On the menu: Going nuclear; Fore!; Newsom uses Trump to get back in Dems’ good graces; Moonbeam to moderate?; Masked bandit
America’s largest military base has had four names in the past five years.
In 2023, the Biden administration rechristened the base in North Carolina as Fort Liberty, replacing the name given to it in 1918 by resentful Southerners in the Army who honored Confederate Gen. Braxton Bragg.
In early 2025, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said that it would be Fort Bragg again, but with a twist. It would be for Roland Bragg, a hero paratrooper from Maine who served in World War II, rather than the bumbling Confederate general.
Then this week, President Trump undid the twist and made it plain that the base, and all the others named for Confederates that had been changed by Trump’s predecessor, were going back to their original namesakes.
And he did it as part of what could only be described as political speech at Fort Bragg to an audience of soldiers who were screened for their political allegiances and responded with wild cheers for Trump’s attacks on his political rivals.
It all put me in mind of the Immovable Ladder of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem. Acclaimed since at least the fourth century as the site of the tomb of Jesus of Nazareth, the church building has been under the joint governance of Greek, Coptic, Ethiopian and Syriac Orthodox sects, the Armenian Apostolic church and the Roman Catholics since the days of the Ottomans.
Outside a window on the second story of the church, there is a rough, wooden ladder that has been there since at least 1721. No one knows when or why the ladder was placed there, but they do know that under the uneasy power-sharing arrangement between the sects, no one has the unilateral authority to move it, nor can anyone obtain the unanimous consent necessary to do so licitly. So fearful are the custodians of the church that any violations of the truce will end in rupture or even violence, that they do nothing. And so, the ladder has sat in the dry desert air for longer than the United States has been a nation.
Now, you can’t run a nation like a pilgrimage church, and certainly not a nation’s military. A lot more than ladders have to get moved to keep the planet’s apex power in position. But the ladder does, ahem, lead up to a valuable way of thinking about how to treat even minor issues when tensions and stakes are high. When things can be left alone, it is often wise to leave them be.
The re-Confederate-ing of the military bases in the South is a small thing on its own, but so was their vestigial connection to the Confederacy in the first place. Other than Fort Robert E. Lee in Virginia, none of the other namesakes had lingered on in popular memory, except for perhaps Bragg’s fellow bungler, George Pickett, most famous for a failed infantry charge. Joe Biden could have left those ladders leaning, but wanted to make a point. Now Trump has made the counterpoint, and we might expect that the next Democratic president may want to make the counter-counterpoint.
None of that will make the American military better, but it will make it more political, and that’s very bad news.
Americans have long been suspicious about the idea of having a large standing army. One of the reasons it took us so long to get into the fray in World War II was that public sentiment demanded a nearly complete demobilization after World War I. For most of American history, the idea that there would be more than a million active-duty troops stationed inside the borders of the United States would have been a very unappealing one. Standing armies are expensive and, as the history of the world shows with crushing frequency, dangerous to the liberty of citizens.
And yet, America’s military is massively popular. An impressive 79 percent of U.S. adults said in a recent poll that they have confidence in the military to act in the public’s best interests. Compare that with just 22 percent for the federal government as a whole, 47 percent for the Supreme Court, 26 percent for the presidency and 9 percent for Congress.
It might be said that our military is the only federal institution that is actually succeeding these days, but certainly it is the only part of it that is broadly popular, enjoying strong public support regardless of which party is in power at any given time.
That is because in the era of large standing armies since the start of the Cold War and especially since the institution of the all-volunteer force after the Vietnam War, our civilian and military leaders have worked very hard to keep politics out of the military. Even as the greedy goblins of partisanship ripped the wiring out of every other institution that worked, the military has stood apart.
Lots of bad things happen in countries when the military is the only stable part of the government, but our highly professional, scrupulously restrained, civilian-controlled military has done an exceptionally good job of staying out of domestic politics. But now, domestic politics has stopped returning the favor.
