Pete Hegseth Should Have Told The Truth Instead of Deflecting

Oh, Pete Hegseth, this could’ve ended very easily. 

All he — our nation’s defense secretary — had to do when asked how The Atlantic editor-in-chief, Jeffrey Goldberg, was added to a highly sensitive war room group chat was say, “I don’t know how that happened, but we are looking into it.” 

Hell, he could’ve blamed Canada — since they are our new enemy — if he just needed to lie about something. 

But Pete Hegseth, he of the tacky medieval tattoos and resume befitting a grocery bagger at Save A Lot, took to the airwaves to claim that Goldberg is a “deceitful and highly discredited so-called-journalist who’s made a profession of peddling hoaxes time and time again.”

And this is after the administration confirmed that the war room group chat leak absolutely happened. 

If that wasn’t bad enough, Hegseth attributed “the hoax of Russia, Russia, Russia,” “the fine people on both sides hoax,” “the suckers and losers hoax” all to Goldberg, who is currently trying to figure how being added to the White House war room group chat turned into a bashing of his bonafides.

But such is life in the drama-filled White House that won’t stop lying, deflecting, or blaming everyone besides those with access to add people to the group chat. And Hegseth has to know that there are screenshots of said text messages all over the internet. 

But why let facts get in the way of some good ole fact-checking? 

Russia, Russia Russia

So Pete Hegseth claims Jeffrey Goldberg is responsible for the “Russia, Russia, Russia hoax.” 

The NewsOne lie detector test determined that is a lie. Trump and Russia go together. Real bad. Trump has so many connections to Russia that Politico had to list them in seven different categories. That’s right; during his first term in office, Trump had so many folks in his cabinet and administration who were connected to Russia that Russian President Vladimir Putin considered the White House his second home. Fine, he didn’t, but he did leave his bonnet and toothbrush there. 

There were so many stories about Trump and Russia that Trump took to CPAC in 2019 and claimed that everything was “Russia, Russia, Russia” and it was all a hoax. But Goldberg was not credited with anything relating to Russia and Trump, and there is no hoax.

Fine people on both sides

Unless Trump is a dummy (I mean we know that he’s a dummy but not that kind of dummy) and someone is moving his mouth, then all of us who witnessed Trump say there are very fine people on both sides after a 2017 white nationalist protest in Charlottesville, Va., are bugging. White nationalists stormed Charlottesville upset that a statue of Confederate General Robert E. Lee was going to be removed. A melee ensued, and one woman was left dead. 

That’s right; people who wanted to keep a statue representing slavery became violent with those who wanted the statue taken down, and in the end, they actually killed someone. A day after the fracas, Trump gave a speech inside Trump Tower and claimed with his rectum-shaped mouth that “there are very fine people on both sides” which was puzzling for many people who thought, “but one side is made up of white nationalists.”

Revisionist historians — or as we call them, Republicans — have tried to reframe the conversation to claim that the statement was taken out of context. And what does Jeffrey Goldberg have to do with any of this? Not a damn thing. The Atlantic did write a few pieces on the subject including, “Trump Defends White-Nationalist Protesters: ‘Some Very Fine People on Both Sides‘” and “The President’s Pursuit of White Power” but everyone was writing these kinds of pieces because, and let me say it slow for the people in the back, the president said it. 

Suckers and Losers

Ok, this claim might have legs. I guess The Atlantic reached out to the president for an interview, and instead of just denying the request, Trump took to Truth Social to berate the magazine for even asking. 

He called The Atlantic a “Third Rate Magazine,” and claimed that they made up the “‘Suckers and Losers’ Hoax about me and the Military, and refused to even acknowledge the vast horde of people who emphatically denied this FAKE STORY,” Trump wrote, The Hill reports. 

Trump was referring to an article written by Jeffrey Goldberg, which claimed that Trump referred to Americans who died in the war as “Losers” and “Suckers”. 

This all happened back in 2018 when Trump was supposed to visit the Aisne-Marne American Cemetery near Paris, and he cancelled the visit because he was concerned that the rain would mess up his hair. He later added, “Why should I go to that cemetery? It’s filled with losers.” He would also call the fallen soldiers “suckers” for being killed. 

Trump’s been denying the claims ever since they were printed, but which is more likely: that a lying president is lying again or a journalist, whose reputation is built on reporting only what they can prove, told the truth?

The president is a notoriously famous draft dodger, and has a history of being caught making wildly inappropriate comments. 

Just remember, all of this could have been nipped in the bud if the secretary of defense had fallen on his sword, but why do that when you can pick the sword up and cut people down with lies? 

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