Mike Pence and Donald Trump Weigh in on the Death of Colin Powell
Each does so with the exact level of grace you would expect from the man.
Here is Pence:
Colin Powell was a true American Patriot who served our Nation with distinction in uniform, as a four-star general, National Security Advisor, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs and as 65th Secretary of State. Karen and I are praying for his wife, Alma, and the entire Powell family.
— Mike Pence (@Mike_Pence) October 18, 2021
And here is Trump:
Given the chance to be gracious about someone’s death, or say nothing at all, Trump takes a decidedly different route pic.twitter.com/HMgFAiiRcK
— Maggie Haberman (@maggieNYT) October 19, 2021
This is one of the few times when Trump and his fiercest critics are looking forward to the same event.
Outside the Trump Memorial
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 10/19/2021 @ 9:01 amTrump never fails to disappoint.
Rip Murdock (d2a2a8) — 10/19/2021 @ 9:28 amTrump has nothing to apologize for, as he said nothing wrong. Those most offended by the remarks tend to be those who either never served or served as far from the front lines as possible. They fear and hate the loss of any automatic respect afforded the military because they spent time and money checking the Good Boy Patriotic Service Merits in their younger years and are OUTRAGED and APPALLED that credential inflation by everyone else who took the opportunity after them has devalued their CVs to less than zero.
Hey, maybe you should have studied how supply-and-demand monetary theory applies in non-financial fields! Or maybe you should have conserved the institutions that produced people who respect your heroes! Or maybe you should have coached your groomed reps on how not to lose friends and alienate people!
Alas, greed and laziness robbed you of the lesson: If you chose to be a traitor or even a well-wishing sideliner to your party in a way that would have never been tolerated during your actual military service during the greatest Republican resurgence in recent memory, then do not expect the everyday niceities of the everyday people whose interests you spurned in favor of your own narrow class.
A soldier who deserts deserves death, but we’ll content ourselves with the metaphorical equivalent of derision until such time as we can properly “accidentally” drone-strike your funerals to take advantage of the target-rich environments. Should have started back at Paul Wellstone’s, to be honest, but thank you for showing us the way to grind out the bitter holdouts via foreign examples in the intervening period.
Funerary EOD (a3e0eb) — 10/19/2021 @ 9:44 am@3 Colin Powell was entitled not to be a Republican if he didn’t want to. If he was half a Republican, that’s also all right.
Sammy Finkelman (c49738) — 10/19/2021 @ 9:51 ammaybe trump saw one of maggie haberman’s obits and figured that’s the gracious example to follow
President Ronald Reagan loses fierce battle with Alzheimer’s at 93
Poverty increased, jobs vanished and more homeless began appearing as Reagan gutted more than 50 years of social programs. Thousands died before Reagan acknowledged there was an AIDS crisis.
The Reagan years also saw the rise of the religious right, which championed a “family values” President – even though he was divorced and remarried, rarely attended church and had strained relationships with his four kids.
Disclosures that his wife, Nancy, whom he called “Mommy,” sometimes whispered answers to him and consulted an astrologer fueled speculation that Reagan was more out of it than the White House let on.
But such talk hit home hardest in 1986 when a stunned nation – and, apparently, Reagan – learned of a secret arms-for-hostages deal that spawned an illegal diversion of money to the Nicaraguan Contras.
when is someone going to write down all these special rules that only trump has to follow?
JF (e1156d) — 10/19/2021 @ 10:07 amMaggie Haberman is not a former President of the United States.
Rip Murdock (d2a2a8) — 10/19/2021 @ 10:12 amTrump sounds like a progressive. Did someone from DU write that for him?
Hoi Polloi (998b37) — 10/19/2021 @ 10:14 am@6 lol maggie habermann calls herself a reporter, present tense
JF (e1156d) — 10/19/2021 @ 10:18 am@5, It’s pretty simple, when someone dies you try to celebrate their life and you refrain from criticism out of deference from those they left behind; their family, friends, and those that armored them.
Plenty of people are criticized for failing to do this, Rightly so. Finding one example of negative commentary from a lengthy piece about Reagan’s life doesn’t excuse Trump or those cheering his comment. It just makes you look pathetic.
Time123 (9f42ee) — 10/19/2021 @ 10:23 amWhereas if you never served AND you are Donald Trump or someone who reveres Trump, then you display your patriotism by trashing people who served if they don’t fall in with your cult of personality. You can even say that enlisted soldiers were suckers, and tell their widows that they “knew what they were signing up for” if they’re killed in battle. You’re still more honorable than all the non-cultists who ever put on the uniform.
