During the interview, [https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2019/10/james-mattis-trump/596665/] several attempts are made at getting Mattis to speak more candidly about Trump.
An excerpt,
In mid-august I checked in with Mattis, to see whether events over the summer?Trump?s attack on four congresswomen of color; his attack on Representative Elijah Cummings; his attacks on other minorities; his endorsement-by-tweet of the North Korean dictator?s ?great and beautiful vision? for his country; the El Paso massacre, conducted by a white supremacist whose words echoed those often used by Trump and his supporters when discussing immigration?might have led him to reconsider his decorous approach to public criticism of the president.
About El Paso he said: ?You know, on that day we were all Hispanics. That?s the way we have to think about this. If it happens to any one of us, it happens to all of us.?
But about this treacherous political moment?
?You?ve got to avoid looking at what?s happening in isolation from everything else,? he said. ?We can?t hold what Trump is doing in isolation. We?ve got to address the things that put him there in the first place.? Mattis speaks often about affection: the affection that commanders feel for their soldiers, and that soldiers ought to feel for one another?and the affection that Americans should feel for one another and for their country but often, these days, don?t. ? ?With malice toward none, with charity for all,? ? he said. ?Lincoln said that in the middle of a war. In the middle of a war! He could see beyond the hatred of the moment.?
I thought back to what he?d told me earlier in the summer, when I had asked him to describe something Trump could say or do that would trigger him to launch a frontal attack on the president. He?d demurred, as I had expected. But then he?d issued a caveat: ?There is a period in which I owe my silence. It?s not eternal. It?s not going to be forever.?
I wonder how long we?ll have to wait for his more definitive assessment. Hopefully before the election.
An excerpt,
In mid-august I checked in with Mattis, to see whether events over the summer?Trump?s attack on four congresswomen of color; his attack on Representative Elijah Cummings; his attacks on other minorities; his endorsement-by-tweet of the North Korean dictator?s ?great and beautiful vision? for his country; the El Paso massacre, conducted by a white supremacist whose words echoed those often used by Trump and his supporters when discussing immigration?might have led him to reconsider his decorous approach to public criticism of the president.
About El Paso he said: ?You know, on that day we were all Hispanics. That?s the way we have to think about this. If it happens to any one of us, it happens to all of us.?
But about this treacherous political moment?
?You?ve got to avoid looking at what?s happening in isolation from everything else,? he said. ?We can?t hold what Trump is doing in isolation. We?ve got to address the things that put him there in the first place.? Mattis speaks often about affection: the affection that commanders feel for their soldiers, and that soldiers ought to feel for one another?and the affection that Americans should feel for one another and for their country but often, these days, don?t. ? ?With malice toward none, with charity for all,? ? he said. ?Lincoln said that in the middle of a war. In the middle of a war! He could see beyond the hatred of the moment.?
I thought back to what he?d told me earlier in the summer, when I had asked him to describe something Trump could say or do that would trigger him to launch a frontal attack on the president. He?d demurred, as I had expected. But then he?d issued a caveat: ?There is a period in which I owe my silence. It?s not eternal. It?s not going to be forever.?
I wonder how long we?ll have to wait for his more definitive assessment. Hopefully before the election.
