{"id":328965,"date":"2019-11-19T16:11:00","date_gmt":"2019-11-19T21:11:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/admin.rushlimbaugh.com\/?p=328965"},"modified":"2019-11-20T16:16:45","modified_gmt":"2019-11-20T21:16:45","slug":"whos-at-the-top-of-vindmans-chain-of-command","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/admin.rushlimbaugh.com\/daily\/2019\/11\/19\/whos-at-the-top-of-vindmans-chain-of-command\/","title":{"rendered":"Who\u2019s at the Top of Vindman\u2019s Chain of Command?"},"content":{"rendered":"

RUSH: Now, there\u2019s one other thing that I want to get to, and I still have voluminous sound bites to get to, but it came up earlier today.<\/p>\n

We had a question from a caller about a half hour ago, 45 minutes ago about Lieutenant Colonel Vindman. He was on the phone call, he leaves the phone call, and he goes and reports to somebody outside the chain. And this caller\u2019s husband is military and realizes what Vindman did is way outside the chain of command, so he wanted to know who he works for.<\/p>\n

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And I do too. I made the point that in the normal chain of command Lieutenant Colonel Vindman would report to the president. Everybody there would. Everybody in the State Department, everybody in the Foreign Service reports to the president. That is who they work for, except these people do not. The people who have testified, and especially the two today, do not consider the president to be the person to whom they report.<\/p>\n

Vindman has a chain of command, and he obeys it. But the top of it is not the president. So who is it? Who does Lieutenant Colonel Vindman work for? It is the question. Because if you answer that question, you find out how all this happened. There\u2019s a phone call between Trump and Zelensky in July. In August, Adam Schiff is told about it by the whistleblower who is informed by somebody, we think Vindman. And then Schiff puts in motion this whole whistleblower report with the inspector general, and it takes us to where we are today.<\/p>\n

Who does Vindman work for? Who do any of these ambassadors who have testified, who do they really work for? Who are they reporting to? To whom are they discussing these events? They are in the executive branch. That means they work for the president, whether he appointed them or not. Whether they are appointees or whether they are career, they work for the president. But these people obviously aren\u2019t.<\/p>\n

So Vindman\u2019s got a chain of command, but it does not feature the president at the top. Who is at the top? Who is giving Lieutenant Colonel Vindman orders that he is following? And Vindman constantly talks about the chain of command as though it is inviolate and it\u2019s sacred. And in his world, it is. The chain of command is the glue that keeps everything together in the military, and he\u2019s got one, and he is following the chain.<\/p>\n

But who\u2019s at the top of that one? I\u2019ll tell you what I think. It\u2019s why his chain-of-command rhetoric actually condemns him. Now, Vindman is asserting an imaginary chain of command under which the Ukraine president is supposedly subservient to the U.S. president. Vindman claims that Trump asking the president of Ukraine for a favor is a demand. And he says it\u2019s a demand because in his world if a superior asks you to do a favor for you, it\u2019s a demand. You had better do it. There are no favors in the chain of command.<\/p>\n

So in Vindman\u2019s cockeyed world, Trump is the head of some chain of command that has the president of Ukraine as a subordinate. What the hell chain of command is this? It doesn\u2019t exist. So he asserts, to make his testimony valid, an imaginary chain of command in which the president of Ukraine is subordinate and subservient to the U.S. president.<\/p>\n

But he didn\u2019t think that when Obama was president. Vindman refuses to follow the real chain of command under which Vindman is subservient to the U.S. president. The U.S. president is Vindman\u2019s commander-in-chief. But he is not obeying orders. And he is not respecting the authority of the president of the United States. He\u2019s got some other chain that he reports to.<\/p>\n

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In the real world, my friends, it is the president who has constitutional authority to set Ukraine policy and policy for every other nation on earth. All foreign policy is set by the president. It isn\u2019t set by Vindman. It isn\u2019t set by John Brennan. It isn\u2019t set by any of these ambassadors in the interagency group. It\u2019s not set by these people who consider themselves to be the normal channel.<\/p>\n

It is Vindman who as Army lieutenant colonel has a constitutional duty to follow the president\u2019s policy. But he is not. He is openly defying the president\u2019s Ukraine policy, under the guise that the president has some authority over the president of Ukraine. The president of Ukraine has no alternative but to do what Trump wants him to do. The president of Ukraine cannot say “no” because of this imaginary chain of command.<\/p>\n

And in Vindman\u2019s closed-door testimony in Schiff\u2019s basement room in the Capitol, Representative Ratcliffe got close to making the case that Vindman was insubordinate during his October 29th deposition and Vindman lawyer erupted. Now, I have the transcript here, and it runs about a page and a half, and I don\u2019t know that even I, with the talent that I possess, could make this compelling for a page and a half.<\/p>\n

But suffice it to say that when Ratcliffe asked this question, to who the hell do you report to? What is your chain of command? These are my words that Vindman was asked. Vindman\u2019s lawyer erupted. “I object to that characterization. It\u2019s pretty obvious what you\u2019re trying to do, sir.” Ratcliffe: “Let me ask the question.” The lawyer: “I\u2019m representing my witness here, and this is my client. For you, I mean this insinuation, if you guys want to go down this road, God be with you.” Ratcliffe: “Let me ask my question, because what I heard \u2013” “You don\u2019t have a jury here, sir. You don\u2019t have the public here.” Ratcliffe: “I understand that. I\u2019m making a record.” “Well, eventually you will, and you can do it then.” Ratcliffe: “I will.” “Right now we\u2019re gonna object.”<\/p>\n

