A very brave U.S. Air Force officer Major Jason Watson stood where cowardly Republicans like Senator Susan Collins are too afraid to show courage

Major Jason Watson is an active-duty U.S. Air Force officer and 17-year logistics veteran who made national headlines in July 2026. He was arrested on the U.S. Capitol steps while in military uniform after publicly calling for the impeachment and removal of President Donald Trump and Vice President JD Vance. 

Air Force Major Jason Watson has never been in combat. He’s an American hero all the same. Echo editorial published in the Sun Sentinel, a South Florida newspaper.

Major Watson spoke his mind and will pay a steep price

Watson is the Air Force Academy graduate who stood in uniform on the U.S. Capitol steps in Washington last week holding a sign saying “Impeach convict remove.”

It took three minutes for the Capitol police to arrest him. That was the least of his concerns.

He’s in Air Force custody now, likely to be court-martialed. Military prison is definitely a possibility. His career is almost certainly over.

Major Watson knew what the price could be for proclaiming in public what so many others in Washington are afraid to say even in private.

Some are the members of Congress, Republicans mostly, who have been abetting Donald Trump’s subversion of the Constitution by doing nothing about it. (Like Republican Senator Susan Collins, for example❗)

Others are military officers disgusted and alarmed by Trump’s military incompetence and how Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth (the wino) has been cashiering generals and admirals for being Black, female or simply for their sense of duty and honor.

And yet, precious few of those congressional Republicans have been willing to speak up for the nation’s sake.

For some mysterious reason, they are paralyzed by Trump’s tyrannical passions for power and punishment, as demonstrated by the recent party primary defeats of two respected Republican senators who he opposed.

Unlike officers in uniform, however, politicians have nothing to lose but their paychecks and perks. The “sacred honor” that 56 people pledged to each other on July 4, 1776 — along with their actual lives and fortunes — is long out of fashion in Washington.

The military has rules against campaign activity in uniform. Article 88 of the Uniform Code of Military Justice also prohibits commissioned officers from using “contemptuous words” against the president, vice president, members of Congress, the secretary of defense and certain others.

To call for Trump’s well-deserved impeachment may be contemptuous to a court-martial, but it will be seen as courageous elsewhere.

“It’s really a question of how severe those consequences will be,” said retired Air Force Col. Morris Davis, who was chief prosecutor of the alleged al Qaeda terrorists at Guantanamo until he resigned rather than obey orders to use evidence obtained by waterboarding.

“I knew it would end my military career, but I chose to do it anyway, because I thought it was worth it,” Davis said in an email to the Sun Sentinel. “I suspect Major Watson went through the same or similar thought process as me. Unfortunately for him, Trump is far more petty and vindictive than George Bush.”

Davis subsequently won a settlement and damages over being fired from the Congressional Research Service for newspaper op-eds criticizing President Obama’s failure to reform the process.

In 2020, he was the Democratic nominee for Congress in a deep-red western North Carolina congressional district.

According to the Washington Post, Major Watson’s protest wasn’t his first. He was an anonymous, masked participant holding an “Impeach convict remove” sign during a 22-day hunger strike last year. That got no attention. It occurred to him what would.

“In the grand scheme of things, I’m just a nobody,” he told the media before climbing the Capitol steps. “What matters far more than who I am is what I have to say and the price I’m willing to pay to say it.”

By coincidence, another well-publicized demonstration occurred in Washington on the Fourth of July. Hundreds of members of the Patriot Front, a white supremacist group, paraded through the capital. Some carried Confederate flags.

Nearly all of them wore masks, lacking the individual courage of a solitary Air Force major with a career and his freedom at stake.

Jason Watson showed them — and all of America — what true patriotism is.

The Sun Sentinel Editorial Board consists of Opinion Editor Steve Bousquet, Deputy Opinion Editor Dan Sweeney, editorial writers Pat Beall and Martin Dyckman, and Executive Editor Gretchen Day-Bryant.

Donald Trump continues to denegrate America: He is "weird" and unworthy to lead

Echo opinion published in the Tennessee Notebook by J. Holly McCall: Editor’s notebook: There’s no patriotism in calling the U.S. a “failing country.” Donald Trump’s repeated use of the term and suggestion that America is not great👿❗ is a disgrace for a politician.

