Hegseth on the hot seat (01-14-2025--Hour1)

[00:00:04] What's going on? Thank you so much for listening to this podcast. It is heard live every day from noon to 3 on WBT Radio in Charlotte. And if you want exclusive content like invitations to events, the weekly live stream, my daily show prep with all the links, become a patron, go to thepetekalendershow.com. Make sure you hit the subscribe button, get every episode for free, right to your smartphone or tablet. And again, thank you so much for your support.

[00:00:29] I've just been watching and listening to the confirmation hearing of Pete Hegseth for Secretary of Defense. And all right, so here is this socialist guy up in wherever northeast is, Stan. Angus King.

[00:00:49] You expressed that with approval. Senator, I'm very familiar with that as a concept, having spent a year at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, guarding 700 of those that attacked us on 9-11. I just want to be clear, are we going to abide by the Geneva Convention and the prohibitions on torture or are we not? Is it going to depend on the circumstances?

[00:01:09] As I've stated multiple times, the Geneva Conventions are what we base on. But what an America First national security policy is not going to do is hand its prerogatives over to international bodies that make decisions about how our men and women make decisions on the battlefield. America First understands we send Americans for a clear mission and a clear objective. We equip them properly for that objective.

[00:01:34] We give them everything they need. And then we stand behind them with the rules of engagement that allow them to fight decisively to defeat America's enemies, which is why we say... I just have a few seconds left, Mr. Kostak, if you could... I was very disturbed in your opening statement where you talked about the priorities that you have. We will work with our partners and allies to deter aggression in the Indo-Pacific from the communist Chinese. There's not a single mention in this statement about Ukraine or Russia.

[00:02:03] Is this code for we're going to abandon Ukraine? Oh, my gosh. Senator, the president, that's a presidential-level policy decision. He's made it very clear that he would like to see an end to that conflict. We know who the aggressor is. We know who the good guy is. We'd like to see it as advantageous for the Ukrainians as possible. But that war needs to come to that. You talk a lot about deterrence of China. I would submit that Xi Jinping is watching what we do very carefully.

[00:02:26] If we abandon Ukraine, that would be the strongest signal possible to Xi Jinping that he can take Taiwan without significant resistance from this country. Thank you, Senator King. I don't know. I mean, I think maybe having like a vegetable as a president, that might also send a message to the communists. All right. So that was Angus King, Senator Angus King.

[00:02:51] Like really focusing like a laser onto this idea that Hegseth outlined in his book, talking about letting our troops go and fight and win with clear defined missions and exit strategies. So we are not bogged down in 20 plus years of war. You go in, you do the mission, you get out and that's it.

[00:03:21] Right. That's and part of that. And we heard all of these stories at the time. Right. Where. Troops on the battlefield were trying to trying to adhere to rules of engagement that made it impossible for them to carry out the mission objective for them to win.

[00:03:40] And that's what he's talking about, that you start off at the you know, with he talked about these different echelons of or layers or levels of of rules. Geneva Convention. And then you've got this, you know, the uniform military or your uniform code of military justice. You have those rules and then you have the rules of engagement.

[00:04:04] And by the time it filters all the way down through the ranks to what he when he was in the service as a major or sergeant major, he had to instruct all of the NATO troops that were coming in what the rules of engagement were. So the Hegseth knew he knows what those rules are. And he was the guy who was first in through the door, kicking down the doors in these various war zones.

[00:04:33] He knows what the practical impact of those rules of engagement are on the troops. He would go through the door. He one of the stories is that he would be first through the door. He would be the first one in. So this way, any of the people that were under his command, if they made the wrong decision, it would ruin their lives. So he would go in first. And Angus Smith or sorry, Angus King.

[00:05:04] Tries to turn this into you support waterboarding and torture. Like I thought Maisie Hirono was the village idiot that had broken containment, but it might actually be Angus King, too. Maybe. OK, maybe there are multiple villages here. They are from different sides of the country. King is from what, Maine or something. Maisie Hirono.

[00:05:30] She's unable to ask a follow up question, likely because either she's drunk. I'm kidding. It's not true. I don't know if she was or not. But like. Those questions are scripted for her, and it is so obvious because she cannot think past the question mark in the sentence. So there's this lead in. Of false assumptions and smears and stupidity because it's Maisie Hirono.

