(Dobbs) Amazing How Double Standards Work!

No more "dudes in dresses." But white nationalist tattoos? Go for it.

There’s a story that’s been nagging me for two weeks, ever since Defense/War Secretary Pete Hegseth flew in almost a thousand of the highest ranking members of the United States Armed Forces from all around the world to attend a one-day meeting at the Marine base in Quantico, Virginia, where he laid down the law about looking professional. No more “fat generals and admirals,” he demanded, no more “dudes in dresses.”

Yes, these were war-weary generals and admirals who have commanded fighting forces in conflicts since before Hegseth donned his first uniform, and this former Fox television host— who only a few years ago styled his own hair in a mullet— lectured them about looking professional.

The main theme of Hegseth’s hourlong oration, at least as advertised, was the “warrior ethos”— as if this audience needed to travel halfway around the globe to hear the Pentagon chief explain to them how to wage war. But adding insult to injury was the part about professional appearance. What Hegseth told them was, “Today, at my direction, the era of unprofessional appearance is over. No more beardos. The age of rampant and ridiculous shaving profiles is done.”

Personally, I don’t much care one way or the other about the ruling about no more beards— although I’d argue that General Ulysses S. Grant was a “beardo” in the Civil War but did a pretty good job anyway….

…. but wasn’t this the pot calling the kettle black?

Maybe Hegseth should have torn his shirt off in front of all that military brass and showed them his idea of “professional appearance?”

The major tattoo on his chest is called the “Jerusalem Cross,” which represents the campaign of the Crusaders almost a thousand years ago to capture Jerusalem but has been co-opted today by White Christian nationalists— Hegseth?— to signal dominance over minorities in the West, including Muslims.

“NO REGERTS” is a popular meme, a deliberate misspelling of the words “no regrets,” put out there to boast that one is living life without any focus on past mistakes. Kind of sounds like Pete Hegseth, doesn’t it.

While on his right arm, “Deus Vult” is Latin for “God wills it.”

But a beard on a soldier is “unprofessional appearance.”

Of course the bigger news from that gathering of our top military leaders was the rambling rant by the president, who treated the men and women in uniform more like political disciples than the officers they are.

This was where he delivered his un-American credo about new assignments for our nation’s armed forces: “We should use some of these dangerous cities as training grounds for our military. We’re under invasion from within. No different than a foreign enemy but more difficult in many ways because they don’t wear uniforms.”

It already has started. And these unworthy leaders aren’t backing off.

The one thing we know for sure is, whatever they order our soldiers to do, those “dudes” won’t be sporting beards— let alone wearing dresses— when they do it. But white nationalist tattoos on their chests? Go for it.

Isn’t it amazing how double standards work.

Over more than five decades Greg Dobbs has been a correspondent for two television networks including ABC News, a political columnist for The Denver Post and syndicated columnist for Scripps newspapers, a moderator on Rocky Mountain PBS, and author of two books, including one about the life of a foreign correspondent called “Life in the Wrong Lane.” He also co-authored a book about the seminal year for baby boomers, called “1969: Are You Still Listening?” He has covered presidencies, politics, and the U.S. space program at home, and wars, natural disasters, and other crises around the globe, from Afghanistan to South Africa, from Iran to Egypt, from the Soviet Union to Saudi Arabia, from Nicaragua to Namibia, from Vietnam to Venezuela, from Libya to Liberia, from Panama to Poland. Dobbs has won three Emmys, the Distinguished Service Award from the Society of Professional Journalists, and as a 39-year resident of Colorado, a place in the Denver Press Club Hall of Fame.

You can learn more at GregDobbs.net