Secretary of the Navy Richard V. Spencer delivers remarks aboard the U.S. Coast Guard cutter USCGC Eagle (WIX-327) during a ceremony in Cherbourg, France, June 6, 2019. (U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist 2nd Class Jonathan Nelson/Released)r
Richard V. Spencer, former Secretary of the Navy, opined in the NYT on the lessons he learned from getting fired “for misleading Secretary of Defense Esper over the case of Chief Petty Officer Eddie Gallagher. . . .”
Reports the WSJ’s Notable & Quotable:
We wouldn’t suggest that a secretary should be a yes-man. Yet Mr. Spencer seems to be suggesting the president was “interfering.”
The idea that a president is “interfering” when he’s exercising a constitutionally granted power is one of the constitutional misconceptions under which Mr. Spencer seemed to be laboring. He discloses that he actually sent the president “a note asking him not to get involved in these questions”—meaning not to exercise his constitutional authority. What kind of individual would send such a note?
“The next day,” Mr. Spencer writes, “White House Counsel Pat Cipollone called me and said the president would remain involved.” Good for Mr. Cipollone, we say. . . .
To Mr. Spencer, this is “shocking and unprecedented”—and “a reminder that the president has very little understanding of what it means to be in the military, to fight ethically or to be governed by a uniform set of rules and practices.”
The ex-secretary seems to have no idea that the Constitution itself is part of the uniform rules that govern Mr. Trump—or any other president.
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