squeeze and will go somewhere else. Military service just ain't on their radar.
It's what's going on after their accession that needs to be fixed.
Not true! The military does things nobody else can do. Many young, black men with STEM degrees would love to get a job where you can go fast and blow things up.
But in 4 years, will the magic that went with diversity hiring be enough of the past that the opportunities offered won't be inflated by the competition? We shall see.
And then, of course, there are those few who became engineers on Uncle Sam's nickel, had to pay that back with service, and decided they liked destroying bridges more than building them. (I mean, who wouldn't, right?)
Pete, I know you study history, you are an educated person. Riots have always been with us. If you draw a line from today to the Babylon empire they will be riots at every generation on your timeline. People riot. Look at Philly.
J6 was an attack on the nation’s government. The 1st and 2d people in the line of succession barely escaped murder. They are not the same.
I think the issue is the Federal resources applied in each situation. Yeah, DC is largely only ever going to be a Fed issue, but the nightly assault on the Portland Fed building didn't get a lot of resources other than hunker down and try to keep the perimeter wide enough the place didn't get torched.
How many Antifa and BLM protesters got rounded up and put in jail longer than overnight?
I cannot believe that they could not have applied the same techniques to that as they did to J6. So the question becomes: It's okay to burn down public property but not okay to frighten the people that are the problem? (Yeah, not that polar, not that simple, but it is illustrative.)
I could be wrong on all of this, but if there were many prosecutions and jailing of BLM and Antifa they were not well publicized like the J6. And it is that publicity that is the deterrent, not the jail time itself.
Which, of course, is an indication that it was never so much about Floyd or social justice as much as it was about countering the current national political agenda.
And that makes me wonder, where have all those street actors gone? Have the last 4 years lulled them into complacency?
I wanted to say, “Who was the Commander-in-Chief of said National Guard,” but here’s a bigger point.
Our constitution, flawed as it is, is premised on an egalitarian premise. The premise is that all men are created equal.
The problem with race-based decisions is that the compensatory decisions are as inequitable as the bigoted decisions which preceded them. Decisions made based on race are corrosive to a republic.
But, let’s be honest. We are a racist nation. But, we live in a world of racist nations, everyone is racist. We are struggling to be less racist, and have made considerable progress since 1565. So, let’s just stop with the elimination nonsense. DEI workers are our brothers and sisters too. We are all Americans.
That is hyperbole. J6 was a show of disgust with the government, the government will know if it is attacked. No one "barely escaped murder", not even Ashli Babbitt. Biden and Garland would love your bias.
"hunting down of anyone who participated these programs" is 100% justified if they have been doing so after ordered not to.
The Cdr's take is perfectly valid. If they did it before, then fine. Those were their orders. If they try to hide it or subvert it now, they need to be gone.
Mess Treasurer was a nightmare! It’s exactly like getting the DEI billet. Incomprehensible bullshit, where one wrong move could torpedo your career. That’s the perfect analogy.
Not every college graduate takes a class in accounting. Debits and Credits make no sense. "In the door and out the window," makes no sense. One of few departures from tradition that makes sense is abolishing this Mess Treasure nonsense.
Just as accounting can seem an arcane art to those unversed in the language, DEI uses words and phrases no untrained person can understand. Some might say they deliberately cloak their intentions. Critics can learn the language, but, most of us normal folks don't bother.
So, think of the MPA on a DD. Keeping a propulsion plant running is a full-time job. Handing him a "diversity" duty is a nightmare. If you go too hard, you are wrong, if you go too soft you are wrong. If the paragraph you were forced to write for the POD is wrong, you get called in the carpet. It is a nightmare. The only thing you can do is hang on, do your best, and make sure that when your term is up, you aren't on watch when the wardroom meets.
I never met a W-2 through O-3 who was a full on retard. If you got a "C" or better in 8th grade arithmetic or was ever an E-3 or O-1 able to balance his budget from payday to payday you were safe in that Mess Treasurer job. The worst part of it was the relentless criticism of the table condiments you did or did not buy, collecting the checks from one or two deadbeats, and enduring the eye rolls of the DISBO when he reviewed your record keeping. Fortunately, I'd just promoted from CWO3 to LTjg and the DISBO was an Ensign.
