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I give ZERO f’s.
Zero think tanks employ merchant mariners. We have zero veteran benefits that can be pulled. We get zero ribbons or salutes. Only one of us this century has gotten an appointment.
We don’t get speaking gigs, book deals, meet-and-greets with senators, fellowships, trips, or gala award dinners.
We don’t even get paid as much as everyone assumes.
Doesn’t matter if the left or right is in charge. We are excluded just because we are Merchant Marine.
We get jack sh!t. Nothing but contempt from these people for years.
They will write a WAPO front page hit piece on me but that’s about it.
And hitting rock bottom is liberating! 
There are no consequences to telling the truth because they have nothing to take from me.
At least we didn’t get any perks, until Trump and @PeteHegseth and @SecDuffy came in and recognized us for the first time since Nixon. An administration that appreciates the hardest working Americans.
And I don’t need to be bribed with anything from them because I’m already grateful for just being seen.
I’m not brave. I’ve just got absolutely nothing to lose when I post and a whole lot of gratitude for finally getting a fraction of the respect and privilege DC elites take for granted.
And that’s why I have deep respect for people like @DataRepublican, @infantrydort, @CynicalPublius, @KurtSchlichter, @RobManess, @RobertMSterling, and many others with more followers than me.
Because these people have plenty to lose. But they post the truth anyway.
A “dirty” merchant sailor from the Bronx will never be respected by the swamp, so I’m free to say whatever the hell I want.
As @maphumanintent says “FULL SEND”
But people like DR? They have everything to lose. They are much braver than me because they can’t just get on a boat and sail away for a few months. 
THIS is the most important post you’ll read this month.  THIS is how the swamp really works 
Quote
DataRepublican (small r) @DataRepublican
Further explanation which I think is insightful: 
Washington DC is culturally liberal. The institutions that long-tenure senators interact with daily: the press corps, the think tanks both parties actually attend (Brookings, CFR, Aspen, Carnegie), the schools their kids go to, the dinner parties are all left-of-center. That creates asymmetric social pressure:
A Republican who drifts left gets rewarded. The press calls them a "statesman," a "maverick," a "reasonable voice." They get invited to the bipartisan events. Their kids don't get weird looks at Sidwell Friends. McCain got this. Collins gets this. Murkowski gets this. There's a whole media infrastructure that celebrates the "heroic moderate Republican.
A Democrat who drifts right gets... nothing. There's no equivalent conservative institutional establishment in DC that would celebrate them. No black-tie dinner full of journalists who would applaud them for being "courageous" by moving right. Their base would primary them. The press wouldn't reward them. So they don't.
The incentive structure is one-directional. DC's Overton window is set by the press corps and the permanent institutions, and it pulls left. Republicans face constant pressure to accept that frame as the price of being taken seriously. Democrats are already inside the frame.
https://x.com/johnkonrad/status/2027209104922378408

John Ʌ Konrad V @johnkonrad - Churchill wasn’t just a PM. His war record before politics was impressive. True acts of courage and bravery.
He was obsessed with the one award that eluded him… the Victoria Cross, the UK equivalent of the MoH… so he conducted a study. 
He wanted to know what made a man do such acts of absolute bravery.
Do you know what he found?
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