“I know nothing. I saw nothing. I don’t remember. I cannot say publicly.”
These are the words for Trump’s top “intelligence” officers, who made a sad public display of their knowledge void and their ability to answer questions before the Senate Intelligence Committee that could offend their benefactor, Trump.
This is the nation’s “intelligence team”–FBI Director Kash Patel, C.I.A. Director John Ratcliffe and Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard—who appeared before the Committee. Their response was pathetic to what many intelligence veterans consider a major security breach only amateurs make.
With an intelligence team like this, who needs enemies?
But despite the feeble responses from the nation’s top intelligence officials, there is a bright side: Gabbard and Ratcliff’s responses seem to shift the blame to the grossly unqualified Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth. Hegseth was a laughable choice for the post, but his right-wing Christian nationalist tattoos and FOX pedigree made him memorable to Trump.
The stage is set for round two of the internal Trump Cabinet fight between Hegseth, Gabbard, and Ratliff over who should take the blame for this gross intelligence failure. This fight will be the second one. A few weeks ago, the oligarch Elon Musk and Secretary of State Marco Rubio had an earlier fight during a Cabinet meeting, according to reports. This is what happens when you have amateurs and better-qualified people (really, only Rubio) in a Cabinet run by a sociopath and convicted criminal who controls your job.
We can look forward to the next cage match between Trump’s Cabinet. We will all watch to see who the first Trump Cabinet member is the first to walk the plank and take the fall for their incompetent boss, Trump.
But, back to the Congressional testimony.
Telling the Truth or Appeasing Trump
These Trump sycophants had to put any answers to questions the Democratic Senators asked them through two filters: the truth and how Trump would respond to their answers. This is a challenging task for anyone because they had to conform their answers to how a mentally ill boss like Trump would interpret their answers. 
That accounts for the score of “I can’t remember” answers this team made to the Senator’s questions. I can’t remember” is akin to invoking the Fifth Amendment against testifying against themselves. In this case, testifying against themselves would be the equivalent of saying, “I really don’t know what’s going on. Get me out of here. When is lunch?”
It’s not very comforting when Ratcliffe, the CIA boss, says he cannot remember. Agents are taught to remember everything they see in all the spy, FBI, and CIA movies. But Ratcliffe cannot remember much about attacking the Houthis in Yemen, which was discussed over the past week.
This is not believable, but Gabbard and Ratcliff should say they had a memory lapse rather than say they were sleeping at the time or were part of the incompetent gang running the country.
Anyone watching the testimony would say it was similar to the responses given in World 
War II movies from officers who said, “I don’t remember. I don’t know,” and, best of all, “I was only following orders.” If that sounds familiar, it should. It was the old answer given by Hitler’s military and civilian followers during WWII.
An excellent question for the Democratic Senators to ask this group was whether the CIA was planning to destabilize and invade Canada, and Greenland. The intelligence expert Malcolm Nance said this plan is in the works for Trump’s new expansionist plans. So, what will the CIA and the military do?
Invading Canada and Greenland should be the peak of Trump’s fascist foreign policy agenda, and many Americans should hit the streets if this happens.
A Carnival of Fools
According to Public Citizen, this discussion was more significant than what the TV hearings showed. Here is a list of the people involved in this discussion:
- According to reports, there were 17 feckless Trump officials involved:
JD Vance, Vice President of the United States
Marco Rubio, Secretary of State
Pete Hegseth, Secretary of Defense
Tulsi Gabbard, Director of National Intelligence
Scott Bessent, Treasury Secretary
John Ratcliffe, CIA Director
Michael Waltz, National Security Advisor
Susie Wiles, White House Chief of Staff
Stephen Miller, Homeland Security Advisor and White House Deputy Chief of Staff
All of these people are spineless Trump supporters. They left their ethics and morals in the dust years ago. If the classified information resulted in the deaths of some US troops involved in the Yemen and Houthi raids, it would not bother these people. After all, Trump has no respect for GIs, except at rallies in staged televised events.
But as for the feckless “intelligence” heads and all Republican Congressmen who are spineless Trump supporters, things will get much, much worse before they get better.
