There is a wise old Mark Twain anecdote where, trying to express how swiftly one’s views change — especially as an adolescent — a man says essentially that when he was 14 years old he was appalled at how ignorant his father was, but that by the time he turned 21 he was amazed at how much his father had learned in just seven years.
Seven years, then, can be a long time — and that’s relevant because it happens to be the amount of time in between when SecDef nominee Pete Hegseth‘s mother wrote to him telling him she was appalled that he was a habitual abuser of women and when the same mother went on Fox News saying that her son’s character was tip-top, and that he was the man for the job.
Hegseth’s nomination seems to be gaining momentum from the same strategy that helped Donald Trump gain electoral momentum — his critics can’t keep track of, or keep the emphasis on, one particular part of his conduct that is potentially disqualifying. Is it his alleged drinking? His alleged abuse of women? His serial philandering? His tattoos with their white supremacy associations?
[NOTE: If opposition to something contains too many elements, it can feel too broad and be painted — as MAGA, and especially Vice President-elect JD Vance are busy doing — as mere character assassination.]
You sent Hegseth’s mom on tv to make a self-serving correction that did nothing to discredit her email but instead argued that he’s changed in the last seven years and now is not an abuser of women.
We’re supposed to disbelieve a private email and believe a staged tv interview? https://t.co/Iy3nWELT2C
— Daniel Goldman (@danielsgoldman) December 5, 2024
In his opposition to Hegseth, Congressman Daniel Goldman (D-NY) is focused on making the nominee’s alleged treatment of women the disqualifying factor — and Goldman’s response to Vance above characterizes Hegseth’s mother’s change of heart as “staged” and therefore a less reliable testimony that the emotional email she sent seven years ago.
Both Goldman and Vance are highly educated lawyers (Stanford, Yale) who know which kind of testimony is given greater weight at trials — and it’s usually the in-the-moment reaction offered in private, not the hindsight vision that is vulnerable to shaping by manipulators and regret.
“You sent Hegseth’s mom on tv to make a self-serving correction that did nothing to discredit her email but instead argued that he’s changed in the last seven years and now is not an abuser of women,” Goldman writes. “We’re supposed to disbelieve a private email and believe a staged tv interview?”