RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/whatever-happened-at-west-point-its-not-good/

As I see it, there are only two explanations for West Point’s having falsely informed a journalist that Donald Trump’s nominee for Secretary of Defense, Pete Hegseth, not only didn’t get in to West Point but never “even applied there.” Those options are that West Point lied or that West Point is incompetent. Neither is good.

I find it hard to believe that West Point would deliberately lie about such a thing. I also find it hard to believe that its staff would be so lazy or inept as to screw something like this up by mistake. This was not some random inquiry; it was connected to an extremely consequential political decision, and related to the reputation of a high-profile figure who, if he is accepted by the Senate, will soon occupy one of the most important jobs in the United States. That being so, how is it possible that West Point did not make one hundred percent sure that it was correct in its denial? Frankly, I’d be somewhat surprised if at least someone at West Point hadn’t preemptively looked into this after the nomination was made public. If I worked there, I think I would have. At the very least, a higher-up ought to have instructed all staff to make absolutely sure they were correct when dealing with inquiries of this sort.

In all likelihood, we’ll never know what happened. What we can say, however, is that this incident has probably helped Hegseth’s chances of being confirmed. One of the main criticisms that Hegseth — and Donald Trump — have advanced in recent years is that the military bureaucracy is both out of control and resistant to civilian oversight. And here we have a golden example of one of those bureaucrats appearing to lie to a journalist about a critic. Whether that lie was inadvertent or not is unclear, but, either way, it does a lot to bolster Hegseth’s case for change.