Mess Treasurer was no nightmare. It just sucked. Huge difference. A nightmare is when all your Motorola walkie-talkies getting stolen from a locked room, you discovering it at 0700 on a Saturday morning when you see the lock to the IC room had been popped with a bolt-cutter and you reporting it, insisting NIS be called and that the brow be secured and the ship searched. (That advice was not taken.) Then the JAGMAN investigation's first endorsement by the Squadron Commander was for NJP for the Officer whose signature was on the custody cards and that also being similarly endorsed all the way to DC. Months later, the Captain called BS and saved my career. Sorry, Tom, I see no perfect analogy in your post.
OK, you win. Every navalist should remember that it was the invention of double entry bookkeeping that allowed tiny Venice to have the premier navy for many centuries.
JO's get lots of sucky assignments, but, to those unversed in accounting, there was a lot of incomprehensible dialect in the proper keeping of books. I mean when you add money to an account, you "debit" it? Writing a check is a "credit?" WTF!?
I've read Derrida, so I have navigated incomprehensible garbage. The verbiage surrounding DEI, is unintelligible, as was accounting for me, so many years ago.
In my time, a cut lock on secured space would have resulted in a "security alert." The Gunner's Mates did not mess around.
I'm not sure if people really understand just how far reaching the Eye of Elon actually goes, but I can assure you that if issues like these are being openly discussed in venues like this one somebody is making notes and taking names.
SecDef's recent meeting with the academy heads was a shot across the bow. Be assured that even now bigger guns are already being trained on bigger targets.
Yes! I took that X post and the interesting photo and prominent spread of it on X as a very public warning that this divisive and soul crushing nonsense was to end immediately, and they'd be given one chance to do so and do it right. The faces on the screen better jump to it because they were the face of the institution. They will be the faces that are slapped for nonperformance, methinks.
True that. He's just built one of if not THE biggest ai-supporting computing facility in the country. It's not all sitting their trying to read burnt scrolls.
People really have no idea how much data is stored, read, sorted, categorized, ad tracked because "no one could do all that, and thy bother?"
Some "one" isn't. Some "thing" is, and has been for a while, and is getting exponentially more information and capability every day.
It must be terrifying to know they have your every email, text, bank transaction, phone call, plane ticket and even hidden gameboy convos saved and stored and it's just a matter of time before the AI machine goes WHIRRRRR and comes up with 3 lemons next to your name. I'm here for the perp walks! Like the kids say, Tick Tock MFers!
The down side is that as soon as they don't like YOU anymore they datamine until they find an offense. I think the sad truth of the huge volume of Federal, State, and local code is that everyone of us is a criminal, we just don't know it.
It is appalling that the services tasked with defending our country have embraced an ideology that has, as a core tenet, the notion that our country is not worth defending.
Not sure if that was sarcasm (I'm late to the CDR Salamander party), but if so, it wouldn't be the first time I was accused of being a master of the obvious. :-)
The problem with only using words to solve a problem is that other people will ignore or re-work your prose. The answer is action. Everyone filling one of the DEI billets and everyone that silently ignored their re-worded titles needs to be excised from the Navy.
Indeed... "Walk the plank," to borrow an old nautical expression. "Pour encourager les autres," to borrow from another point of nautical lore.
As you point out, the Navy has no seat at the table. If we think there will be a focus on the Navy over the next four years, we are fooling ourselves. I’m not going to fight the DEI war here, but imagine if all this effort and energy were applied to better manning, training and equipping our Sailors and Ships. I want to see an EO that will eliminate undermanned ships, subhuman living conditions in the shipyard, and build more ships.
Imagine if all the personal and professional capital that Admiral Guilday expended defending that racist Kendi was spent doing all the things you just mentioned.
While we're visiting other and alternative universes, imagine if Navy ships didn't have so much rust on them.
Or if they didn't spend all their time colliding at sea with other vessels. Cdr USS Harry S. Truman, you are needed at the bridge, sir!
Heh. To be fair--Port Said. Usually chaotic. Worse in reduced visibility.
I "quit" on the Navy when Ray Mabus decided to name the second John Lewis unrep ship as the "Harvey Milk" and the CNO didn't walk into Mabus' office and declare "over my dead body".
We've had gutless, spineless leadership far too long, and as my Mother used to tell me "the best way to lie is to tell half the truth, you can always remember the truth, but the lie will leave your memory quickly". USNA just lied and think SecDef office is too dumb to realize "the truth".
I dislike Mabus for getting rid of the meter made covers which made women look taller and slimmer. All in the name of DEI.
