How would you protect someone like Vindman from that kind of retaliation? Would you force the MAGA crowd to wash his feet? He's also benefited- I was surprised and delighted to see him on an episode of Curb your Enthusiasm
We were talking about protections from prosecution which Snowden absolutely had.
> How would you protect someone like Vindman from that kind of retaliation?
Realistically, there is nothing rule-based that I can think of in the US that would protect someone like Vindman. He probably knew that.
The protection has to be from a system of shared beliefs about what is ethical and appropriate.
Trump’s whole campaign and strategy (love it or hate it) was to completely dumpster that idea.
There could be an interesting discussion about the merits and demerits of disrupting the existing system of shared beliefs that was in place when Trump was elected (I would actually welcome that), but Trump mostly (if not entirely) just used the opportunity to feed his narcissism.
> Would you force the MAGA crowd to wash his feet?
Totally uncalled for.
A simple solution would be things like:
- Don’t block his career for petty politics. The problem is that Trump specifically was all about retaliation and petty politics. I think most of the folks around him gave guidance not to do these sorts of petty things, but that was his style.
- Own your mistakes. Again, I don’t think this was Trump’s strong suit.
- Factor in the bigger picture when making decisions. Vindman, if my read on his career is correct, is precisely the type of person we need more of in the upper officer ranks. Tanking his career was bad for Vindman, but worse for the country, imho. That’s just short-sightedness.
We were talking about protections from prosecution which Snowden absolutely had.