So Vindman\u2019s lawyer objected to Ratcliffe trying to elucidate who do you work for, Vindman. Who are you reporting to? Because it clearly isn\u2019t the president. Now, in the real world, this is insubordination. In Washington it is Trump guilty of insubordination because he\u2019s not following the usual channels. He\u2019s not going through the usual channels of the national security apparatus, which is populated by people who are trying to sabotage, undermine, and destroy Trump.<\/p>\n

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It makes perfect sense that he would be doing an end run around them. It\u2019s called draining the swamp. It\u2019s called doing exactly what he was elected to do. Vindman has acted outside his chain of command and has been the witness, I think, that has affirmed this. He keeps preaching about chain of command, chain of command, chain of command, and it\u2019s obvious he is abrogating his own because he works for the president.<\/p>\n

He does not work for the president of Ukraine. He does not represent Ukraine interests. But if you listen to his testimony, that\u2019s what he\u2019s all about. He is representing the interests of Ukraine against Donald Trump. He\u2019s supposedly telling the Ukraine president, advising the Ukraine president who to be on the lookout for, what to be on the watch for. And it\u2019s all Trump-related stuff. This is massive insubordination. So Vindman\u2019s got a chain of command, and he\u2019s following it. But it\u2019s outside the actual chain of command that he is part of.<\/p>\n

BREAK TRANSCRIPT<\/p>\n

RUSH: Forest in Dallas, great to have you. Hello, sir.<\/p>\n

CALLER: Rush, thank you for taking my call. To your point about Vindman\u2019s sense of self-importance, what jumped out at me… I only got to listen for about an hour, but I must have heard him refer to himself as a coordinator and how he coordinates… Epecially when Jordan was questioning him, he fell right back into that. And you could just read in his words that in his mind the coordinator was the boss. And I believe he believes that. And I\u2019m yet to work for a big company or see a big company that has chief coordinator officer. But in his mind as a bureaucrat, he\u2019s in charge because he\u2019s the coordinator.<\/p>\n

RUSH: Yeah, I know what you mean. We all know people like this. They are third- and fourth-level functionaries who need to do things. And they are made to feel extremely relevant and important for making the trains run on time and so forth and they end up believing it. But Vindman\u2019s not a policy guy, he\u2019s an order taker. But here\u2019s the thing about that. I don\u2019t… Self-importance? Sometimes, folks, you need to make people feel self-important in order to get them to do the job.<\/p>\n

I mean, employer psychology is a very intricate thing, and you need different policies for different people, and he probably perfectly fits the role. The real question again, folks, it comes down to who does he work for? Let me play you a couple sound bites to illustrate what I\u2019m talking about. Two of Vindman here. He\u2019s being questioned by (let\u2019s see) Schiff, Pencil Neck. Question: “Colonel, you described this favor the president asked as a demand.<\/p>\n

“What is it about the relationship between the president of the U.S. and the president of Ukraine, that leads to you conclude that when the president seeks a ‘favor\u2019 like this, it\u2019s really a demand?” Now, this all comes from the testimony that Vindman gave behind closed doors that nobody saw, because all these are leading questions. Vindman said things that they want him to repeat so they phrase questions knowing what the answer is. It\u2019s all a set up. But, anyway, here\u2019s how Vindman characterized this belief that the president of Ukraine is subordinate to Trump.<\/p>\n

VINDMAN: Chairman, uh, the culture I come from, the — the military culture, um, when a senior asks you to do something, even if it\u2019s polite and pleasant, it\u2019s — it\u2019s not… Um, it\u2019s not to be taken as a request. It\u2019s to be taken as an order. Uh, in this case, the power disparity between the two leaders, uh, my impression i-is that in order to get the White House meeting, uh, President Zelensky would have to deliver the investigations.<\/p>\n

RUSH: Who does he work for? Who does he work for? In his chain of command, he works for Trump, but he says Trump has more power than Zelensky so he\u2019s gotta protect Zelensky here. You don\u2019t work for Zelensky, Lieutenant Colonel! But, furthermore, you know what? The investigations have not happened — and, you know what? Zelensky got the Oval Office visit. The Biden investigation has not happened, Lieutenant Colonel. But even despite — and that fact ought to just shut all of this down.<\/p>\n

So here\u2019s Trump lauding it over this little, tiny, insignificant new leader — where, in Vindman\u2019s world, this guy reports to Trump. Trump is the chain of command, and this guy\u2019s gotta do what Trump says or else. Well, he didn\u2019t do what Trump wanted. He didn\u2019t start the investigation. He still got his aid. He still got his assistance, and he still got the trip to Washington and the joint press conference with Trump, got the meeting in the Oval Office. Next question, the MSNBC lawyer, Daniel Goldman, says, “Is there a process to determine official U.S. policy?”<\/p>\n

Now, listen to this question. “Is there a process to determine official U.S. policy?” And this answer is exactly what our caller was just citing.<\/p>\n