I had a medically retired FC2, who kept her bucket cover, as she saw it as a link back to the WAVES. Wants it to be at her funeral, and the family knows.
They are still permitted for wear but try getting one.
Can’t even order direct for the manufacturer. I was going to send that to my sailors.
The Navy WILL be the primary focus because of China, it must be.
Well, for the first few days. Then the Air Force will take over the fight while the navy is trying to find what contractor will send their ocean going tugs into a war zone and trying to convince the civilians on unarmed logistics ships to sail into the battle zone.
Who will be picking up the Navy and AF pilots in the drink? Hope the AF shark repellant is up to snuff.
Same people trying to pick up the survivors of the George Washington BG. Too bad we don't have any of those planes that can land on water.
Please see the above reply to Sicinnus.
The plan is to subcontract the Japanese Navy to assist in SAR ops to pick up our folks (pilots and sailors) from the sea using its excellent ShinMaywa US-2.
Apparently our Navy refuses to purchase any of the US-2's so we keep kicking that can down the road.
Nothing is resolved or repaired until the CNO is fired. Whether for cause or not is debatable. Then every single flag officer both USN and USMC need to put in their papers, retire. Stalin did it the violent way (was expensive) but until you pull this bunch of cowards and politicans wearing OUR uniforms out and off the line it doesn’t get fixed. These admirals and generals are not part of the problem they ARE the problem.
I vote for violent removal, heads on pikes too much?
Impalement.
Better, as I have argued before. It's hard to have a heroic death, squatting on a couple of feet of pine, with bodily fluids running down your legs...
Sometimes the old ways are best, lol
Tradition!!!
https://www.bing.com/videos/riverview/relatedvideo?q=tradition+song&mid=73A82056422ECE4E06AF73A82056422ECE4E06AF&FORM=VIRE
Charles you are absolute correct. I am wondering why Hegseth hasn’t cleaned out the JCS or fired the superintendent of USNA. No midshipman would make it past an honor board if they behaved like their sup.
The replacements need vetted first. We don't need knee jerk replacements, we need salty men willing to make decisions and act.
Agreed. No more Mad Dog Mattis.
Why hasn’t Admiral Lisa - the lady with a degree in journalism - been removed?
Looking to prove good cause. And making the case ironclad.
USS Harry Truman is a good cause.
Is she actually a problem...?
What part of what she put out fleet-wide is there to disagree with?
https://news.usni.org/2024/01/09/cno-franchettis-warfighting-priorities
While its easier to cut-off the head and let that serve as an example, I think we all know that there's a lot of roots and stems that need removal verses just a simple head-lopping.
The CO is responsible for the organization. If there are parts that are out of control and they don't act in a timely manner once they learn of it (or are too dense to discover it), then that's grounds for loss of confidence by the senior command levels.
I'm cool with giving her a chance. A mere 3.5 weeks from the ultimatum is not much time to get through the OODA loop. But this is clearly a command priority from the top so some focus needs to be applied. How long is long enough? Don't know, let's say by end of May.
She had her chance.
She became CNO on 2 Nov 2023, not on the date of her Happy Talk PR release of 27 Jan 2024.
The head of the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis, Maryland, says the school is "taking steps to close all agency Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Accessibility (DEIA) offices and end all DEIA-related contracts in accordance with President Trump’s executive orders," Why isn't the CNO axing the head of the USNA? "Taking steps" is weasel-wording, when what needed to be done was for the Head of the USNA to swing the ax right-effing-now. I have no confidence that the USNA can or will fix their OODA loop. Time for punishment drills on the grinder?
Too many people were beguiled with this from Lisa: https://nwcfoundation.org/cno-releases-priorities/
Fine words butter no parsnips.
lol I had not heard that phrase before. Definately applicable.
Let’s not forget the other service academies in New London and Kings Point. Even though they are not a part of DoD they are infected with the DEI virus.
I've heard rumors that Kings Point still has rainbow fingerpaintings hanging on some of the walls, presumably as motivational artwork. This, while that famous mural of Jesus touching the struggling sailors remains in a storage room, courtesy of the current Super. Just rumors, though... Have not set foot on site in a few yrs.
They might be Hunter masterpieces that were acquired at huge discounts.
Wild speculation, Pete. I'm about 37% certain that DOGE will kibosh that slander. ☺
Every Coastie I know is absolutely disgusted about their alma mater also.