“The idea that somehow we are this failing country, I never heard a president talk like this before. We – we’re the envy of the world,” said President Joe Biden in a CNN interview. “Name me a single major country president who wouldn’t trade places with the United States of America.”

“For all our problems and all our opportunities, we’re the most progressive country in the world in getting things done. We’re the strongest country in the world,” he said. “We’re a country in the world who keeps our word, and everybody trusts us, all of our allies.”

Biden was addressing Trump’s statement — one he made not for the first time — that “We’re a failing nation right now. We’re a seriously failing nation. And we’re a failing nation because of Biden.”

During the debate, Trump also said “All over the world we were respected, and then he comes in, and we’re now laughed at. We’re like a bunch of stupid people.”

It would be disingenuous to suggest that Biden had a good debate (although Trump was equally bad!) but on this point, Biden was right.

Donald Trump fails to inspire American patriotism 

This is one thing about Trump and his “Make America Great Again” slogan, which has bugged me ever since he launched his first campaign in 2015. He and his supporters call themselves patriots and talk about patriotism while at the same time showing enormous disrespect for the U.S. by calling it a “failing nation.”

Get out of here with that noise❗💢💥

It’s one thing to protest or dissent in order to improve flaws. Protest is a key part of the First Amendment, and the U.S. is by no means flawless. For Americans to protest peacefully — by which I mean not attacking the Capitol with weapons and assaulting law enforcement officers — no matter the issue, is one thing.

But to have a former chief executive of the nation who runs on the idea that the country is a failure is as disrespectful as anything I can think of. For a one-time (and possibly future) president to say he supports veterans while calling them “suckers and losers,” as has clearly been documented, is incredibly unpatriotic.

I wrapped up a work conference in Washington, D.C. a few weeks ago and had a few hours to kill before my flight home, so I hopped the subway to National Mall, the grassy park that sports the Capitol at one end and the Lincoln Memorial at the other.

I meandered past the Washington Monument, smiling to myself as sweating parents tried to corral their unruly kids into posing for photos with the monument in the background. As I approached the World War II Memorial, I saw a chaperone lecturing a group of restive 8th graders about decorum, before I made my way to the Pacific Theater side of the monument to check out the pavers marking the islands on which my dad fought.

When I arrived at the Lincoln Memorial, I sat on the steps overlooking the Mall and people-watched. There were families of Asian descent eating ice cream on the steps next to me, and families speaking African languages. Some were U.S. citizens, I’m sure, but some had brought their families to Washington to see what so many people around the world view as an ideal: a jewel. Our nation’s capital represents democracy and freedom to so many.

As I sat there, I reflected that no, the U.S. isn’t perfect. But it’s still pretty damn good. And a politician who doesn’t recognize that, who calls it a “failing nation” — that’s just not patriotic at all.

Donald Trump failed again in Paris #myUS_apologies

Dear citizens of Europe, as an American citizen, please accept my sincere apologies for the ongoing embarrassment of Donald tRump.

#myUS_apologies

The New York Times reports
By Peter Baker and Alissa J. Rubin

PARIS — Dozens of leaders from around the globe marched in the soaking rain down the Champs-Élysées on Sunday, expressing solidarity for an international order that had its origins in the end of a world war 100 years ago, an order now under increasing pressure on both sides of the Atlantic.

Only after these leaders arrived by foot at the Arc de Triomphe did President Trump show up, protected from the rain as he made an individual entrance. A few minutes later, President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia did the same.

For Trump, at least, the separate arrival was attributed to security concerns. But somehow it felt apt that these two leaders would not arrive with the crowd.

No one has done more to break up the postwar global system in the last couple of years than Mr. Trump and Mr. Putin. As the anniversary of the armistice that ended World War I was commemorated on Sunday, Mr. Trump’s brand of “America First” nationalism was rebuked from the podium while he sat stone-faced and unmoved, alienated from some of America’s strongest allies, including his French hosts.

But while he may have been out of step with many of the leaders gathered around him, Trump remains at the vanguard of forces that are redefining the Western political paradigm in countries like Poland, Hungary, Italy and Turkey. In Britain and Germany, two of the Continent’s major powers, nationalist movements have upended the establishment.

