As Townhall has been covering, General Mark Milley has had a rough few days. His portrait was gone from the Pentagon on the same day that President Donald Trump took office, and Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth has stripped Milley of his security detail and clearance, and is looking into having the general stripped of a star for his retirement. A second portrait is also to be removed from the Pentagon. That led to lamentations from Susan Glasser, a staff writer at the New Yorker.
"The pulling down of portraits and forced erasing the past is a reminder—check your 20th century history about what kind of regimes do this stuff[,]" read her post over X on Tuesday night.
The pulling down of portraits and forced erasing the past is a reminder—check your 20th century history about what kind of regimes do this stuff… https://t.co/NDRlXPkwlj
— Susan Glasser (@sbg1) January 28, 2025
Glasser's post has been up for a little more than 24 hours, and has so far been hit with over 7,000 replies. Many more have also fired back with quoted reposts, including Vice President JD Vance.
"Imagine having lived through the last 10 years--the desecration of Washington, Jefferson, Lee, Roosevelt, and even Lincoln--and then drawing the line at...Mark Milley," Vance chimed in, offering his own response. It's not merely General Robert E. Lee, who led the Confederate Army during the Civil War who is mentioned, but also American heroes and presidents, including George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Theodore Roosevelt, and President Abraham Lincoln.
The "desecration" of statues, as Vance fittingly referred to it as, especially reached a fever pitch after wokeness hit America following the death of George Floyd. It wasn't just angry mobs going for the statues, either. The Museum of Natural History shamefully took down the statue of Roosevelt, who was a native New Yorker, in January 2022.
Imagine having lived through the last 10 years--the desecration of Washington, Jefferson, Lee, Roosevelt, and even Lincoln--and then drawing the line at...Mark Milley. https://t.co/UE6ElzSXiM
— JD Vance (@JDVance) January 29, 2025
Glasser herself has called for the removal of statues. It wasn't just Vance who called her out. Glasser's post was hit by Community Notes, with posts she herself made in years past, calling for the removal of Confederate statues and the renaming of military bases.
"Susan Glasser advocated for the pulling down of statues," Community Notes pointed out. "She also advocated for the renaming of military bases."
120 votes for Confederate statues. I thought it was 2021, not 1921. https://t.co/CUKTNtIMWN
— Susan Glasser (@sbg1) June 29, 2021
Thank you @caroranwill, for writing this, a searing essay that should be the definitive word on these Confederate monuments. Take them down now. https://t.co/Daj2rBcGZK
— Susan Glasser (@sbg1) June 28, 2020
OK, per White House press briefing: the agenda of the President apparently consists of: keeping the names of Confederate generals on US military bases and attacking a protester injured by police because the POTUS has a 'right' to 'raise questions'
— Susan Glasser (@sbg1) June 10, 2020
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