Same as the Merchant Mariners, I believe.
Any bets on who is gonna by the next cno? I’d love to see a public ucmj with sec def and potus presiding. Insubordination by a flag officer is not only insidious, it’s something that needs to be publicly punished, just like tailhook, only better.
Start with Milley. Reduce him in rank to an O1
I don't think you can do that, but isn't there language about setting his retired grade at the last point he 'successfully served"
Isn't O-8 the lowest he can go?
Maybe just O-9, but it sends a message and puts stink on him. Fewer speaking engagements and Boards
Actually....
If he is retired, and I'm sure that's the case, he still has obligations. Recall him to active service, convene a GCM, bust him to E1, forfeit all pay and allowances and toss him in Leavenworth for 20 years.
except that SCOTUS previously ruled that GCMs were FEDERAL COURTS and that resulting verdicts were FEDERAL Felonies. And Biden already Pardoned him from all FEDERAL Prosecutions during that period.
States could bring charges for State crimes, and DOD could recall him and conduct some hearings and admonishment, but not Convict him for a Federal crime during that period.
Beyond that, and I'm not a JAG, I don't think Officers can get a "bust him to E1"?
Hmmm...here's a reference:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Courts-martial_of_the_United_States#Types_of_courts-martial
So yeah, you appear to be correct. Nor will a special or summary work.
Looks like the most you could do is make it a nuisance and give him a letter of reprimand (at least I think you can do that without a CM).
Probably can't mess with his retirement pay either.
Though I suppose you could send him out to command Thule or Adak weather stations for a couple years.
Without dragging out my textbooks, I'm pretty sure a GCM has the full gamut of options including death, but more notably reduction to E-1 for anyone, full forfeiture of pay and benefits, and imprisonment for years prior to dishonorable discharge. Penalties are codified in the UCMJ so limit the court as to punishment. And recalling someone to active duty just to send them to a CM is likely to be contested in itself. SFAIK, it's never been done.
No one above O-6 level should be allowed to be the next CNO.
Truly a national disgrace. How sad.
In several Navy related groups on Facebook I’m in there has been much wailing and gnashing of teeth over the end of the diversity programs. For some, it’s been the loss of the eval/fitrep bullet points. Others, the responses have been it does not affect the leadership requirements and charges. I’m in the don’t start the fight camp online, so just keep scrolling.
The current administration is not beholden to DC, and is firmly committed to knocking over rice bowls. Keep that in mind.
Yeah there is one particularly insufferable guy I keep stumbling across who uses words like "Trumpenproletariat" (as if that's a bad thing) and acts like the known world is about to come crashing down upon our heads because of the damage being done... we are headed for absolute ruin, he says! I roll my eyes and scroll on by. But the absolute contempt for those who believe differently and the rank condescension is appalling. And he is probably not alone.
In a macabre sort of way, I'm kind of glad that remnants of the True-Believer Left are still out & about, banging their tired old drumbeat. No... It's not admirable, not by a long shot. By comparison, at least those old Japanese jungle soldiers -- the ones who never surrendered and lived in caves for many decades -- presented a sense of duty and honor about them. But with Lefties? At this point they're just sorry husks, or call them absurd artifacts of another era, who remind us all of what our culture has finally transcended, and is now leaving behind.
I suspect many of the screeching DEI people were getting baksheesh from the USAID money laundry machine in the form of payments and their anger is because the spigot to that rancid flow is being shut off. So when I see people screaming about Elon and his DOGE cuts, I just assume those opposed to stopping the money waste are on the take. Those who don't see the poison of DEI but who made rank as a white male whatever seem to be fine with closing the gate after themselves. Yet they whine that Trump is ruining everything. No, he is fixing it before it is too late. DEI is a cancer that was killing our military. It will take a generation and a half to fix the damage. If at all.
At least they've found new "conservative" leaders to follow like Bolton and Cheney.
These neocons played us for suckers.
Imagine if we had spent our time and treasure preparing for China instead of (failed-)nation building.
I have not read of anyone rallying around either Bolton or Cheney. Both seem to be regarded as lepers by each side of the aisle. Maybe Billy Kristol has taken them under his wing.
lol
I suspect Cheney will be running for the hills when DOGE gets to the DOD. My guess is that as much waste and corruption we have seen between dems and the various DOS affiliates we're going to see between the GOP and DOD.