[00:05:59] There's always a heavy dose of stupidity. So you have this narrative building in the front part of the question and then a question that really isn't connected to the narrative or the smearing. And it's designed to get him to answer. Please answer yes or no. Yes or no. When did you stop beating your wife? Yes or no. Like, that doesn't even make sense, Senator. I'm going to take that as a failure to answer. And then she just moves on.

[00:06:29] So bad. Almost as bad as Senator Kristen Gillibrand, who is in, I think, a perpetual screech. I'm not sure she has another setting in her delivery. It seems like just this perpetual screeching where and her wind up, her smear assumptions go on for like five minutes or something and then makes all of these allegations and stuff.

[00:06:56] You at one point, she said that he had accused women of not being competent. And he never he never said that. But Gillibrand just says it and then moves on, says a bunch of other stuff, other stuff, other stuff, other stuff. Sorry. Other stuff, other stuff, other stuff. And then throws out a question that's detached. Why don't you want women in the military? OK, first off, I never said I don't want women in the military.

[00:07:25] Hegseth is talking about. High standards. For all of the different missions, all of the different specializations. Right. And so if you are a machine gunner, you have to be able to carry the freaking machine gun. Like that's the standard. You have to be able to carry the weight, literally carry the weight.

[00:07:50] If you cannot meet that standard, then you should not have that role. If you cannot meet the physical standards, you should not have the role that the physical standards require because the weaponry doesn't get lighter. Right. The shells, if you're in artillery, Tom Cotton mentioned this, a single artillery shell is like 100 pounds.

[00:08:19] If you can't lift that thing, then you have no business getting an MOS as an artillery ammo loader. Right. You shouldn't be able, you should not be put in charge of putting the shells into the weaponry if you cannot lift the shell. This seems so freaking basic and common sense. That only Democrats apparently on the Senate Armed Services Committee can be this obtuse.

[00:08:48] Of course, here's the thing. They are not. They just need their YouTube moment. They need to have a YouTube moment. They need to be able to cut about 20 seconds or so, 30 seconds, maybe a minute out of the, you know, the questioning. And then send it out to get the donations flowing.

[00:09:12] Same thing goes for the people that interrupted the opening statement by Pete Hegsa, which so far they have not had further interruptions. But these leftists get up there and interrupt the his opening his opening statement. And then they get removed. And the chair of the committee. Like I would not have run it like that after the first one. I would have said next one.

[00:09:41] Anybody who does this, you're you're getting arrested. We're pressing charges. You're getting arrested. And if it happens again for the second time, I'm clearing the room. Everybody out. Especially if you are wearing pink. Because you could see who these people were. They were all code pinkers. They were all there dressed up in their silly little clown costumes. All dressed in pink with stupid looking glass.

[00:10:10] Actually, that is on trend now apparently. It's the big thick frames for the liberal women. I don't know why they. I don't know why. But like that. So. And they got these silly hats on and stuff. Like. I can tell who's going to disrupt this meeting. It's them. It's the code pink people that have been doing it for 20 years. Oh. Elizabeth Warren. Speaking of illicit idiots. In this role.

[00:10:37] Now, I've been trying to get answers from you for quite some time on this. You haven't wanted to meet or to answer any of my questions. So we'll just have to do it here. And dive in. Yeah. I want to pick up on some of the questions asked by Senator Shaheen and Jill Brand and Hirono. And I just want to make sure. About the women in the military again. The facts that I think are undisputed. I'm not going to talk about anonymous sources. I'm just going to quote you directly. We've got the video. We've got it in print.

[00:11:03] So going back to January 2013, you told a Fox News interviewer that women in the military simply couldn't measure up to men in the military saying that allowing women to serve in combat roles would force the military to lower the bar. You picked up on that same theme in 2015, making remarks on Fox News. You see what they're doing? They're conflating every single MOS. Every single. Because he talks also in his book about people he has served, women he has served with, who

[00:11:35] served bravely, courageously, were awesome teammates, has no bad words about them. He's talking about specific things. And if you are like if you meet the standard, you can do any job. If you can't meet the standard, you should not be doing the job. And the military should not be lowering the standards in order to juice the stats, in order to get more people into those jobs with the lower standards.

