Hopes of the nation rest on General John Kelly

Imagine for a second that you are John Kelly, the current Chief of Staff in the White House. I’m not trying to exaggerate too much, but could this job be the most difficult one of his career?

I’d like to imagine that a man of Kelly’s pedigree is driven by a profound sense of duty and patriotism. As he puts on his crisp blue suit and tie every morning, I picture him staring himself in the mirror and saying, “The fate of the Country is in my hands.”

I’ve had the honor of meeting a few Generals over the years. We’ve done some interviews when a new book comes out, and I got to meet with the equivalent of a General for the Air Force when I visited Japan on behalf of the show. Without fail, I found every one of these men to be no-nonsense and driven by a code honed over years of exacting service.

That’s why I can’t help but think that for General John Kelly, it must take every ounce of self control he has not to tell Donald Trump to drop and give him pushups. It must be torture for him to not be able to command Trump to go take a long march in full battle rattle. I bet he secretly fantasizes about breaking down the psyche of Trump in boot camp and rebuilding him with military precision. But he must suppress all of those urges, bite his lip, and serve the office of the President.

This is a man who was charged with taking Baghdad in 2003. When asked by a reporter from The Los Angeles Times if he would ever consider defeat if the U.S. somehow underestimated the power of Saddam Hussein, Kelly’s responded, “hell these are Marines. Men like them held Guadalcanal and took Iwo Jima, Baghdad ain’t #$%^.”

Now he sits in a room and tries to explain to Donald Trump why it’s a good idea to fire the guy who runs a website that’s a platform for the alt-right. He now has to do damage control after the president wings it in a Q&A on infrastructure and basically endorses Neo-Nazis.

He was a commander of men, now he is a container of ego.

In my opinion, this is the most important mission of his life. John Kelly is all of our lifeline to sanity. He knows how the world really works. He answered the call when evil men needed to be eliminated in the name of everything the United States believes in.

He now has to stay three steps ahead of the most volatile president we’ve seen in modern times. He has to anticipate a brand of crazy that has quite possibly never occupied the Oval Office.

That speech on Afghanistan last night. Most likely John Kelly wrote that. I would have liked to see the rehearsal.

“Just read the speech Mr. President. No add libbing, no improvising, nothing off the top of your head. It’s of the utmost importance that you just read the speech.”

Kelly has already shown a steady hand while he prunes some undesirable personalities out of the West Wing.

Let’s hope he uses his mastery of the art of war to get the president to put down his smart phone and turn off Twitter.

General John Kelly, the hopes of the nation rest upon your shoulders.