Summary

Donald Trump’s appointment of John Phelan, a private investment firm chairman with no military experience, as Secretary of the Navy has sparked backlash from some of his supporters on Truth Social.

Many pro-Trump users, including veterans, criticized the pick as rewarding a donor or friend instead of selecting someone with Navy experience.

Some expressed feelings of betrayal, accusing Trump of abandoning their values and making decisions that harm the nation.

The move has raised questions about qualifications and loyalty among his base.

  • TransplantedSconie@lemm.ee
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    14 days ago

    These veterans not read project 2025 and realize they are about to lose their benefits?

    Zero sympathy for them. I feel bad for the veterans who saw through the bullshit.

    • MrVilliam@lemmy.world
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      14 days ago

      This is the most terrifying part. They say that he’s “liberated” now, but to me that just means he has nothing to lose. Assuming he lives past January 2029, he has nothing to lose and everything to gain by throwing all resources into staying in power. He has no reason to give a fuck about whether anything he does or says is “popular” once he’s sworn in. There will be zero consequences for anything until he leaves office, if he leaves office.

      The dumb motherfucker proved that somebody with the mentality of a six year old can win the US presidency and then do whatever the fuck he wants, and he’ll never face a single, real, goddamn consequence. I am ashamed of my country, and it’s horribly depressing how many people died serving our military just to have this flag-hugging dipshit get to be the commander in chief, and he’ll sell out to the highest bidders and get several more killed.

      We’re fucked, and only a small fraction of his worshipers are even beginning to see that. And when the shit hits their fan specifically, most of them will find a way to blame somebody else, probably somebody who is brown and/or has a vagina. Most of these incurious assholes will line up for whatever strong daddy negs them hard enough, and right now that’s trump, and there will be a new strong daddy successor to tell them what to do and who to love and how to dress. Strong daddy hurts you and controls you, but at least you don’t have to make decisions for yourself when you have strong daddy there to tell you what to think.

      Fucking pathetic.

      • SkyNTP@lemmy.ml
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        14 days ago

        Even dictators need public support. This is a fundamental truth about leadership, that even Trump can’t escape. Those that don’t tend to have a short life expectancy.

          • WhatAmLemmy@lemmy.world
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            13 days ago

            The support of the military and corporations are far more important than the people. Authoritarians have been using the military and corpos to oppress the people for centuries.

            • nomous@lemmy.world
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              13 days ago

              And I think it’s clear to most of us that Trump doesn’t control the corpos but the opposite, they control him.

              He’s not going to skip any opportunity to enrich himself. Deregulate and sell is going to be their mantra, shit is going to get so bad over the next few deacdes. I wonder if America will even be recognizable in a century.

      • Serinus@lemmy.world
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        14 days ago

        He’ll be out after his four years. The important parts for him were grifting and escaping consequences. He’ll have accomplished that, even after he leaves office.

        The damage he’ll do in the meantime…

        • KairuByte@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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          14 days ago

          I think k you missed the part where he unironically wants to “run for a third term.” And has literally every check and balance in his pocket.

          • Serinus@lemmy.world
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            14 days ago

            He’s not going to win a third term. And he won’t be able to cheat into a third term. I’m not concerned about that.

            I’m concerned about A. the damage this term, and B. the smarter version that follows a similar playbook.

            However, you have to be pretty fucking dumb to be the President of the United States and still feel like you have any obligations to Russia. You tell the CIA what you fucking did, and they take care of it. What is he worried about, the pee tape getting out? Just call it fake news like he has literally everything else. It doesn’t matter how much evidence there is. It never matters how much evidence there is. People follow him anyway.

            • Pelicanen@sopuli.xyz
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              14 days ago

              He’s not going to win a third term. And he won’t be able to cheat into a third term. I’m not concerned about that.

              Oh buddy, haven’t you been paying attention? Disenfranchising voters and rejecting unfavorable election results has been one of their biggest priorities.

            • Laurel Raven@lemmy.zip
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              13 days ago

              He’s not going to win a third term. And he won’t be able to cheat into a third term. I’m not concerned about that.

              The number of times he’s flown right past that, things he’s said or done that were guaranteed to lose him the election, or get him impeached and removed from office, or at least lose support among his base or Congress, or get him prosecuted, or or or…

              Yeah, at this point, I’m not betting anything or anyone will realistically stop him.

              And if you’re betting on the Constitution blocking him from running again, remember that him being inaugurated is already a violation of the Constitution as an instigator of insurrection against the US government. Nobody is going to stop him. Do you really think it’ll be different in '28? After 4 years of no longer solidifying but outright cementing his judiciary at all levels he can seat? With an executive branch that’s been purged of non-loyal employees?

              He’s been underestimated at every step, except for the 2020 election, the one time he’s truly lost anything. So you really think underestimating him now and expecting norms and laws to keep him in check when they’ve literally never done so is a good idea?!?

  • fuzzyspudkiss@midwest.social
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    14 days ago

    If you still voted for Trump after 2016-2020 and Jan 6th then you deserve what you get. Welcome to the find out stage, it just sucks that I have to be here with you.

  • agent_nycto@lemmy.world
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    14 days ago

    Dude said that dead soldiers were losers abd disrespected the Arlington cemetery and they are surprised by this one?