Trump’s decision to host a massive military demonstration in the streets of Washington on Saturday would have been a dubious choice under any circumstances. The occasion is the Army’s 250th birthday, which also happens to fall on the president’s 79th birthday. Trump will review a force of 6,600 troops and 150 vehicles including Abrams tanks, Paladins and Strykers, as well as Black Hawk, Apache and Chinook helicopters overhead as they pass in front of the White House.
It’s something Trump wanted in his first term, but was refused by military leaders who said it would be too expensive and send the wrong message about the military’s relationship to the government. Rolling tanks through the capital city just isn’t something Americans typically do, until now.
Also in the category of Trump this week realizing unachieved goals from his first term is his mobilization of the military to suppress riots. In the summer of 2020, Trump was stymied in his efforts to use military force to smash the riots that followed in the wake of the George Floyd protests. The protesters in Los Angeles, and the copycats that one assumes will follow at other protests against federal deportation raids, have given Trump the chance to finish another unrealized goal of his first term.
You may think what Trump is doing with the protesters and rioters is correct, and it may even end up being considered legal, but the timing sure does stink.
Does anyone imagine that, rightly or wrongly, the bipartisan esteem for the military won’t take a hit in all this? Setting up clashes between the Marines and Americans at the same time as the president held a political rally for himself at an Army base and just ahead of a massive military parade down Constitution Avenue doesn’t exactly reinforce the idea of an apolitical military.
Indeed, one of the best reasons to not politicize the military is so that when a commander in chief has to use our forces in controversial ways, it can be free of any taint. If you want to be able to send the Marines to Compton, you’d better pass on the political spectacles.
Biden’s name games with the bases or the use of the military to advance domestic political issues certainly didn’t help. He moved the ladder, and now Trump is picking it up and smashing it through a window. If our political leaders keep at this, we will end up with what Americans for so long feared: a partisan military. No good can ever come of that.
Holy croakano! We welcome your feedback, so please email us with your tips, corrections, reactions, amplifications, etc. at WHOLEHOGPOLITICS@GMAIL.COM . If you’d like to be considered for publication, please include your real name and hometown. If you don’t want your comments to be made public, please specify.
NUTRITIONAL INFORMATION
Trump Job Performance
Average Approval: 42%
Average Disapproval: 53.6%
Net Score: -11.6 points
Change from one week ago: -1.7 points
Change from one month ago: -0.4 points
[Average includes: Gallup: 43% approve – 53% disapprove; Ipsos/Reuters: 42% approve – 52% disapprove; Marquette: 46% approve – 54% disapprove; ARG: 41% approve – 55% disapprove; Quinnipiac University: 38% approve – 54% disapprove]
Americans going nuclear
Do you favor or oppose more nuclear power plants to generate electricity?
Now
Favor: 59%
Oppose: 39%
Spring of 2021
Favor: 50%
Oppose: 47%
Spring of 2016
Favor: 43%
Oppose: 54%
ON THE SIDE: LAYING OUT OF SAM SNEAD’S BUNKER
As the most venerable of all American golf tournaments gets underway, writer Brody Miller goes digging for a central piece of lore. The Athletic: “There’s a story about Oakmont Country Club the members love to tell. And they’re right to tell it. Because it’s the perfect story about the hardest golf course in America, the place just outside of Pittsburgh that is hosting the U.S. Open this week. It’s the perfect story about the Fownes family, the father and son who built this course and believed so deeply in the sanctity of par that the famous W.C. Fownes’ line goes: ‘A shot poorly played should be a shot irrevocably lost.’ And this story? The people of Oakmont always believed it to be factual. Until very recently. ‘Well …’ Oakmont historian David Moore says with a chuckle. ‘There’s a little debate about that right now.’ It goes like this …”
PRIME CUTS
In Trump showdown, Newsom gets chance to dispel notions of appeasement: NBC News: “The battle between the president and the governor of the country’s largest state instantly turned [Gavin Newsom] into the face of resistance to President Donald Trump’s expansive interpretation of the authorities of his office and mass-deportation campaign. Newsom, who is a potential 2028 Democratic presidential candidate, has been taking heavy criticism from within his own party over his efforts — in part through his new podcast — to cast himself in the role of conciliator. … On Monday, California sued Trump for using emergency powers to deploy National Guard troops to the Los Angeles area over the weekend. Trump, citing a statute that allows the president to activate the guard to repel a foreign invasion or quell a rebellion, accused Newsom and Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass of failing to protect federal agents and property from demonstrators.”
