{"id":11232,"date":"2023-07-19T14:43:53","date_gmt":"2023-07-19T14:43:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/lonecandle.com\/?p=11232"},"modified":"2023-07-19T14:43:53","modified_gmt":"2023-07-19T14:43:53","slug":"the-far-rights-war-on-woke-has-real-world-consequences-for-the-military","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/?p=11232","title":{"rendered":"The far right\u2019s war on \u201cwoke\u201d has real-world consequences for the military"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\n\n“Alabama Sen. Tommy Tuberville has held up the confirmation of more than 260 generals for new command posts \u2014 including members of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the head of the Marine Corps \u2014 over his objections to the Pentagon\u2019s abortion<\/a> policy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Tuberville, a former football coach who is closely allied with former President Donald Trump<\/a>, has refused to go forward with the routine confirmations and is essentially using defense policy as leverage to promote his cultural ideology. But the Department of Defense has repeatedly warned that holding up the confirmations is damaging the military\u2019s chain of command at the highest levels, including the Joint Chiefs of Staff<\/a> \u2014 especially concerning amid a time of increasing tension between the US and China<\/a>, and as the US supports Ukraine against Russia<\/a>\u2019s invasion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThese are our nominees who have incredibly important jobs all around the world, who are working with our partners and allies,\u201d Deputy Pentagon Press Secretary Sabrina Singh said in an interview with Fox News Thursday<\/a>. \u201cAnd it sends a message to our adversaries.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Any senator can hold up these confirmations, even if the other 99 wish to move forward with them, because of the Senate concept of unanimous consent<\/a>, which is not a formal Senate rule but allows the body to make changes to regular order to expedite legislating such as allowing batch confirmations<\/a>. Unanimous consent<\/a> can apply to all different parts of the Senate\u2019s legislative process \u2014 everything from limiting debates and amendments to scheduling votes \u2014 and essentially means that the body has decided to dispense with the Senate\u2019s usual procedures in the interests of moving business forward. It\u2019s not always part of the legislative process, but it\u2019s used so often that there are rules and precedents surrounding it<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Senate has long relied on unanimous consent to promote military personnel through batch confirmations, but with Tuberville\u2019s hold, the only way to move the confirmations forward would be to vote on them one by one, through regular order. Sen. Jack Reed, a Democrat from Rhode Island and the chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, told the Associated Press<\/a> that doing so would take up to 84 days with the chamber working regular, eight-hour days, or 27 days if they worked \u201caround the clock.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Tuberville\u2019s hold, which could affect 650 military promotions by the year\u2019s end, is based on a misrepresentation of how the Pentagon\u2019s abortion policy works. And he isn\u2019t the only Republican usinglegislation related to the military to force right-wing policies<\/a> into defense policy. House Freedom Caucus members scored a victory this week when the House passed a version of the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) that included amendments limiting abortion, LGBTQ<\/a>+ rights, and diversity, equality, and inclusion programs. \u201cThis bill has been transformed into an extremist manifesto,\u201d House Minority Whip Katherine Clark told CNN<\/a> after the bill passed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In a macro sense, right-wing Republicans\u2019 push to undo progress in the DoD both echoes and foreshadows their intent to halt the business of governing to try to codify policies that many Americans don\u2019t support. And on a more specific scale, it affects the overall functioning of the military \u2014 everything from funding, to the chain of command, down to military families trying to plan moves to new bases. Tuberville and House Freedom Caucus members are also breaking with decades of Republican tradition by failing to support the military and military policy.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

https:\/\/www.vox.com\/2023\/7\/16\/23793775\/republican-wokeness-pentagon-military-tuberville<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

“Alabama Sen. Tommy Tuberville has held up the confirmation of more than 260 generals for new command posts \u2014 including members of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the head of the Marine Corps \u2014 over his objections to the Pentagon\u2019s abortion policy.
\nTuberville, a former football coach who is closely allied with former President Donald Trump, has refused to go forward with the routine confirmations and is essentially using defense policy as leverage to promote his cultural ideology. But the Department of Defense has repeatedly warned that holding up the confirmations is damaging the military\u2019s chain of command at the highest levels, including the Joint Chiefs of Staff \u2014 especially concerning amid a time of increasing tension between the US and China, and as the US supports Ukraine against Russia\u2019s invasion.<\/p>\n

\u201cThese are our nominees who have incredibly important jobs all around the world, who are working with our partners and allies,\u201d Deputy Pentagon Press Secretary Sabrina Singh said in an interview with Fox News Thursday. \u201cAnd it sends a message to our adversaries.\u201d<\/p>\n

Any senator can hold up these confirmations, even if the other 99 wish to move forward with them, because of the Senate concept of unanimous consent, which is not a formal Senate rule but allows the body to make changes to regular order to expedite legislating such as allowing batch confirmations. Unanimous consent can apply to all different parts of the Senate\u2019s legislative process \u2014 everything from limiting debates and amendments to scheduling votes \u2014 and essentially means that the body has decided to dispense with the Senate\u2019s usual procedures in the interests of moving business forward. It\u2019s not always part of the legislative process, but it\u2019s used so often that there are rules and precedents surrounding it.<\/p>\n

The Senate has long relied on unanimous consent to promote military personnel through batch confirmations, but with Tuberville\u2019s hold, the only way to move the confirmations forward would be to vote on them one by one, through regular order. Sen. Jack Reed, a Democrat from Rhode Island and the chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, told the Associated Press that doing so would take up to 84 days with the chamber working regular, eight-hour days, or 27 days if they worked \u201caround the clock.\u201d<\/p>\n

Tuberville\u2019s hold, which could affect 650 military promotions by the year\u2019s end, is based on a misrepresentation of how the Pentagon\u2019s abortion policy works. And he isn\u2019t the only Republican using legislation related to the military to force right-wing policies into defense policy. House Freedom Caucus members scored a victory this week when the House passed a version of the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) that included amendments limiting abortion, LGBTQ+ rights, and diversity, equality, and inclusion programs. \u201cThis bill has been transformed into an extremist manifesto,\u201d House Minority Whip Katherine Clark told CNN after the bill passed.<\/p>\n

In a macro sense, right-wing Republicans\u2019 push to undo progress in the DoD both echoes and foreshadows their intent to halt the business of governing to try to codify policies that many Americans don\u2019t support. And on a more specific scale, it affects the overall functioning of the military \u2014 everything from funding, to the chain of command, down to military families trying to plan moves to new bases. Tuberville and House Freedom Caucus members are also breaking with decades of Republican tradition by failing to support the military and military policy.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[542,259,1146,865,1280],"class_list":["post-11232","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-article-share","tag-congress","tag-military","tag-right-wing","tag-senate","tag-woke"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11232","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=11232"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11232\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11233,"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11232\/revisions\/11233"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=11232"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=11232"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=11232"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}