The Guardian is all over new details, exploding out of I Alone Can Fix This, by Carol Leonnig and Philip Rucker, which was also reported by New York magazine on Wednesday. To say that Chairman of the Joint Chiefs General Mark Milley and the Pentagon knew of and feared the possible repercussions of a Trump loss is putting it mildly. As shocking as the details might be, it is thankfully not shocking that the world’s most elite and powerful military fully understood the situation.

According to The Guardian:

Shortly before the deadly attack on the US Capitol on 6 January, the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, Gen Mark Milley, told aides the US was facing a “Reichstag moment” because Donald Trump was preaching “the gospel of the Führer”, according to an eagerly awaited book about Trump’s last year in office.

And, of course, on January 6th, the U.S. did face its “Reichstag moment.” But as we’ve noted elsewhere, the U.S.’s “Reichstag moment” was fought off, mostly. We should all be thankful that Trump did not lead his supporters up to Capitol Hill, where he might have angrily demanded that they follow him into the building and stop the voting. If Trump wasn’t such a coward and instead had some Castro in him, or Saddam, or Pol Pot, and his followers been a little more committed, then the U.S. really might have topped that moment, if Trump sympathizers in the Pentagon also rose up.

Thankfully, we will never know. Instead, we still have to guard against the slow roll, or future “Reichstag moment.” After all, we’re talking about the guy who said that Hitler did some good things. Trump never elaborated on what he viewed as “good things,” and it took Hitler a while to gain full control.

As if we needed yet another reason to thank our dogs in heaven that Joe Biden won the election – by a clear enough margin – to get a real president back in office, we got one anyway.

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Peace, y’all
Jason
[email protected] and on Twitter @JasonMiciak