On Monday, President Donald Trump was asked if he planned to deploy members of the U.S. Marine Corps to quell the violence in Los Angeles. “We’ll see what happens,” he said. “I think we have it very well under control.”
As usual, Trump was either unaware or didn’t care that he contradicted himself by ordering the deployment anyway.
Nor is it surprising that Sen. Dan Sullivan’s immediate instinct was to escape into an elevator to avoid responding to a reporter’s questions about it. Only later in a statement issued by his office was he willing to back Trump’s actions.
And once again, when it comes to the rule of law, Sen. Lisa Murkowski is the last conservative in Congress standing.
“Our laws say exactly that,” she told Alaska Public Media’s Liz Ruskin. “Our military are to be used to protect us from foreign threats, but not within our own country.”
Let’s add honesty and humility to conservative values demolished by Trump.
No, L.A. has not “been invaded and occupied by Illegal Aliens and Criminals,” as he wrote on his social media site that’s dedicated to his endless stream of lies.
On Tuesday, he repeated that to soldiers at Fort Bragg who, according to Military.com, had been screened “based on political leanings and physical appearance.”
He also bragged about “setting the strongest peacetime recruiting records ever.” And because he has to make everything about him, he added “six months ago, we couldn’t recruit anybody to join the military.”
Enlistment did fall short of its goals in 2022 and 2023. But not in 2024 after a new strategy was implemented.
A 2023 article published in The US Army War College Quarterly exposes the other half of that lie.
“First and foremost, recruitment problems are the norm, not the exception,” Brian McAllister Linn wrote. “Nostalgic references to a golden age where Americans were fit, patriotic, and motivated have been a staple of Army lore for well over a century, but they hardly reflect historical reality.”
By itself, that could all be passed off as the embellishments of an egotistical politician. But the problem is Trump acts like the military exists to serve his political agenda.
As a candidate, he openly mused that “the enemy from within” could be “easily handled by, if necessary, by National Guard, or if really necessary, by the military.” And he directed that term at two prominent Democrats in Congress.
Now, he’s referring to any America who protests at this weekend’s $40 million military parade as “people who hate our country” and said they will be “met with very big force.”
If Kamala Harris had won the election last November and ordered a parade to honor the U.S. Army’s 250 birthday, Sullivan and Rep. Nick Begich III would have been right to compare her to Vladimir Putin, Xi Jinping and Kim Jong Un. And if she implied that force would be used against protestors, they might have evoked the Tiananmen Square massacre.
But they’re letting Trump sweep away the guardrails that have kept politics out of the military throughout American history.
“It’s called the checks and balances,” Murkowski said in April referencing the constitutional design intended to prevent any branch of government from accumulating too much power. “And right now we are not balancing as the Congress.”
At the time, she could have been referring to Trump’s tariffs, defiance of the judiciary, upending of our European alliances, and overt political retribution.
More memorable from that day was her candid answer when asked about the fears of her constituents.
“We are all afraid,” she replied, noting after a brief pause that we’re “in a time and a place where I certainly have not been here before.”
That statement reflects a conservative humility rooted in tradition, stability, and the law of unintended consequences.
“Donald Trump, of course, is leading the competition in his complete lack of humility,” Harper West, a licensed psychotherapist and award-winning author, recently wrote. She goes on to explain that “humility is an essential emotion and cognition that tells us when we are out of our depth.”
Republicans are collectively out of their depth. They can make believe they have full confidence in Trump’s prescription for fixing what they think is wrong in America. But they have no idea where the king of hubris is leading them.
• Rich Moniak is a Juneau resident and retired civil engineer with more than 25 years of experience working in the public sector. Columns, My Turns and Letters to the Editor represent the view of the author, not the view of the Juneau Empire. Have something to say? Here’s how to submit a My Turn or letter.
