Open Thread

What’s on your mind?

Comments

[Mr. Bumble]

Omar married her brother.
Prove me wrong.

[not guilty]

Professor Jack Goldsmith has written about the indefensible nature of Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth's reported spoken directive about the September 2 strike against the survivors of the initial strike on a boat in the Carribbean Sea. “The order was to kill everybody,” per the Washington Post. https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2025/11/28/hegseth-kill-them-all-survivors-boat-strike/

Professor Goldsmith points out that Section 5.4.7 of the DOD Law of War Manual says:

Prohibition Against Declaring That No Quarter Be Given. It is forbidden to declare that no quarter will be given. This means that it is prohibited to order that legitimate offers of surrender will be refused or that detainees, such as unprivileged belligerents, will be summarily executed. Moreover, it is also prohibited to conduct hostilities on the basis that there shall be no survivors, or to threaten the adversary with the denial of quarter. This rule is based on both humanitarian and military considerations. This rule also applies during non-international armed conflict.

[Emphasis added.]

If the Washington Post story is correct, Hegseth and the Special Operations commander overseeing the Sept. 2 attack, from Fort Bragg in North Carolina, Adm. Frank M. “Mitch” Bradley, deserve to be prosecuted for murder in violation of 18 U.S.C. §§ 2 and 1111(b) and for violation of 18 U.S.C. § 956(a)(1) (making it a felony to conspire within the United States “to commit at any place outside the United States an act that would constitute the offense of murder … if committed in the special maritime and territorial jurisdiction of the United States” if “any of the conspirators commits an act within the jurisdiction of the United States to effect any object of the conspiracy”).

[Mr. Bumble]

Get back to us when the Post (and any other news outlets, right or left) publish stories with named sources.

[Commenter_XY]

https://www.breitbart.com/border/2025/11/28/hegseth-weve-only-just-begun-to-kill-narco-terrorists-proclaims-cartel-war-entered-new-phase/

Well NG, I don't think SecWar Hegseth got Goldsmith's memo, nor does he particularly give a shit what WaPoop has to write.

"We have only just begun to kill narco-terrorists." -- SecWar Hegseth

Contact your Senators and Congresscritter. See what they think. 😉

[Kazinski]

Pentagon Spokesman Sean Parnell said they told the WAPO the story was fake before they printed it.

https://x.com/SeanParnellUSA/status/1994556986768155105?s=20

[not guilty]

And just who does Mr. Parnell report to? What would you expect him to say?

For that matter, President Clinton shook his finger, bit his lip and solemnly declared, "I did not have sexual relations with that woman, Miss Lewinsky."

Merely issuing a self-serving statement doesn't make something so.

[Commenter_XY]

This one is a head scratcher.

The Cauliflower and the Autopen.

Can POTUS Trump actually undo The Cauliflower's actions authorized by Autopen, based on The Cauliflower being unaware of what was being forged signed with his signature?

I don't think POTUS Trump can. I would only counsel that one day, the shoe will be on the other foot, and a future POTUS might do the same. It isn't a good idea.