BTW, the 2020 election saw a substantial shift away from the GOP on military bases.
Radegunda (96c736) — 10/19/2021 @ 10:33 am@9 maybe read the original post first
JF (e1156d) — 10/19/2021 @ 10:46 amThose most offended by the remarks tend to be those who either never served or served as far from the front lines as possible.
The man is a draft-dodger.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 10/19/2021 @ 11:01 amI read both Patterico’s post and Habberman’s Obit, you still look pathetic.
Time123 (9f42ee) — 10/19/2021 @ 11:03 amBut, to be fair, I fully intend to wear a party hat the day Trump dies.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 10/19/2021 @ 11:03 amKarma is a heartless b*tch.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 10/19/2021 @ 11:04 am@13 then you’re just being dishonest as usual
JF (e1156d) — 10/19/2021 @ 11:08 amTrump brought up Powell’s death and made it about himself. Nothing wrong in that at all. Cuh-lassy.
Paul Montagu (5de684) — 10/19/2021 @ 11:09 amThe leader of the Republican Party has spoken. It’s probably a test to find out who will aggressively defend his comment, who will lead the misdirection using what-aboutism, who will simply ignore it (see no evil), who will give a gentle rebuke, and who will strongly distance himself. He’s looking for future cabinet members and press secretaries. Once you defend horrible….in for a penny, in for a pound
AJ_Liberty (ec7f74) — 10/19/2021 @ 11:10 amComment 5 is Vippy-Ann MacFapperson, the Canadian troll.
Trump’s type is buff, tanned, sailors, in dress whites, like Gallagher and Crozier. It’s trauma from his childhood, I think, when he wet his little sailor suit and his nanny spanked him on his bare bottom. Or maybe he’s just a nasty pig who only knows how to grunt and oink to other pigs.
nk (1d9030) — 10/19/2021 @ 11:17 ampowell is fortunate the war dead can’t tweet
and probably fortunate for them as well, else they’d be called ungracious
JF (e1156d) — 10/19/2021 @ 11:18 amOops, sorry, that’s Comment 3 is Vippy-Ann MacFapperson.
nk (1d9030) — 10/19/2021 @ 11:19 am“Why so obsessed about mean tweets? It’s merely style. You’re an elitist!”
Radegunda (803a6e) — 10/19/2021 @ 11:22 amReactions from other Republican presidential wanna-bees:
Darling Nikki still hasn’t commented, and neither has Mike Pompeo.
Rip Murdock (d2a2a8) — 10/19/2021 @ 11:40 amSenators Marco Rubio (R-FL); Rick Scott (R-FL); and Tim Scott (R-SC) have also not issued statements. I guess they are too broken up to do so.
Rip Murdock (d2a2a8) — 10/19/2021 @ 11:45 am@23 powell isn’t a republican, nor was he ever in elected office
why are you expecting every republican to offer a reaction, or else?
was this guy royalty?
JF (e1156d) — 10/19/2021 @ 11:47 am@25, why are you so invested in trashing a man who just died?
Time123 (9f42ee) — 10/19/2021 @ 11:51 amNope. I honestly think that the criticisms of Reagan Habberman put in her obituary don’t at all justify Trump’s statements and that your attempt to pretend they do make you look pathetic.
Time123 (9f42ee) — 10/19/2021 @ 11:55 am@26 powell made mistakes that cost the lives of many innocent people
like dubya, he recognized the path to rehabilitation was to attack republicans and make friends on the left
if not for that, the usual suspects here and in the media wouldn’t be so invested in his hagiography
it would be folks like habermann being ungracious, but as it is his cozying to the left paid off
i don’t expect you to see through that rank hypocrisy, since you’re an example of it
JF (e1156d) — 10/19/2021 @ 11:59 amRip:
Mama always said, if you can’t say something nice, don’t say anything at all. I prefer the silence to the narcissistic garbage Trump dished up.
By the way, did anyone figure out what #3 was on about? It sounded like he was the angry man standing at the fence of the cemetery, yelling at somebody’s grave.
Appalled (1a17de) — 10/19/2021 @ 11:59 amColin Powell’s endorsement of Obama in 2008 pissed a lot of people off, but it was pretty much to be expected. Obama’s run (in 2008, at least) was a “team” thing to most black folk. It wasn’t about policy, it was about becoming. Condi Rice has never said who she voted for then, although in 2012 she was upfront in support of Romney.