Hmmmm… Trumpenproletariat? Might it be the same fellow who the weekend before the election wrote “That half the country will vote for a terrible human being [Trump] says more about voters than it does him.” His contempt and condescension is for that part of America that provides most of our warriors. He must be appalled by the recent surge in military recruits since Trump was elected.
Maybe.. lol. Like, read the room, dude! Must be nice to be that lofty. Has he ever gotten his fingernails dirty? Was he ever passed over for anything for being a FWM?
For many of these people, "[Their] contempt and condescension is for that part of America that provides most of [America]."
I've been saddened to see (and hear, in some cases directly) that a number of my classmates, many who served well and honorably, have completely succumbed to TDS. NOTHING this administration does will be perceived as useful, good, or even legal. Some have even encouraged (online) "resistance" by federal employees.
Those disgust me. My legitimate military authority is derived from obedience to lawful orders issued under Article II, Section 2. All executive branch authority is derived from the Office of the President.
If you can be enthusiastic about putting women on ships, a long term bad idea that I've accepted, than you can accept it when the bureaucracy is in the sights of an elected official who has good reason to consider the leadership plotted against him.
Maybe they believe that the separation of the sovereign’s powers into three distinct branches of government allows individual freedom and personal liberty to flourish, and that a stronger executive is the road to tyranny. Cf. Charles I.
How does reducing the number of departments and personnel in the Executive Branch increase the power of the Executive?
Unelected bureaucrats should NOT think they have the power to overturn the will of the people as expressed through their elected President.
The number of departments and personnel in the Executive Branch is set by Congress. The Executive is to "faithfully" execute the laws passed by Congress.
If Congress wants to send condoms to Hamas, and they pass a Bill, then the President can either Veto the Bill or send condoms to Hamas.
Our system of government arose when folks threw off the yoke of a Monarch; both in 1776, but more importantly in 1642. Limiting the power of the sovereign led to the flourishing of humanity. Trump is trying to claw back power which Parlement determined belonged to the people on January 30, 1649. I believe that there are many conservatives who think Trump's decisions to unilaterally stop funding and administering programs which Congress determined should be funded and administered is wrong. Real conservatives honor the constitution. Article II, Section 3. explicitly provides that the President, “shall take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed.” "Shall," not "may," or "might," or "if he likes the Laws." Shall.
I'd like to see where Congress passed a law specifically allocating these expenditures.
That said, it is nonsensical to claim the executive is expanding its power by decreasing its personnel and spending. The DoGE initiative is the only potential for this Republic to escape the abyss
I love your optimism. I'm considering changing my user name to CatotheElderWasRight.
They can always retire or resign.
"The Supreme Court tried to block me from relieving student debt. But they didn't stop me."
The USNA even kept their DEI staff, just gave them new titles!
https://www.usna.edu/Engagement/staff/index.php
"The Engagement, Retention, and Equal Opportunity directly supports the Naval Academy's Strategic Imperative One: To recruit, admit, and graduate a diverse and talented Brigade of Midshipmen.”
In other words, DEI...
Very sad. Those idiots didn't even have the sense to change the words on the web page to avoid scrutiny, just changed the title of the page and republished.
I'm trying to remember, are there yardarms on the mast from the USS Maine?
In pictures, it lacks yards. I'm sure there are some BMs over at the NSA and YPs who could assist.
More useless desk jockeys vying for 'spending more time with their families'. Identify these clowns and either post them to Thule or offer them retirement
What happens when one extreme causes an opposite extreme? Sure, some of the rhetoric and programs got out of hand, especially after George Floyd.
DOD recognition of Black History Month on the other hand has been around since I first joined in 1974. Mostly it meant some posters going up on base and maybe a mention in the Plan of the Day. If it made some Black servicemembers feel welcome and that the team had their back, great.
Now we see an oppressive wipe-out and hunting down of anyone who participated these programs. Someone mentioned zampolit - this is looking like true ideological purging.
This week's insanity were the recruiting commands withdrawing from the Black Engineer of the Year awards because "black" Trumps "engineers" I guess. Why might they want to have visibility among a group of engineers and engineering students? Moronic.
https://www.military.com/daily-news/2025/02/10/military-drops-recruiting-efforts-prestigious-black-engineering-awards-event.html
I disagree. This is about eliminating policies that cause division in the ranks. First thing we learned in OCS and Bootcamp is that no one is special. "There is no racial bigotry here. I do not look down on niggers, kikes, wops or greasers. Here you are all equally worthless. And my orders are to weed out all non-hackers who do not pack the gear to serve in my beloved Corps. Do you maggots understand that?” ~ Gunnery Sergeant Hartman, USMC
"The Marines don't have any race problems. They treat everybody like they're black."