[00:12:04] That's what he's been talking about. I think it's pretty clear. And maybe the Democrats do, too, and that's why they're just conflating all of this stuff together. Here's a great idea. How about making an escape to a really special and secluded getaway in western North Carolina, just a quick drive up the mountain? And Cabins of Asheville is your connection. Whether you're celebrating an anniversary, a honeymoon, maybe you want to plan a memorable proposal, or get family and friends together for a big ol' reunion, Cabins of Asheville

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[00:13:32] Hello, Pete. I wanted to just touch on the Hegseth nomination. It's a Democrat playbook. Pete Hegseth could have literally won a war by himself, and they would still say that he would be worse than Hitler. And they're all going to come out and say every bad thing that can be said.

[00:14:01] The Republicans are going to be like, guys, we have to be nice. No, we don't. This is war on a different scale than what Pete's done, but this is war. We need to politically destroy anyone who is against making the military as lethal and as efficient as possible. Well, that's been the message that Hegseth has been hammering.

[00:14:27] Republicans have not taken the position that you said you're worried that they're taking. They've all been, even Joni Ernst, they had a cordial exchange, and she was one of the Republicans that they were saying she may not support him. So, yeah, I mean, it looks like the Republicans are, they're not going to be abandoning Hegseth, at least so far as what I can tell.

[00:14:52] So they're not going to abandon him, but they're going to, but they're not going to come out and fight with the same fervor that the Democrats have. They're going to be like. Well, it's always easier to attack. I mean, when Republicans were in the minority, it's always easier to savage and to go after somebody, you know, easier to go on the offense than it is to defend, you know, somebody because you've got to just listen to the allegations and people hear them and they're like, oh, my gosh, that's so bad.

[00:15:21] So it's easier to just throw the smears out there. And Lord knows there's been enough of them that have been reported against Pete Hegseth. He's not done himself a lot of favors with some of the stories and some of the history. Now, not all of the stuff that has been reported has been true. So that's and he keeps saying that as well. Those are anonymous, false allegations. He keeps saying it and Democrats just don't hear him say it. So, John, I appreciate the call. All right. I hope you had a happy holiday season.

[00:15:49] But tell me if something like this happened at your house, your family and friends are gathered around. Maybe y'all are in the living room. You're laughing, swapping stories, reminiscing. And then somebody says, hey, dad, remember those old VHS tapes? Did you ever get them transferred? And then the room gets all quiet. All eyes are on dad who says, oh, you know, well, I've been meaning to. But I just haven't gotten around to it. Look, don't let those priceless memories sit in a box for another year. All right.

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[00:16:43] Trust the experts at Create A Video, conveniently located in Mint Hill, right off I-485, and online at createavideo.com. We are going to run a little bit of a test here. Find out if C-SPAN's pause feature works well on its live feed. In other words, when watching a live feed, if I press pause, does it actually pause the video?

[00:17:07] And upon resumption of playing, will it skip ahead to the live portion or will it play the part that I paused? Which in this case is Elizabeth Warren, U.S. Senator from Massachusetts, famous fake Indian. And she's asking Hegseth here about his call for generals to not go to work for defense

[00:17:35] industry companies for 10 years after retirement. Mr. Hegseth, you have written that after they retire, generals should be banned from working for the defense industry for 10 years. You and I agree on the corrosive effects of the revolving door between the Pentagon and defense contractors. It's something I would have liked to talk to you about if you'd come and been willing to visit with me. But the question I have for you on this is, will you put your money where your mouth is

[00:18:02] and agree that when you leave this job, you will not work for the defense industry for 10 years? Senator, it's not even a question I've thought about. Because it's not one that- You can think about it right now. It's not one that my motivation for this job- I understand that. I just need a yes or no year. Has never been about what could conceivably come next. Time is short. I just need a yes or no. I would consult with the president about what the policy should be at the defense department.

[00:18:26] In other words, you're quite sure that every general who serves should not go directly into the defense industry for 10 years? You're not willing to make that same pledge? I'm not a general, Senator. You'll be the one- Let us just be clear- in charge of the generals. So you're saying, sauce for the goose, but certainly not sauce for the gander? I would want to see what the policy of the president is. Oh, I'll bet you would.