I would have preferred that Powell had had the courage to support Romney in 2012 but of course in 2016 there was no way he’d support Trump. Which is really the only thing that Trump cares about.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 10/19/2021 @ 12:07 pmJF’s posts are examples of all that is wrong with this country. He probably thinks he’s a patriot, too. LOL.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 10/19/2021 @ 12:08 pm@31 a drive by attack wins you friends here, and that’s clearly most important to you
JF (e1156d) — 10/19/2021 @ 12:15 pmAn obituary is supposed to be more objective, or in line with what the audience for it thought during life, than a condolence statement. Which this wasn’t really. It was Trump showing he’s not sleeping through this. He seems to have been sttruck by the way all coverage is favorable and they are not talking about all the was he’s considered to have gone wrong. But it’a in Colin Powell’s New York Times obituary,
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/10/18/us/politics/colin-powell-dead.html
It still, whilw backing up the criticism, treats him very favorably on that
Sammy Finkelman (c49738) — 10/19/2021 @ 12:15 pmSure, George W. Bush is famous for attacking Republicans every chance he gets ….. Not.
It’s Trump, of course, who attacks Republicans by name more than he attacks Dems. But in MAGAland, Trump’s attacks on Republicans are evidence that he’s a truer Republican than anyone he attacks.
Radegunda (96c736) — 10/19/2021 @ 12:26 pmHe isn’t a Republican because he’s dead, but he was one for 26 years, longer than Trump.
Paul Montagu (5de684) — 10/19/2021 @ 12:45 pmRip:
Mama always said, if you can’t say something nice, don’t say anything at all. ……
Appalled (1a17de) — 10/19/2021 @ 11:59 am
A lesson Trump never learned (or was probably taught).
Rip Murdock (d2a2a8) — 10/19/2021 @ 12:49 pmJF, why don’t you go see what people here had to say when Rush passed away. Might surprise you.
Time123 (a5a857) — 10/19/2021 @ 12:50 pmKevin, pretty much.
Time123 (a5a857) — 10/19/2021 @ 12:50 pm#37 — When Rush passed away, I kept silence.
Radegunda (96c736) — 10/19/2021 @ 12:58 pm(Trump) seems to have been sttruck (sic) by the way all coverage is favorable and they are not talking about all the was he’s considered to have gone wrong.
Most of the articles mention the run up to the Iraq War, and seemingly insufficient investigation and his misrepresentation of his role the My Lai Massacre investigation.
Rip Murdock (d2a2a8) — 10/19/2021 @ 1:02 pm@23 powell isn’t a republican, nor was he ever in elected office
why are you expecting every republican to offer a reaction, or else?
I find it interesting that half of the potential Republican field has recognized his service in a way that is diametrically opposed to Trump’s reaction, and that certain others, especially Darling Nikki and Pompeo, the two candidates with the most foreign policy experience, (along with Josh Hawley) have absolutely no reaction. Obviously they expect the MAGA base to agree with Trump (which they do), and pick them up for their own presidential aspirations.
Rip Murdock (d2a2a8) — 10/19/2021 @ 1:09 pmOh.
BuDuh (4a7846) — 10/19/2021 @ 1:18 pmSame link.
BuDuh (4a7846) — 10/19/2021 @ 1:19 pm@31 a drive by attack wins you friends here, and that’s clearly most important to you
I must admit I have nothing constructive to say regarding your posts. I’m rather amazed that anyone engages.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 10/19/2021 @ 1:25 pmespecially Darling Nikki and Pompeo,
Maybe they’re on the beach somewhere, trying to get a tan.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 10/19/2021 @ 1:27 pm@42: Yes, well Victor was a hard-core left-winger. Not really representative of the site. I think that people either STFU or found something in Rush’s work they could praise.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 10/19/2021 @ 1:30 pmHowever, given the fact that a new poll shows 78% of Republicans want to see Trump run again, I can understand their silence.
Rip Murdock (d2a2a8) — 10/19/2021 @ 1:33 pmDarling Nikki already has a tan.
Rip Murdock (d2a2a8) — 10/19/2021 @ 1:33 pm@44 your posts get much more likes, yay
JF (e1156d) — 10/19/2021 @ 1:41 pmI often disagree with what Kevin says. But he’s smart and thinks things through so it’s well worth the time.
Time123 (a5a857) — 10/19/2021 @ 2:15 pm“powell made mistakes that cost the lives of many innocent people”
The Neocons thought that the Middle East could be “transformed”…..and with Saddam a tyrant with his fingers in much of the de-stabilizing muck….Iraq was ripe for regime change. The Wolfowitz argument was that the chess pieces on the board had to be upended to avoid continuing the same dysfunctional dynamic in the region. We needed to be pro-active, rather than reactive like 9/11. I think the administration believed that we would be seen as liberators and that any opposition could be readily smashed by American military power (stealth + precision weapons + fast attack). Obviously this was wrong….and men like Chalabi and Alwan were mistakenly trusted. Errors about WMD raw intelligence flowed from this fever for regional transformation. Chaos in Iraq did then contribute to the formation of ISIS and all of those unintended consequences. So, it was a stark repudiation that American force could create the conditions for democratization…or at least pacification.