Recalling the forces that led to World War I, Mr. Macron warned that “the old demons” have been resurfacing and declared that “giving into the fascination for withdrawal, isolationism, violence and domination would be a grave error that future generations would very rightly make us responsible for.”

Mr. Trump, who recently declared himself “a nationalist,” appeared grim as he listened to the speech through an earpiece and clapped only tepidly afterward.

He had no speaking role and made no mention of the issues Mr. Macron raised during an address later at a cemetery for American soldiers killed in the war.

The ceremony led by Mr. Macron encapsulated the tension in the international arena as Mr. Trump seeks to rewrite the rules that have governed the world in recent decades. He has abandoned international agreements on trade, nuclear proliferation and climate change, and disparaged alliances like NATO and the European Union.

On the campaign trail this fall, Mr. Trump railed against what he called the “rule of corrupt, power-hungry globalists,” as he put it at a rally in Houston. “You know what a globalist is, right? You know what a globalist is? A globalist is a person that wants the globe to do well, frankly, not caring about our country so much. And you know what? We can’t have that.”

Mr. Macron has now, in effect, given a rebuttal. In addition to the speech, he also used an interview with Fareed Zakaria of CNN that aired Sunday to define himself as “a patriot” rather than a “nationalist.”

“Patriotism is the exact opposite of nationalism,” President Emmanuel Macron of France said in a speech at the Arc de Triomphe, welcoming the leaders and extolling an old system now under siege. “Nationalism is a betrayal of patriotism by saying: ‘Our interest first. Who cares about the others?’”

Not politically correct anymore- Rep. John Lewis

Paul Krugman explains why Rep. John Lewis labeled Donald Trump an illitimately elected president.  Nevertheless, it's the Republicans, led by Donald Trump, who must get accustomed to politically incorrect language. In other words, the truth hurts; but Donald Trump doesn't understand the word. Maybe "pravda" makes more sense to him meaning "truth" in Russian.

"With All Due Disrespect"-by Paul Krugman in The New York Times

As a young man, Congressman John Lewis, who represents most of Atlanta, literally put his life on the line in pursuit of justice. 

As a key civil rights leader, Congressman Lewis endured multiple beatings. Most famously, he led the demonstration that came to be known as Bloody Sunday, suffering a fractured skull at the hands of state troopers. Public outrage over that day’s violence helped lead to the enactment of the Voting Rights Act.

Right wing extremists don't like when the abandonment of political correctness is blown up their asses, as in (rightly) accusing Donald Trump of being an illegitimate president.

Now, Mr. Lewis says that he won’t attend the inauguration of Donald Trump, whom he regards as an illegitimate president.

As you might expect, this statement provoked a hysterical, slanderous reaction from the president-elect – who, of course, got his start in national politics by repeatedly, falsely questioning President Obama’s right to hold office. 

Nevertheless, Mr. Trump — who has never sacrificed anything or taken a risk to help others — seems to have a special animus toward genuine heroes. 

Maybe he prefers demonstrators who don’t get beaten?

But let’s not talk about Mr. Trump’s ravings. Instead, let’s ask whether Mr. Lewis was right to say what he said. Is it O.K., morally and politically, to declare the man about to move into the White House illegitimate?

Yes, it is. In fact, it’s an act of patriotism. (Our US Constitution deliberately gave all Americans the right to dissent.)

By any reasonable standard, the 2016 election was deeply tainted. It wasn’t just the effects of Russian intervention on Mr. Trump’s behalf; Hillary Clinton would almost surely have won if the F.B.I. hadn’t conveyed the false impression that it had damaging new information about her, just days before the vote. 

This was grotesque, delegitimizing malfeasance, especially in contrast with the agency’s refusal to discuss the Russia connection.

Was there even more to it? Did the Trump campaign actively coordinate with a foreign power? Did a cabal within the F.B.I. deliberately slow-walk investigations into that possibility? Are the lurid (salacious) tales about adventures in Moscow true? We don’t know, although Mr. Trump’s creepy obsequiousness to Vladimir Putin makes it hard to dismiss these allegations. Even given what we do know, however, no previous U.S. president-elect has had less right to the title. So why shouldn’t we question his legitimacy?