Cuomo nabs Bloomberg backing with less than two weeks to go: New York Times: “Former Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg on Tuesday announced that he was backing former Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo in the New York City mayor’s race, giving Mr. Cuomo an endorsement coveted by many of the Democratic candidates in the race. Mr. Bloomberg has a long record of helping Democratic candidates. … But he has mostly avoided endorsing mayoral candidates at the primary level in New York City, making his backing of Mr. Cuomo more notable. … The endorsement may also persuade some undecided voters who have criticisms of Mr. Cuomo’s handling of the pandemic or who may have misgivings over his sexual harassment scandal, which led to his resignation as governor of New York in 2021. … Mr. Cuomo has led in polls ahead of the June 24 Democratic primary. But he has faced a surprisingly strong challenge from Zohran Mamdani, a state lawmaker from Queens and a democratic socialist. The endorsement comes two days before the second and final candidate debate on Thursday. Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez endorsed Mr. Mamdani last week, and polls show the race narrowing.”
Voters don’t find beauty in Trump’s big bill: The Hill: “More than half of voters oppose the domestic policy bill that President Trump has pushed Republicans in Congress to pass by July 4, according to a poll released Wednesday. Quinnipiac University’s national survey found less than a third of registered voters surveyed support Trump’s agenda-setting One Big Beautiful Bill Act, while 53 percent oppose the legislation.”
New Jersey gubernatorial race set for Ciattarelli and Sherrill: Associated Press: “Republican Jack Ciattarelli, who had President Donald Trump’s endorsement, and Democratic Rep. Mikie Sherrill won their primary elections in New Jersey’s race for governor, setting the stage for a November election, poised to be fought in part over affordability and the president’s policies… New Jersey has been reliably Democratic in Senate and presidential contests for decades. But the odd-year races for governor have tended to swing back and forth, and each of the last three GOP governors has won a second term.”
SHORT ORDER
Daughter of longtime Maine Rep. Chellie Pingree (D) joins crowded Democratic gubernatorial primary—WMTW
After Tennessee Rep. Mark Green (R) announces plan to quit, a crowded field forms—Tennessee Lookout
Youngkin sets Sept. 9 special election to fill Connolly’s seat in Congress—Virginia Mercury
Iowa state Sen. Zach Wahls (D) announces challenge to Republican Sen. Joni Ernst—The Hill
TABLE TALK
‘Gonna be a rumble out on the promenade.’
“The voters know who I am.” — Atlantic City, N.J., Mayor Marty Small Sr. explaining his primary victory in his reelection campaign, despite facing multiple criminal indictments along with his wife, Atlantic City School District Superintendent La’Quetta Small. Mayor Small has been in office since 2019, when his predecessor resigned after pleading guilty to wire fraud.
MAILBAG
“Democrats should run the closest carbon copy of former California Gov. Jerry Brown that they can find: if not the 87-year-old man himself. Jerry transformed himself from Governor Moonbeam to a wise, fiscally responsible leader. After seven years in office, Brown turned a $27 million deficit into a $13.8 billion rainy day fund, which [Gov. Gavin Newsom] has quickly blown through, bringing us to a $12 billion deficit. As an American and conservative Republican, I would have no problem voting for a Jerry act-alike.” — Peter S. Krimmell, Glendora, Calif.