But attacking Iraq…even though there was no direct connection to 9/11 and that evidence of WMD was sketchy at best…..was quite popular. I think Americans….not known for great complexity….figured that the problem of 9/11 was a problem with the Middle East….and wanted vengeance and violence to quell our unease. Saddam was a bad guy and the region needed an enema. So Iraq wasn’t just a neocon intellectual wet dream….it also represented some Jacksonian desire to kick a$$ and take names — payback on steroids. I’m not absolving Neocons but the end decision was more textured. Powell shares the blame….and as a country we learned a hard lesson. The question today is whether it’s fair to dump that on Powell’s casket. Remember the nationalistic urge to strike was bipartisan. Many people could have asked much harder questions. In my opinion, it’s a bit cheap to excessively tar Powell with it…especially when a lot of people were for it before conveniently discovering that they were against it…..when things got tough…..
AJ_Liberty (ec7f74) — 10/19/2021 @ 2:42 pmFrom the New York Times:
https://www.nytimes.com/live/2021/10/18/us/colin-powell/colin-powell-vaccinated-myeloma#breakthrough-covid-deaths
If his doctors didn’t know this, they’re incompetent. If they didn’t test to see if the vaccine worked and how well, they’re mediocre fools. If they didn’t give him monoclonal antibodies as a prophylactic, they weren’t trying hard enough to save his life.
And the family thanks the doctors!
Sammy Finkelman (c49738) — 10/19/2021 @ 2:49 pmAJ, the only part there that I disagree with is that ISIS was a consequence of our invasion. It was a consequence of our abrupt and total withdrawal after we had actually achieved some stability in Anwar. The people who trusted us were left high and dry. They people who were still in opposition were emboldened by our perfidy and our erstwhile allies’ collapse.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 10/19/2021 @ 2:50 pmBut Sammy, if they did all these things it might have failed anyway. If you have no immune system there are lots of things that can kill you no matter what they try.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 10/19/2021 @ 2:52 pmBuDuh,
Do you not expect the public pronouncements of a former president (or a sitting president) to be somewhat more diplomatic and decorous than anonymous comments on a blog? Or is it merely, once again, the Trump Exemption to any and all standards of judgment applied to other people?
I’ll never fathom why so many people find cretinous, petty, self-serving behavior to be so admirable, as though it’s a mark of heroic manliness or something.
Radegunda (96c736) — 10/19/2021 @ 3:06 pmWhat does that even mean? What exactly were the doctors supposed to do to “see if the vaccine worked” in this particular case?
Radegunda (96c736) — 10/19/2021 @ 3:22 pmAnd do you know what the doctors actually did do in treating Powell? He had a condition that can kill an 84-year-old without Covid. Why must it be made another example of the stooopid “experts” don’t know what they’re doing?
54. Kevin M (ab1c11) — 10/19/2021 @ 2:52 pm
hat;s righr. He was 84 years old, and had a blood cancer.
That;s true, but he was fine a week ago (temporarily maybe) It probably wasn;t that he had no immune system, bt t might have been 1/5 or 1/20 as good.
What they did about Covjd was thoughtless if what they was vaccinate him.
Maybe they tested him, found he had little immunity and prioritized a booster. But if the first shots barely did anything, why should the later ones? They should have experience by now.
Here’s the leukemia study published in July:
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41375-021-01354-7
The thing to do was infuse him with manufactured neutralizing monoclonal antibodies instead of a booster shot and repeat that every few months. The dose could be low, too. (the antibodies and the vaccines don’t work well together – the antibodies will tend to ensure the vaccine won’t do much if anything because the body doesn;t need to make its own antibodies to get rid of the virus. It may make a little.
Aa for the flu, the flu has an antiviral treatment.
They may also have been trying to take care of other things at the same time.
Sammy Finkelman (c49738) — 10/19/2021 @ 4:19 pmRadegunda (96c736) — 10/19/2021 @ 3:22 pm
Test him for antibodies. He gt baccinateda at the beginning of the year. Besides they should have guessed that the vaccination had about a 50-50 chance of conferring immunity, except that they could know what raised the odds and what lowered them. Instead of pretending they knew nothing.
No, I don’t know except that the vaccine failed and it could have been predicted to have a high probability of failing, and whatever they did do, was not adequate.