And talking frankly about how Mr. Trump gained power isn’t just about truth-telling. It may also help to limit that power.

It would be one thing if the incoming commander in chief showed any hint of humility, of realizing that his duty to the nation requires showing some respect for the strong majority of Americans who voted against him despite Russian meddling and the F.B.I.’s disinformation dump. But he hasn’t and won’t.

Instead, he’s lashing out at and threatening anyone and everyone who criticizes him, while refusing even to admit that he lost the popular vote. And he’s surrounding himself with people who share his contempt for everything that is best in America. What we’re looking at, all too obviously, is an American kakistocracy — rule by the worst.

What can restrain this rule? Well, Congress still has a lot of power to rein the president in. And it would be nice to imagine that there are enough public-spirited legislators to play that role. In particular, just three Republican senators with consciences could do a lot to protect American values.

But Congress will be much more likely to stand up to a rogue, would-be authoritarian executive if its members realize that they will face a political price if they act as his enablers.

What this means is that Mr. Trump must not be treated with personal deference simply because of the position he has managed to seize. He must not be granted the use of the White House as a bully pulpit. He must not be allowed to cloak himself in the majesty of office. Given what we know about this guy’s character, it’s all too clear that granting him unearned respect will just empower him to behave badly.

And reminding people how he got where he is will be an important tool in preventing him from gaining respect he doesn’t deserve. Remember, saying that the election was tainted isn’t a smear or a wild conspiracy theory; it’s simply the truth.

Now, anyone questioning Mr. Trump’s legitimacy will be accused of being unpatriotic — because that’s what people on the right always say about anyone who criticizes a Republican president. (Strangely, they don’t say this about attacks on Democratic presidents.) But patriotism means standing up for your country’s values, not pledging personal allegiance to Dear Leader.

No, we shouldn’t get into the habit of delegitimizing election results we don’t like. But this time really is exceptional, and needs to be treated that way.

So let’s be thankful that John Lewis had the courage to speak out. It was the patriotic, heroic thing to do. And America needs that kind of heroism, now more than ever.

(What I like most about the moral bravery of Rep. John Lewis is how he took the Right Wing Extremists contempt for the use of "political correctness" and blew it right back up their asses!)

Read my blog, The Conscience of a Liberal, and follow me on Twitter, @PaulKrugman.

Right Wing Republicans Need a Course in How to Govern

Republicans advocating for shutting down the US government are horrible people who have no sense of patriotism. These right wing crazy ideologues zealously believe they must entrench themselves in intractable opposition to anything progressive, regardless of how their regressive positions harm people.

All of Congress takes an oath to support the Constitution of the United States, but Republicans appear to be enchanted by their ego rather than caring for the people they represent. Congress does not just represent the people who voted for them. Rather, Congress represents all Americans.  

Here's a primer for Republicans who don't

understand what it means to be patriotic:

1.  patriotism:  
devoted love, support, and defense of one's country; national loyalty

2.  patriot

a person who loves, supports, and defends his or her country and its interests with devotion

3.  treason

the offense of acting to overthrow one's government

4.  sedition

incitement of discontent or rebellion against a government

5.  anarchy

a state of society without government or law

The above are not complicated, but Republicans seem to prefer ignoring the first two bullets and, by default, are complicit with lessons 3, 4 and 5.

Rather than support hard working people who rely on government for leadership, right wing Republicans want to do what they were unable to accomplish in 2012, when Governor Romney lost the Republican election. President Obama won the 2012 election by a wide margin. From the moment of Obama's victory, Republicans wormed their way into figuring out how to upset the outcome of the Obama victory.

Since the Republican caucus is now controlled by a minority of right wing zealots, it seems to me they should be guilty as charged of being unpatriotic and falling into seditious behavior.

This irresponsible behavior must be punished.  

Meanwhile, all Republicans should be required to write one thousand times on the Congressional blackboard:

I was elected to represent all the people in "We the People".

I was elected to represent all the people in "We the People"

I was elected to represent all the people in "We the People"

This tragic melodrama of governing by shutting down government is evidence of "dunce cap" politics. It must be remedied by replacing everybody who votes on regressive and seditious legislation.

