Jim VandeHei: Trump Likes Hegseth Because He Does Not Push Back, Because He Defends Everything that the President Does

EXCERPT:

VANDEHEI: “Again, we’ve talked about this for a month. This was all foreseen and foreseeable. The president was warned by all of his advisors that all the scenarios we keep talking about on this show could and would likely happen, that the Iranian regime wouldn’t just buckle, that it would fight back, that they’re not motivated by worrying about economic sanctions or economy is already collapsed. So then when you go into this war and you send these wobbly signals about whether it’s working or not working, imagine being the Secretary of Navy trying to figure out, 'Okay, when do I have to rotate deployments?' Imagine being the commander of that ship. One day it seems like it’s done, the next day it seems like we’ll be there forever. Then the obvious outgrowth of that is what you talked about at the top of the show. My dad loves the saying, 'Prior planning prevents piss poor products.' Same thing with performance. And you’re seeing it because there isn’t a plan. There’s no direction to give these. And he likes Hegseth. Yes, there’s a lot of people around him who don’t like the Defense Secretary. He likes him because he does not push back, because he defends everything that the president does, that he says it’s always part of the plan, that he’ll go after the press, that he’ll purge people that don’t look like him outside of the military, regardless of what their qualifications are. He’s doing what he was asked to do."