[00:18:56] Thank you, Senator Warren. Senator Tuberville. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thanks for your hard work and your committee's hard work, Mr. Chairman. This has gone well. I'd like to submit this letter, topic conduct at Vets for Freedom, for Hexeth. I'd like to submit that for the record, please. Without objection. General Hexeth, I mean Mr. Hexeth. Thanks for being here today. All right.

[00:19:25] So anybody else note the irony of who is asking the question about cashing in on a title? Tim Young, who's a comedian. You can find him. I think he does a podcast. But I don't see. Anyway, Tim Young. He does a podcast, and you can find him on Twitter or X.

[00:19:54] At Tim Runs His Mouth. That's his name. Tim Runs His Mouth. So Tim Young. He points out that Elizabeth Warren questions whether or not Pete Hexeth would cash in on the Secretary of Defense job. Keep in mind, she lied about being a Native American to cash in. And just the other day, she tweeted an ActBlue link, pretending it was a charity for victims of the Los Angeles wildfires.

[00:20:22] This is what makes this whole thing so farcical. They are obviously coordinating. Democrats are using their female senators on the committee to ask about the women in combat roles. Just, you know, they keep asking the same questions over and over and over again. That staffers obviously wrote and coordinated.

[00:20:44] And then they've got Tim Kaine and the male senators asking the questions about the allegations of sexual abuse. Somebody, I guess it was, it was Maisie Hirono who asked about the NDA. Has he ever, she started doing this, I think, during the Brett Kavanaugh hearings.

[00:21:09] So she says she always asks everybody who comes before the committee for a confirmation hearing. She always asks them, have you ever been accused of, you know, being told no, rape, okay, sexual assault. Has anybody ever accused you of this or have you ever done this sort of thing? And Hexeth says no. And then she asks, have you ever had anybody sign an NDA to cover it up?

[00:21:36] And once again, like those types of agreements, it's like surely she knows. Even somebody as shallow as Hirono knows that people in powerful positions that have money, or at least it's perceived that they have money, get accused of things that they did not do. And then they get basically extorted.

[00:22:06] That's what Hexeth's lawyer said. Hexeth's lawyer says that this was basically extortion. That they, he, he was on Fox News. He has money because he's on Fox. And so you accuse him of something and then you sue him or you say I'm going to go public or something. They then write a check. You sign the non-disclosure agreement and then they're not allowed to talk about it.

[00:22:33] They can't make any more accusations against you in public. They can't continue to lob these allegations. That's what you're paying for. And the people who make false allegations know this. That's why they do it. It's for the money when it's not true, right? When people make these types of false allegations against powerful, prominent, rich people, it is for the money. That's the point.

[00:23:02] And it's just cheaper and easier to pay them a check and have them go away. I don't like it. I don't know if, I mean, I, well, I'm not rich, but then again, people may think I am because I'm on the radio, which tells me they know nothing about radio. But the amount of time and turmoil it would take and the expense, right?

[00:23:30] So you can either spend a hundred, $200,000 in legal bills. It take five years to litigate, get dragged through the courts, drag through the media. Or you write them a check for $20,000. I don't know what the going rate for hush money is. Maybe we could ask Stormy Daniels. But you pay the money and they go away and then you move on with your life. You keep going and you're not happy about it.

[00:24:00] I don't like the fact that I had to write the check, but it's a cheaper alternative in every category except the one which is where you have to pay for something you didn't do. But when you talk to people who are in that level of wealth, in that income bracket, they know that this is essentially a cost of not doing business. It's a cost of living.

[00:24:29] Just like a security detail when you become famous. It's one of the things that you have to pay for. And again, I don't like it. But that's what he's saying. And for some reason, Democrats don't understand it, which is weird because I know there's a whole boatload of members of Congress that had to pay out these NDAs too. Like if I'm up there, I'd be like, well, why don't you guys release the list of all the NDAs? Y'all have had people sign for you in exchange for the payoffs, right? Haven't members of Congress been extorted in the same way?

[00:24:59] Or are they all guilty too? Why don't you release the list of all of them? All right. If you're listening to this show, you know I try to keep up with all sorts of current events. And I know you do too. And you've probably heard me say, get your news from multiple sources. Why? Well, because it's how you detect media bias, which is why I've been so impressed with Ground News. It's an app and it's a website and it combines news from around the world in one place. So you can compare coverage and verify information.

