David Remnick's New Yorker is a joke. Literally.
The usual top trending item is Andy Borowitz trying to figure out what satire is (he still hasn't.) And between the Reddit critiques of Thomas the Tank Engine's crimes against social justice and the insane rants about Trump, the New Yorker is trying to outdo the remnants of the New Republic in a race to the bottom.
Helping out is Masha Gessen with the claim that Kelly's rejoinder to Congresswoman Wilson's tantrum was some sort of precedent for a military coup.
Consider this nightmare scenario: a military coup. You don’t have to strain your imagination—all you have to do is watch Thursday’s White House press briefing, in which the chief of staff, John Kelly, defended President Trump’s phone call to a military widow, Myeshia Johnson. The press briefing could serve as a preview of what a military coup in this country would look like
"Well that escalated quickly" is basically every media article about Trump.
Still this one escalated really quickly.
Argument 1. Those who criticize the President don’t know what they’re talking about because they haven’t served in the military.
They don't know what they're talking about in this particular area because it involves military service. Much as I wouldn't begrudge New Yorker writers and editors their expertise on the subject of taking so much cocaine they imagine themselves in another galaxy.
If serving in the military doesn't give you the authority to speak about serving in the military... what does? (Besides working on shoveling out progbait at the New Yorker.)
Fallen soldiers, Kelly said, join “the best one per cent this country produces.” Here, the chief of staff again reminded his audience of its ignorance: “Most of you, as Americans, don’t know them. Many of you don’t know anyone who knows any of them. But they are the very best this country produces.”
The one-per-cent figure is puzzling. The number of people currently serving in the military, both on active duty and in the reserves, is not even one per cent of all Americans.
This is not a joke. This is the New Yorker. If you buy it or subscribe to it, the joke's on you.
The number of Americans killed in all the wars this nation has ever fought is indeed equal to roughly one per cent of all Americans alive today. This makes for questionable math and disturbing logic. It is in totalitarian societies, which demand complete mobilization, that dying for one’s country becomes the ultimate badge of honor.
It's in all societies. Except Berkeley.
Now he seemed to be saying that, since he was sent in to control the President and the President had, this time, more or less carried out his instructions, the President should not be criticized.
The President should not be criticised for disrespecting the military and the sacrifice of a soldier because he was following the advice of a general who had lost a son.
Is Gessen really unable to understand the fundamental flaw in the logic of obsessively generalizing from relevant specific cases, discarding the context and shouting, military coup?
And if so, neither do her editors or readers. This is what the left looks like now.