  • Laurel Raven@lemmy.zip
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    14 days ago

    Some expressed feelings of betrayal, accusing Trump of abandoning their values and making decisions that harm the nation.

    If only someone could have predicted this and warned them, over and over, for years…

    • CharlesDarwin@lemmy.world
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      14 days ago

      They were probably focused on things like how the wimmenz and the tranz were hurting the military. Or something. Or at least the thin-skinned cishet xtian rightwing white male incel’s feelings, anyway…

      • floofloof@lemmy.ca
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        14 days ago

        One disturbing thing about this election was how many people in the groups Trump promised to victimize went and voted for Trump.

        • CharlesDarwin@lemmy.world
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          14 days ago

          I noticed that the “but mah inflation” narrative even worked on people that could otherwise afford the increases from corporate price-gouging disguised as “inflation” just fine.

          Some of these same had to admit that their 401K still went up and up the past few years, even as they bitched about how the Democrats/Biden were “destroying the economy”.

          I just cannot explain how people that were not really feeling it from “inflation” and are at risk from the qons could vote for donvict. It just makes no sense, except in the case that some of them expect to get more handouts aimed at the rich, and/or they think they are one of the “good ones” and the qons will not harm them.

    • eluminx@lemmy.world
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      13 days ago

      I hate myself for laughing so hard at these type of news, but it is what it is. The next 4 years will have so many articles with similar titles. I will keep crying and laughing all the same!

  • Clinicallydepressedpoochie@lemmy.world
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    14 days ago

    Every criticism of trumps cabinet picks are 100% for a fact over stated. I know the average Republican and they do not give a fuck. They won’t be satisfied until Trump crowns himself king.

    • Railcar8095@lemm.ee
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      14 days ago

      King? Do I have you remind you there’s Trump fanart as Warhammer’s God-Emperor of humankind? Leader of the in canon Fascist army of warhammer 40K?

      Not that there’s a good army (orks maybe?)

      • greedytacothief@lemmy.world
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        13 days ago

        I wonder if they thought picking Big E to represent trump was ironic or not. Because the emperor made a bunch of mistakes that made everything a whole lot worse for a whole bunch of people. Like this is dystopian fiction we’re talking about.

        The orks are good, but only from their moral lens. Fighting=good, green=good, gits=bad, krumping gits=good. The only reason we think of them is good is because there’s a lot of information on orc psychology, whereas we see the other races as more or less human instead of the aliens that they are.

        Fuck i should help make the Warhammer communities here more active

        • nomous@lemmy.world
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          13 days ago

          As someone who doesn’t play the game or paint the minifigs or really interact with the franchise in any way at all, I really enjoy the lore and world building involved.

        • bestboyfriendintheworld@sh.itjust.works
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          13 days ago

          It’s post ironic edgy. Too many levels of irony and seriousness. It’s ridiculous. They know it’s ridiculous and are having a lot of fun pretending it’s serious and laugh at those upset by it.

  • Rentlar@lemmy.ca
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    14 days ago

    What the hell were any Trump-voting servicemembers expecting? That Harris and Walz were making stuff up when they brought up time after time how much Trump hates servicemembers and his country if they get in the way of his needs?

    • Screamium@lemmy.world
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      14 days ago

      I think it’s pretty obvious they never heard a thing any democrat ever said, only what right wing media SAYS that ‘the libs’ are saying or doing

    • Soulg@sh.itjust.works
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      That Harris and Walz were making stuff up

      Yes. They thought it was all a lie to make Trump look bad.

      • Raiderkev@lemmy.world
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        14 days ago

        To be fair, there was only ironclad fucking evidence to back it up, and reading isn’t their strong suit.

    • CharlesDarwin@lemmy.world
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      They were only focused on the parts where he talked about how he’d be “hurting the people he needs to be” hurting.

  • Don Escobar@lemmy.world
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    14 days ago

    I call bullshit on this, if anyone loves to advertise his goods is this cat. You knew what you were buying, fuck you.

    • Tinidril@midwest.social
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      14 days ago

      Most of what Trump says is complete bullshit though. In the 2016 campaign he supported universal healthcare.

      I don’t think anyone has any idea what specific horrors Trump will unleash in this time, but it should be obvious to anyone that it will be horrors.

  • A_Random_Idiot@lemmy.world
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    13 days ago

    next 4 years are gonna be made much more tolerable from watching all the conservative bleating and handwringing about “HE WASNT SUPPOSED TO DO THAT. HE WAS SUPPOSED TO HURT THE NOT-MES!”

  • Jesus@lemmy.world
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    Almost everyone he appointed is a shady political insider or a rich guy. He’s draining the swamp water so he can fill the hole with nuclear waste.

    • CharlesDarwin@lemmy.world
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      And to the donvict cultists, what they call a “swamp” is actually a set of people that are experts and/or long-term public servants - something they’ve been trained to bray is a “bad” thing - calling them “elitists” (a perversion of the term) and yelling about “term limits”… instead, they’d apparently rather have a bunch of “outsiders”, which means - incompetent grifters and/or enemy agents looking to weaken this country for the benefit of the likes of Putin.

    • dondelelcaro@lemmy.world
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      14 days ago

      Though usually they appoint them to ambassador to a ally like France or England or somewhere else cushy with minimal political impact.