The antibodies were maybe not administered in time, or at all, and the best time is before infection. That probably would have prevented this. And he didn’t die of his principle diagnosis.
This happens maybe 1/8 of the time. Here the principle stupidity is paying attention almost exclusively to the vaccine. This error is all over.
They’ll change it within about half a year or so, and start giving out these antibodies as a prophylactic. Which will prove the “experts” were stooopid in not doing it sooner.
One thing the FDA did, after much begging from doctors: Say that it is OK to get a booster shot of a different vaccine than the one you took originally. They’ve been doing that in the UK for some time.
Another thing today: Over the counter hearing aids are on track.
They sometimes reverse stupidity. Like there was this prohibition against adding signifucant aounts of folic acid to food, until 1998.
Sammy Finkelman (c49738) — 10/19/2021 @ 4:40 pmHere’s a beautiful tribute to Powell from Marc Thiessen
Something I hadn’t known: Until Powell joined the ROTC: “He was a “C” student who attended the City College of New York.
Jim Miller (edcec1) — 10/19/2021 @ 4:49 pmWhere is it stipulated that a vaccine has “failed” if it isn’t 100% effective in every case regardless of any other conditions that compromise a person’s immune system — including cancer and advanced age?
You appear to be assuming that the doctors had the means to cure an 84-year-old with cancer and Covid, and simply failed to do so. But as you admit, you don’t actually know what they did or what they failed to do, beyond “failing” to confer immortality.
Radegunda (803a6e) — 10/19/2021 @ 10:21 pmThat’s a nice tribute from Thiessen.
I just remembered an incident from many years ago: A colleague was tragically killed much too young (while she was traveling abroad). In my last interaction with her, she had done something that I found demeaning to me, and it stung — but I had not previously felt insulted by her, and I didn’t want that to be how I remembered her. So at a memorial gathering, I got up and said nice things about her, in a way that directly contradicted that one insult. I did it for my own well-being as well as for her relatives. Not because I’m a moral hero, but because it was the right thing to do — and the sort of thing that Donald Trump cannot do.
Radegunda (803a6e) — 10/19/2021 @ 10:30 pmSF: I don’t know except that the vaccine failed and it could have been predicted to have a high probability of failing, and whatever they did do, was not adequate.
Radegunda (803a6e) — 10/19/2021 @ 10:21 pm
I meant it failed (to deliver immunity) in his case, and this should not have come as a surprise to his doctors.
Not necessarily of the cancer, but he was more or less stable at the time, but they did have the means to cure him of Covid or to prevent it – the neutralizing monoclonal antibodies, even if that’s Florida Governor Ron DeSantis’ favorite approach.
The vaccine clearly was futile. And they shouldn’t have bothered with scheduling a booster shot. His death does not highlight the need for boosters, as Forbes magazine says, echoing idiot public health officials who can be compared to World War I generals. It highlights the need for knowing who will probably not be helped by a vaccine and giving antibodies as a prophylactic instead. Eventually, less than two years from now at worst, the FDA and the CDC will agree.
No the mistake is not simple. It’s profoundly and deeply wrong. I wouldn’t expect better from most medical professionals, though. It is therefore, not malpractice, because malpractice is only when treatment falls below the standard of care. and if the standard of care does not include something, however stupid what they do, or do not do, may be, there’s no liability, but there is fault.
Yes, that’s right. But I can make an educated guess.
Here they didn’t need to to confer immortality. They just needed to do something that would work to prevent him from dying of Covid, if they were concerned about him getting it, and that something was not planning to give him a booster shot of vaccine.
They didn’t have to wait for the FDA or the CDC to recommend it, because Colin Powell was a VIP.
They didn’t need to stick to protocol and mindlessly continue with the vaccination idea when they should have known it hadn’t worked with him. But this is what happens when people think all doctors are equally good.
Sammy Finkelman (c49738) — 10/20/2021 @ 8:40 amhttps://www.npr.org/2021/10/19/1047400922/expert-helps-untangle-vaccine-misinformation-that-has-followed-colin-powells-dea
Idiot! If the original vaccination didn’t work, why should the booster shot? And why not give him an infusion of antibodies every three or four months? If you’re really trying to protect the patient.
They are all idiots, if they believe what they are saying.
Sammy Finkelman (c49738) — 10/20/2021 @ 8:44 amPeople with diabetes, or other chronic diseases, know that it may be dangerous to defer to random doctors. That;s one of the arguments for a second opinion, except that two is not enough, especially of the doctors come from approximately the same background.
Sammy Finkelman (c49738) — 10/20/2021 @ 8:52 am