D J Chappie James, Jr
My version as a Drill Sergeant: "I only see Green!"
The only reason to have concern is some of our dark green and blue fellows don't float as well.
That’s genuinely funny.
Dude, I’ve been writing about this problems since the Bush43 presidency. It didn’t get bad after George Floyd, it just got worse.
George Floyd is the Horst Wessel of DEI
No songs though...I think.
Black National Anthem?
One could quibble with that. Lift Every Voice and Sing was composed 125 years ago. So well predates the current issues.
That's more like dredging up something Wagnerian for the occasion. Though nothing comes to mind that would be fitting, per se. But I'm by no means conversant on Wagner.
A Defense Intelligence Agency memo went out last week "pausing all events, activities . . and Special Observances" for two federal holidays, MLK Day and Juneteenth. These are federal holidays passed by the House and the Senate and signed into law by presidents.
There are some who oppose the MLK holiday because of MLK's personal peccadillos. Some oppose Juneteenth because they say Juneteenth is an arbitrary date out of several possible, even though it has had significance for black Americans for years. Other droolers oppose them because they oppose any civil rights or infringement on owning people or are virulent racists.
It was the judgment of our representative government that MLK's leadership, eloquence and heroism and the end of slavery in the USA were worthy of commemoration, like Memorial Day or Presidents' Day.
When you pick out two federal holidays which can't be acknowledged only because they involve black people, that's racism. Perhaps this is malicious or overenthusiastic compliance, but as far as I know the memo hasn't been amended. This is the extremism of which I speak.
Yes, I understand you want every particular identity an American might hold should be homogenized into some uniform American allegiance, but that's not how others feel about their own identity. Within the lives of tens of millions of Americans there was segregation, denial of voting rights, and Jim Crow. That creates allegiances and resentments that the polity felt it had to acknowledge. You were always opposed to Black History Month, ok I get it. But for most, it was either an comfort, an inspiration, an amusement, or a passing irritation. Personally, I was ok with all of it until the rhetoric strayed into collective guilt of white people, eg "white supremacy/privilege." But with doing things like banning official observation of MLK Day and Juneteenth, I'm seeing the point of Kendi and the "white supremacy" rhetoric.
NWC needs sweepers and a fresh water washdown too
Is black engineering different from white engineering? Do they have different standards to get a prize? What is going on here that they need their own special room to pat each other on the back?
Perhaps Female engineering is? I remember that bridge in Florida...
DEI engineering is.
I've known black and female engineers that were very good.
I agree. my comment was meant as humorous
Yeah, I recognized that, but I was on a comment roll and had to throw that out.
It's all good Drill SGT.
One has to spend time with Marines before the humor can be appreciated.
you sure you got the right thread? I would expect that response to my Chappie James quote
I don't particularly see a problem with canvassing at these events. However, the vast majority of blacks with in demand STEM degrees realize the juice ain't worth the squeeze and will go somewhere else. Military service just ain't on their radar.
It's what's going on after their accession that needs to be fixed.
Not true! The military does things nobody else can do. Many young, black men with STEM degrees would love to get a job where you can go fast and blow things up.
Trust me Tom, there's not much interest in that narrow demographic to commission.
Disagree. Many young men, of all races, can heed the call. Military service is also a life of adventure.
Not black males with stem degrees.
Last year I would have agreed. Well, for now too.
But in 4 years, will the magic that went with diversity hiring be enough of the past that the opportunities offered won't be inflated by the competition? We shall see.
And then, of course, there are those few who became engineers on Uncle Sam's nickel, had to pay that back with service, and decided they liked destroying bridges more than building them. (I mean, who wouldn't, right?)
Burning, looting and murdering is more than just getting out of hand.
Compare the treatment of BLM to J6.
Pete, I know you study history, you are an educated person. Riots have always been with us. If you draw a line from today to the Babylon empire they will be riots at every generation on your timeline. People riot. Look at Philly.
J6 was an attack on the nation’s government. The 1st and 2d people in the line of succession barely escaped murder. They are not the same.
