He saved the worst for last.

“Our blood is cheaper than water.” Those are the words of one of many Iraqis outraged at Trump’s pardoning of former Blackwater contractors who’d been sentenced to life in prison for murdering fourteen Iraqi civilians in broad daylight in downtown Baghdad. The four were sentenced for the events that transpired on September 16th of 2007, where they executed 14 civilians, including small children, by firing upon the unsuspecting, unarmed victims with a hail of gunfire and even grenade launchers.

Ali Ninani was the youngest of the victims, at only nine years old. He had ran outside of his home shortly after 9 a.m. that day, chasing down his father, Mohammed Kinani, who was off to drive around the city as a chauffeur for the day. The two decided to go to the newly-built park in downtown Baghdad.

Ali was shot in the head and killed before he and his father ever made it to the park. He was murdered in broad daylight by two American Blackwater contractors. His father survived and would later testify, helping to put the contractors behind bars for the rest of their lives in 2014. Justice was served.

That was until President Trump began issuing the pardons that he’s currently handing out like candy. And even worse, he’s handing them out to the worst people conceivable. Child murderers? Really?

I know this deeply pains the millions of American service members who fulfilled their duties without murdering anyone. Millions of real military members entered into that exact same war zone and never resorted to murdering children.

One of my close friends was in the Army and served in Iraq for multiple tours. He recalls dangerous encounters with mobs of angry townsfolk who were armed with little more than sticks or stones. He remembers awaiting the orders from the chain of command before engaging. Sometimes, the command wasn’t given and he was ordered to stand down and not engage. You don’t shoot civilians. Doing so is a war crime. It’s the law.

In war, it’s not as simple as just shooting everything that moves, regardless of what shoot-em-up Hollywood movies make it seem like. There’s a very strict chain of command so no innocent civilians are accidentally shot. There are international laws that need to be followed at all times. There are rules in place to make sure that instances like the one that happened on September 16th of 2007 never happen.

And yet, here are these four men. Convicted. Sentenced. And now set free on a whim.

…and they weren’t even in the U.S. Military.

The offensiveness is overwhelming. While it may seem like a minor distinction to us civilians, many millions of Americans have served with dignity and honor and the entire name of the U.S. military was tarnished with the stroke of a pen this week. All of it just to free security contractors who’d been convicted of murdering innocent civilians.

Trump has eroded the good standing of the military that’s been hard-earned by countless men and women who’ve fought bravely, with humility and compassion, all in the name of being a provocateur by pardoning these four men.

And that was just the tip of the iceberg that would eventually rip a hole in the hull of the ship carrying Trump’s fraudulent care for veterans. And now, as the ship begins to sink, the Republican members of Congress have been forced to choose between the abandonment of the Trump's vessel or saving their own skins.

The final nail in the coffin of Trump’s pretend caring for veterans took place this week, as Trump finally carried out in action what he’d believed in word for practically his entire life. That Trump thinks our military vets are suckers and losers, stupidly sacrificing their lives to keep the world safe, to keep trade routes protected, and to maintain a geopolitical stronghold that dissuades other, arguably less-friendly world powers from filling the vacuum should they suddenly pull back to the United States.

A rare bipartisan bill landed on Trump’s desk this week, the military spending bill that funds, among other things, the U.S. military operations that sustain the defense of our nation, as well as the pay for military troops. And just yesterday, Trump vetoed it.

Now, military construction projects are at risk for grinding to a halt, government and military employees risk going without pay, and more — all because Trump wants to employ a scorched earth tactic and burn the fields as he retreats after being voted out of the Presidency.

So, let me get this straight. The Republican Party who’ve spent decades talking about how we need to “support our troops”, driving around with their Wounded Warrior bumper stickers, their VA and POW-MIA hats, and other military memorabilia, have now elected a man who refers to combat veterans as “suckers” and “losers,” a man who pardons child killers who tarnish the name of the U.S. military, and a man who strips the already-agreed-upon bipartisan bill that funds the very military that they profess to care more about than anyone else?

And worse than that, they tried to elect him twice?

Hold up. This is a lot to wrap my brain around. The Republican Party’s new leader is now waging an overt political war against the U.S. Military itself?What might cause him to do such a thing?

First, he’s upset that the government hasn’t eliminated section 230 from the U.S. penal code, a section that grants websites federal protections from lawsuits for the content that their user's post. Section 230 essentially can’t be repealed without breaking the Internet, as the vast majority of internet sites feature comments sections and user feedback. Trump said, quote:

“Your failure to terminate the very dangerous national security risk of Section 230 will make our intelligence virtually impossible to conduct without everyone knowing what we are doing at every step,”

Second, he’s angry that the military spending bill includes name changes for the military bases that are named after long-dead (and much traitorous) Confederates, people who fought in the American Civil War to preserve the institution of slavery and secede from the United States, tearing down the Republic as it stood.

This is the final stake that’s been driven through the heart of American veterans and the Republican Party is guilty by association. Destroying the name of U.S. Military while simultaneously holding up their pay and our defense spending so you can throw a tizzy tantrum is no bridge too far for Trump.

And you know what? The more I think about it, the more it makes sense. It all makes sense in the most bizarre, twisted, fucked up way thinkable.

It makes sense if you secretly believe that the United States has veered off course and become an “illegitimate government” as many in the Trump-leaning militia movements and right-wing political groups, including white nationalist groups, believe.

It makes sense if your subscription to the Trump identity is one that believes that the entire Democratic Republic and all of the American values are so irredeemably corrupted that you’d rather burn it to the ground and install an autocrat atop the ashes than try to fix things from within the political framework we’ve been granted. That’s what a lot of people wanted when they voted for him, isn’t it? Didn’t they clamor to “drain the swamp” and shake things up?

Doing politics is hard. It requires persuasion, convincing, reaching out, having conversations, and listening to others who see the world differently from you. The temptation is great for many to throw their hands up and say burn the whole society to the ground, or, at the very least, throw veterans and the U.S. military under the bus the moment you don’t get your way about something.

For many people in these crazy alt-right circles, militias exist because the military isn’t legitimate. Trump is president to drain the illegitimate swamp. Veterans who still support the system and who believe in the American experiment are indeed, suckers and losers in these people’s eyes, though they’ll often use another word — sheep. As a pejorative, of course.

That means that, for all the brandishing of American flags, all the talk of supporting the troops, all the speak of law and order, the same law and order that went out the window with the slew of inglorious pardons that Trump unleashed this week, at bottom, all of these things are just empty slogans, political tools with which many on the extreme right can get their way. It’s a song-and-dance on the creaky wooden stage of national politics, one that writes checks that are rendered null and void before the ink dries.

And the moment this certain subset of our population is needed to put their money where their mouths are, they can be counted on to elect leaders who don’t give a damn about the military, who call them suckers and losers, and who will strip their funding at a moment’s notice for personal reasons.

What I see when I look at the Republican Party is a party that can’t decide whether it likes America or not — or her veterans.

Thank you for reading. Feel free to follow me on Twitter and sign up for my newsletter.

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