[00:25:26] You can check it out at check.ground.news slash Pete. I put the link in the podcast description too. I started using Ground News a few months ago and more recently chose to work with them as an affiliate because it lets me see clearly how stories get covered and by whom. The Blind Spot feature shows you which stories get ignored by the left and the right. See for yourself. Check.ground.news slash Pete.

[00:25:53] Subscribe through that link and you'll get 15% off any subscription. I use the Vantage plan to get unlimited access to every feature. Your subscription then not only helps my podcast, but it also supports Ground News as they make the media landscape more transparent. All right, back to the Senate hearing. This is now Tammy Duckworth. So first off, as I mentioned earlier, Democratic senators at the hearing have coordinated their questioning.

[00:26:23] And now she's going to use that coordination to attack Pete Hegseth, the Secretary of Defense nominee. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Senator Duckworth, you're recognized. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And also Secretary Mattis had to have this waiver as well. Mr. Hegseth, this hearing is about whether you are qualified to be Secretary of Defense. And one of the qualifications to answer my colleague's question is to actually win the votes of every member of this committee

[00:26:51] and to be confirmed by the United States Senate. Okay, that's not true. That's a lie. A nominee does not need to win the support of every member of this committee. That's not true. They need to be confirmed by the Senate, but that also does not require a unanimous vote. Just needs a majority. That's it. And you need to convince us that you're worthy of that vote because the people of the state of Illinois voted for me to be their senator

[00:27:19] so that I could cast that vote when it comes to picking who is going to be the next Secretary of Defense. Also not true. He doesn't need to convince you. He doesn't need to convince all the Democrats, who, by the way, have a long history of not supporting the nominees of Republican presidents during these hearings. Republicans, on the other hand, do. But here we go.

[00:27:44] This hearing now seems to be a hearing about whether or not women are qualified to serve in combat and not about whether or not you are qualified to be Secretary of Defense. The reason why that the hearing has become that is because of your fellow Democrats who keep asking about this topic. And now she's using their focus, the Democrats' focus on this issue, as if he has made this the focus of the hearing.

[00:28:14] I suspect he would rather it not be the focus. And let me just say that the American people need a sec def who's ready to lead on day one. You are not that person. Our adversaries watch closely during times of transition. And any sense that the Department of Defense that keeps us safe is being steered by someone who is wholly unprepared for the job puts America at risk. And I am not willing to do that. With that in mind, Mr. Hexeth, I want you to try to explain to the American people,

[00:28:41] this committee, who have to vote for you, and to our troops who are deployed around the world, why you are qualified to lead the Department of Defense. We already know that you've only led the largest 200-person organization. We already know that you so badly mangled a budget that after you left, they had to bring in a forensic accountant to figure out what went wrong. And the largest budget you ever managed was about $18 billion.

[00:29:06] You know, that is about 51,560 times fewer, lower than the Department of Defense budget of $825 billion. Okay, I don't even know if she knows what she just said there. $16 million is 51,568 times smaller than the defense budget. Please describe to me, Mr. Hexeth, you talk about DOD passing an audit.

[00:29:33] Please describe to me a time or an organization that you led underwent an audit. Because you say you're going to hire smarter people than you to run this audit. I'm not asking you to be an accountant. I want you to be able to tell me what kind of guidance will be given to those employees, what will happen whether or not you pass that audit. Have you led an audit of any organization, yes or no? I don't want a long answer, yes or no. Have you led an audit of any organization of which you were in charge?

[00:30:01] Senator, in both of the organizations I ran, we were always completely fiscally responsible Yes or no, did you lead an audit? And the way my leadership has been stated has been completely mischaracterized. What are you afraid of? You can't answer this question. Yes or no, did you lead an audit? Do you not know this answer? Senator, every part of my leadership of these organizations has been misrepresented from top to bottom. That's a senator just screaming at a candidate, a nominee. All right, that'll do it for this episode.

[00:30:31] Thank you so much for listening. I could not do the show without your support and the support of the businesses that advertise on the podcast. So if you'd like, please support them too and tell them you heard it here. You can also become a patron at my Patreon page or go to thepcalendorshow.com. Again, thank you so much for listening and don't break anything while I'm gone. Thank you.