I think the issue is the Federal resources applied in each situation. Yeah, DC is largely only ever going to be a Fed issue, but the nightly assault on the Portland Fed building didn't get a lot of resources other than hunker down and try to keep the perimeter wide enough the place didn't get torched.
How many Antifa and BLM protesters got rounded up and put in jail longer than overnight?
I cannot believe that they could not have applied the same techniques to that as they did to J6. So the question becomes: It's okay to burn down public property but not okay to frighten the people that are the problem? (Yeah, not that polar, not that simple, but it is illustrative.)
I could be wrong on all of this, but if there were many prosecutions and jailing of BLM and Antifa they were not well publicized like the J6. And it is that publicity that is the deterrent, not the jail time itself.
There were few if any mostly peaceful protesters prosecuted convicted or did time.
Cannot comment because that’s a local issue from a locality I know nothing about because it’s two mountain chains away. (Three ?)
As I remember, things quieted down a lot after Rittenhouse saddled up, and riots weren't needed after the election.
Which, of course, is an indication that it was never so much about Floyd or social justice as much as it was about countering the current national political agenda.
And that makes me wonder, where have all those street actors gone? Have the last 4 years lulled them into complacency?
It was a setup. One thin line of the NG would have held back any crowd.
I wanted to say, “Who was the Commander-in-Chief of said National Guard,” but here’s a bigger point.
Our constitution, flawed as it is, is premised on an egalitarian premise. The premise is that all men are created equal.
The problem with race-based decisions is that the compensatory decisions are as inequitable as the bigoted decisions which preceded them. Decisions made based on race are corrosive to a republic.
But, let’s be honest. We are a racist nation. But, we live in a world of racist nations, everyone is racist. We are struggling to be less racist, and have made considerable progress since 1565. So, let’s just stop with the elimination nonsense. DEI workers are our brothers and sisters too. We are all Americans.
The Speaker of the House is in charge of security of Capital Hill. The same person who publically ripped up Trumps SOTY speech.
No, she isn’t. The Speaker runs the Legislative Branch, they legislate. The President runs the Executive Branch.
Speak for yourself when it comes to being a racist.
DEI is Marxist claptrap. Diversity means dividing people into groups and setting them against each other.
Equity means payback not equality.
You are not included.
Dude, I’m on your side. Egalitarians believe in equal opportunity, not equal outcomes.
That is hyperbole. J6 was a show of disgust with the government, the government will know if it is attacked. No one "barely escaped murder", not even Ashli Babbitt. Biden and Garland would love your bias.
"hunting down of anyone who participated these programs" is 100% justified if they have been doing so after ordered not to.
The Cdr's take is perfectly valid. If they did it before, then fine. Those were their orders. If they try to hide it or subvert it now, they need to be gone.
Exactly. Consider the Division Officer who gets DEI handed to him as one of the 15 ancillary duties he’s given. He’s a pariah now?
Being DEI was more than being the wardroom mess treasurer. It was more akin to being a commissar.
Mess Treasurer was a nightmare! It’s exactly like getting the DEI billet. Incomprehensible bullshit, where one wrong move could torpedo your career. That’s the perfect analogy.
You got it backwards. The wardroom mess treasurer could not end the careers of senior officers for getting pronouns wrong.
Not every college graduate takes a class in accounting. Debits and Credits make no sense. "In the door and out the window," makes no sense. One of few departures from tradition that makes sense is abolishing this Mess Treasure nonsense.
Just as accounting can seem an arcane art to those unversed in the language, DEI uses words and phrases no untrained person can understand. Some might say they deliberately cloak their intentions. Critics can learn the language, but, most of us normal folks don't bother.
So, think of the MPA on a DD. Keeping a propulsion plant running is a full-time job. Handing him a "diversity" duty is a nightmare. If you go too hard, you are wrong, if you go too soft you are wrong. If the paragraph you were forced to write for the POD is wrong, you get called in the carpet. It is a nightmare. The only thing you can do is hang on, do your best, and make sure that when your term is up, you aren't on watch when the wardroom meets.
Sorry Tom. Bad analogies. You need accountants to run an organization. You don’t need diversity commissars. They ruin organizations.
