Senate panel overwhelmingly approves Trump Pentagon pick

[Miles Archer]

Source: Reuters

The U.S. Senate Armed Services Committee voted overwhelmingly on Wednesday to recommend President-elect Donald Trump's pick for Secretary of Defense, retired Marine General James Mattis.

The committee voted 26-1 to back Mattis' nomination when it is received by the full Senate from Trump after he is sworn in as president. As a result, Mattis' nomination will be sent directly to the Senate for a vote without referral to the committee.

The identity of the senator who voted against Mattis was not immediately available.

Congress cleared the way for Mattis' quick confirmation last week by backing a waiver that would allow him to lead the Pentagon despite retiring from active duty as a Marine general only in 2013.

Read more: http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-congress-mattis-idUSKBN1522V9?utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=Social

[skylucy]

1. I am ok with this. I do wonder how long Gen. Mattis will last before Trump fires him since he

is not a Putin loving, traitorous, nutjob.

[tenorly]

3. My thoughts exactly.

How far down the line of succession is Gen. Mattis? Considering the choices we've been left with, I'd gladly take him as our next President at this point.

[eggplant]

6. 6th.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_line_of_succession

Cabinet officers are in line according to the chronological order of their department's creation, or the department of which their department is the successor (the Department of Defense being successor to the Department of War and the Department of Health and Human Services being successor to the Department of Health, Education and Welfare).[

[tenorly]

8. Thanks!

So it's King Con, Mike Putz, Eddie Munster, Orrin Bitch, Rex Putinson, and Goldman Sucks.

Is there an asshole convention they could all be sent to overseas somewhere?

[INdemo]

9. He can cahnge quickly and suckup to Trump

to keep his job and just love Putin..thats how it is with Republcians

[Dopers_Greed]

2. The only respectable Dumpf pick?

Or at least the only non-Putin lackey?

[haele]

7. Both. Funny thing is that he was picked for his nickname.

So far as I know, he's not known to be an Oafkeeper or an End-timer.
The people I know who worked with him both in the military and in civilian world indicates he's as much into strategy as he is tactics - so policies he would pursue would be oriented to ones that would actually impact missions and mission readiness, - policies that help the troops, not fancy costly technology that looks good but can't be used. For all his faults (and there are many - Theranos is a major problem he still hasn't shaken), he still would have probably ended up on the short list for a SecDef nominee made by any number of potential 2020 Democratic Presidents - well, unless the problems with Theranos will have dragged him down.

He's more like Patton than McArthur or Marshall, which means he's probably not going to last very long in either a Trump or a Pence administration.

Haele

[IronLionZion]

4. Gen. Mattis is the most sensible appointee Trump has made yet

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Mattis

Gen. Flynn on the other hand is a complete nutjob pretending to be a conservative Democrat

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_T._Flynn#Political_views

[nycbos]

5. Exactly.

Mattis a reasonable guy.


Flynn however is like Gen. Ripper from Dr. Strangelove.

[Joanie Baloney]

10. Totally!

This has been in my mind since I saw Flynn peering behind Trump at the Mar e Lago compound.

:shudder:

-JB

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

11. He's probably the least bad of the whole sorry bunch

of Trump cabinet nominees. At least he seems to have enough sense to try to keep Trump from starting WWIII because he thought some world leader disrespected him on Twitter.

[weissmam]

12. actually

he is not a total train wreck