Mr. Krimmell,
I think that is very much what your current governor has in mind! National Republicans scoff and sneer at Newsom’s recent reinvention as a foe of the excesses of wokeness and socialism, but he seems very much to have in mind a Brown-like reinvention. It certainly doesn’t match with his record, especially on the fiscal matter to which you refer, but he would hardly be the first politician to undergo an ideological overhaul before seeking public office. Newsom’s may be jarring to Republicans, but if he could somehow get through a progressive-leaning Democratic primary electorate (a big if), it might be hard to convince persuadable voters that he, a career-long flip-flopper, was actually a true believer in anything.
Newsom’s career prior to 2018 as member of the board of supervisors and then mayor in San Francisco or as Brown’s lieutenant governor all point to a kind of squishy, corporatist, Clintonite Democrat. It seems much more believable that he was faking his radicalism in service of his ambitions within a radicalizing state party than that he had simply been suppressing his inner extremist for the previous 20 years.
If the current and no doubt extended showdown with the Trump administration gives Newsom sufficient standing with the left, he might find it possible to shift his policy positions back to the center without disqualifying himself entirely with the Democrats’ activist base. Donald Trump’s rapid public ideological positioning from moderate Democrat to Reform Party to conservative Republican to pure populism suggests that many voters care little about consistency if they have a strong emotional attachment to the candidate.
The more likely outcome is that Newsom will trip on his shoelaces amid all that fancy footwork, but stranger things have happened.
All best,
c
“I don’t always agree with your conclusions but very much appreciate your view of both sides of an issue. Do you ever do personal appearances and public presentations? Also, what is ‘Holy Croakano.’” — J. Stan Carpenter, Concord, N.C.
Mr. Carpenter,
I do get around a good bit for speeches and talks at colleges, etc. I don’t know of anything near you or in the Charlotte area anytime soon, but keep a lookout.
The more important question, though, is about croakano!
I don’t have a sufficient etymology for the word — pronounced kind of like volcano: cro-kuh-no. It is an excited utterance or interjection: a mild oath used in place of a more vulgar or blasphemous word.
It came to me as a county colloquialism used by my father and, at least, his father before him in Cumberland County, Ill. Did they even have it when my branch of the Stirewalts left North Carolina in the 1820s? Who knows? There was a popular Canadian board game from the 19th century called crokinole, the name for which is thought to be from the French word croquignole, for a small biscuit.
How that would have made itself into croakano and gotten to the crossroads town of Timothy, Ill., circa 1900 I couldn’t guess, or it may be a false lead altogether. But as always, I invite you and all our readers to share the regional or family linguistic gems that you treasure with us so we can try to keep them alive.
Yours in word nerddom,
c
You should email us! Write to WHOLEHOGPOLITICS@GMAIL.COM with your tips, kudos, criticisms, insights, rediscovered words, wonderful names, recipes, and, always, good jokes. Please include your real name—at least first and last—and hometown. Make sure to let us know in the email if you want to keep your submission private. My colleague, the daring Meera Sehgal, and I will look for your emails and then share the most interesting ones and my responses here. Clickety clack!
FOR DESSERT
Dr. Doolittle, Kentucky style
WHAS: “A man from Murray, Kentucky, was arrested last week after police say he released a raccoon inside a business. This comes just months after the same man was arrested for attempting to evade police officers on a mule. On June 6, 2025, Murray Police Department responded to a call that a person had intentionally released a raccoon into an open business, and that he had fled the scene. Soon after, officers initiated a traffic stop on Jonathan Mason, 40. According to police, he refused to roll down his windows or exit his vehicle. Officers physically removed Mason from the vehicle. Investigators learned the raccoon that was released into the business bit a person, and that Mason was previously warned that he was not allowed on the property of the business.”
Chris Stirewalt is the politics editor for The Hill and NewsNation, the host of The Hill Sunday on NewsNation and The CW, a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and the author of books on politics and the media. MeeraSehgalcontributed to this report.