I never met a W-2 through O-3 who was a full on retard. If you got a "C" or better in 8th grade arithmetic or was ever an E-3 or O-1 able to balance his budget from payday to payday you were safe in that Mess Treasurer job. The worst part of it was the relentless criticism of the table condiments you did or did not buy, collecting the checks from one or two deadbeats, and enduring the eye rolls of the DISBO when he reviewed your record keeping. Fortunately, I'd just promoted from CWO3 to LTjg and the DISBO was an Ensign.
Mess Treasurer was no nightmare. It just sucked. Huge difference. A nightmare is when all your Motorola walkie-talkies getting stolen from a locked room, you discovering it at 0700 on a Saturday morning when you see the lock to the IC room had been popped with a bolt-cutter and you reporting it, insisting NIS be called and that the brow be secured and the ship searched. (That advice was not taken.) Then the JAGMAN investigation's first endorsement by the Squadron Commander was for NJP for the Officer whose signature was on the custody cards and that also being similarly endorsed all the way to DC. Months later, the Captain called BS and saved my career. Sorry, Tom, I see no perfect analogy in your post.
OK, you win. Every navalist should remember that it was the invention of double entry bookkeeping that allowed tiny Venice to have the premier navy for many centuries.
JO's get lots of sucky assignments, but, to those unversed in accounting, there was a lot of incomprehensible dialect in the proper keeping of books. I mean when you add money to an account, you "debit" it? Writing a check is a "credit?" WTF!?
I've read Derrida, so I have navigated incomprehensible garbage. The verbiage surrounding DEI, is unintelligible, as was accounting for me, so many years ago.
In my time, a cut lock on secured space would have resulted in a "security alert." The Gunner's Mates did not mess around.
what's the Vegas line of the CNO and Superintendent of the USNA bring fired?
It probably tracks with the other GOFO FAFO two-step being conducted across the board. Same outcome is predictable.
Don't give orders that are understood, give orders that can't be misunderstood, and can people for casual disobedience.
Harry W: Good point.
I'm not sure if people really understand just how far reaching the Eye of Elon actually goes, but I can assure you that if issues like these are being openly discussed in venues like this one somebody is making notes and taking names.
SecDef's recent meeting with the academy heads was a shot across the bow. Be assured that even now bigger guns are already being trained on bigger targets.
Yes! I took that X post and the interesting photo and prominent spread of it on X as a very public warning that this divisive and soul crushing nonsense was to end immediately, and they'd be given one chance to do so and do it right. The faces on the screen better jump to it because they were the face of the institution. They will be the faces that are slapped for nonperformance, methinks.
True that. He's just built one of if not THE biggest ai-supporting computing facility in the country. It's not all sitting their trying to read burnt scrolls.
People really have no idea how much data is stored, read, sorted, categorized, ad tracked because "no one could do all that, and thy bother?"
Some "one" isn't. Some "thing" is, and has been for a while, and is getting exponentially more information and capability every day.
It must be terrifying to know they have your every email, text, bank transaction, phone call, plane ticket and even hidden gameboy convos saved and stored and it's just a matter of time before the AI machine goes WHIRRRRR and comes up with 3 lemons next to your name. I'm here for the perp walks! Like the kids say, Tick Tock MFers!
Yeah, that's the up side.
The down side is that as soon as they don't like YOU anymore they datamine until they find an offense. I think the sad truth of the huge volume of Federal, State, and local code is that everyone of us is a criminal, we just don't know it.
Unless you are Amish. Even then I'd bet your outhouse is not up to the local county building codes.
"Three Felonies A Day: How the Feds Target the Innocent"
I'm sure that time is much closer to the present than we'd hope.
So, "Orwell was right" about total surveillance, but you're ok with it but if you agree on their goals?
Where did I say I agree with it? It's happening regardless.
All Social Media is public communications anyway. Most people have willingly given up their privacy.
Elon is not the only one on Trump's team who monitors social media discussions.
Easy fix.....relieve the CNO and the Superintendent, immediately.
It is appalling that the services tasked with defending our country have embraced an ideology that has, as a core tenet, the notion that our country is not worth defending.
Ooh, very astute observation.
Not sure if that was sarcasm (I'm late to the CDR Salamander party), but if so, it wouldn't be the first time I was accused of being a master of the obvious. :-)
No, I actually liked it. If I don't like something you say you'll know. lol
Don't worry, if there's a problem, the commentators who have decades of Naval experience will point it out.
No shortage of feedback here, positive or negative.
I would welcome that.