Qualifications of a House Speaker - First Do No Harm

House speaker John Boehner is a leader obsessed with obstruction. Although he pretends to lead his colleagues in the House of Representatives, he fails the basic political test of a public servant to create trust. 

As though Americans need more reasons to mistrust Speaker Boehner, he has now criticized President Obama for not attending a previously scheduled summit meeting with Russian President Putin in early September. House Speaker John Boehner used the development as an opportunity to take a swipe at Obama.
"A reset with Russia just collapsed," he said.  

President Obama has every reason not to attend a summit with Putin in advance of the G-20 economic summit in St. Petersburg.

Apparently, Boehner is unaware of how the US was diplomatically snubbed when the National Security Agency whistle blower Edward Snowden, a man on the lamb for breach of national security, was given asylum by the Russians, despite US protests 

This decision to cancel the summit meeting was made in the interest of affirming America's international leadership in the face of a national security embarrassment over the asylum granted to Snowden by Putin.  

Boehner's criticism of President Obama is making a delicate situation even more fragile. Moreover, the criticism doesn't demonstrate patriotic leadership.  In short, Boehner isn't building trust in America by criticizing the President about this important decision not to attend the summit.  

Putin must have known this response to the summit was coming. For President Obama to attend the summit, while Russia continues to provide Snowden asylum, would be ridiculous, because only acrimony would result. This anticipated negative political affect shared by two world leaders wouldn't be good for either nations' public relations.

One has to wonder if Speaker Boehner even bothers to read the news he needs to know.  (Boehner needs Katie Couric's question. "So, Speaker Boehner, what newspapers do you read?")

Boehner doesn't understand how his leadership is harming our national security and America's international credibility.

In short, Boehner must learn to "first do no harm".

Let's begin with the public servant's obligation to build trust. About the only thing Americans can trust Boehner to do is obstruct any and all things sanctioned with a President Obama imprimatur.

Obviously, Speaker Boehner doesn't recall, or he chooses to ignore, the effective leadership built upon the trust shared by Republican President Ronald Reagan and Democratic Speaker of the House Tip O'Neal.  MSNBC pundit Chris Matthews reported in a January 8, 2011 Washington Post op-ed article how politicians today should pay attention to the effective leadership shared by these two elected politicians, who didn't philosophically agree:   "...it seems like a good time to reflect on Ronald Reagan and Tip O'Neill.  It would serve us well to understand how these very different politicians managed to temper their philosophical divide with a public, and sometimes personal, cordiality," wrote Matthews.

In other words, President Reagan and Speaker O'Neal worked together for the public good.  Although the two didn't agree much, they enjoyed mutual and national respect, leading to trust. 

Certainly, this isn't so with Speaker Boehner and his relationship with President Obama.  In contrast, Boehner's leadership of the US House has driven public opinion for the once dignified august House of Representatives into a walloping Gallop Poll rating of 79 percent disapproval!  Americans can't trust a politician who leads the Congress into a hole covered by public disdain.  

Speaker Boehner is harming American foreign policy by not supporting President Obama, especially when it makes patriotic and international good sense to do otherwise.  

Supporting President Obama's decision not to attend the summit with arrogant President Putin will do no harm to our nation or Speaker Boehner. As a matter of fact, the decision for President Obama not to attend the summit will likely save Americans a lot of tax money needed for travel security.  Support, rather than criticism, won't do any more harm to Speaker Boehner's image with Ohio Democrats, either.

It's really time Americans examine the qualifications of House Speaker John Boehner in the same way we ask to see the licenses of physicians who are treating patients for illness. Speaker Boehner's continuous obstruction of President Obama's agenda is unpatriotic and, therefore, doing more harm than good.

It's time to remove Speaker Boehner from his Congressional leadership position, because he's clearly doing us harm.  I have seen no evidence to the contrary.  There isn't a public initiative I can think of where Boehner's leadership has improved our nation's human condition.  

Boehner is not demonstrating the patriotic qualifications required to continue being Speaker of the House. My vote is to replace Boehner with somebody who garners respect.  Unfortunately, a Republican with qualifications required for this important leadership role seems, at this time, to be nonexistent.

Which may prove that the entire Republican Party needs to be sanctioned for political malpractice, until they can learn how to govern without doing more harm.