Harry Baldwin comments:
"There was a recent news story about how the White House pastry chef resigned because “I don’t want to demonize cream, butter, sugar and eggs,” which was Michelle's policy. It struck me that this was the first resignation on a matter of principle from a White House position that I can remember since Elliot Richardson in 1973."
Washington does not have a glorious tradition of resignation on principle.
William Jennings Bryan resigned as Secretary of State in 1915 to protest how Wilson's policy was pushing the U.S. into the Great War, but that just proves what a hayseed bumpkin Bryan was. (In Britain in August 1914, two cabinet ministers, John Morley and John Burns, resigned in protest.)
Opposing the Iranian hostage rescue plan, Cyrus Vance secretly submitted his letter of resignation as Jimmy Carter's Secretary of State three days before the attempt.
And that's about it for cabinet posts.
Besides the Saturday Night Massacre over Watergate, Jerald F. terHorst resigned as Ford's press secretary to protest the Nixon pardon. Leftist Peter Edelman (husband of Marian Edelman) quit as Assistant Secretary of HHS to protest Clinton signing the welfare reform bill.
Two low level State Department figures resigned to protest the Iraq Attaq of 2003. They're so obscure I wasn't going to mention them, but, now that I think about it, they deserve some recognition:
John H. Brown, who had been a cultural attaché at the embassy in Moscow, submitted his resignation to Mr. Powell, saying, ''Throughout the globe, the United States is becoming associated with the unjustified use of force'' and is ''giving birth to an anti-American century.'' And John Brady Kiesling, who had been political counselor at the American embassy in Athens, resigned last month, saying in a letter to Mr. Powell, ''I do so with a heavy heart.''
P.S., White House pastry chef denies resigning on principle. For those of us concerned about the state of morals among government officials, we can only hope he's lying.
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Is this related to the recent article in the New York Review of Books?
http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/2014/apr/03/dick-cheney-he-remade-our-world/
Pretty excellent article about potential resignations during the GWB admin.
Realpolitik trumps principle.
The signal lack of integrity in regards to resignation in the last quarter century was Colin Powell's failure to do so. Instead he chose to knowingly lie in his infamous speech to the world at the U.N.
Turkey just banned youtube to stop people from hearing a tape of Erdogan plotting a false flag operation to start a war with Syria.
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2014-03-27/here-youtube-false-flag-attack-syria-clip-erdogan-wanted-banned
America, neither a shame nor an honor culture. Who takes the fall for this? is a question we don't even ask. Like Waugh's charming pederast, left by his regiment in a closed room with a bottle of whiskey and a revolver, our malefactors drink the whiskey and go out on speaking tours.
Rand Beers was special assistant to the President and Senior Director for Combating Terrorism on the NSC staff: he resigned in March 2003.
Gregory Newbold was Director of Operations for the Joint Chiefs, and was offered the #2 command in in the invasion of Iraq. Instead he took early retirement.
I am led to believe that a number of Air Force officers threatened to resign rather than use nuclear weapons (against Iran, presumably as punishment for not being involved in 9-11). That protest succeeded. Cheney's idea, of course.
It is obvious from the original source of the quote that he is not accusing Michelle of demonizing butter. This is all just taken out of context.
Washington does not have a glorious tradition of resignation on principle.
That is more a British thing than an American one.
The Cook, the Thief, his wife & her lover.
I forget the Senator's name but during the Clinton Lewinsky scandal, he was exposed as having had an extramarital affair of his own. In a speech I'll never forget, he resigned from the Senate and dared the President to do the same. Very impressive.
It's also telling that Democrat operatives exposed as many GOP public officials as possible for such treatment. So they were willing to defend their boss by the expedient of bringing the whole ruling class into repute.
I bet he couldn't take any more of Michelle. Wouldn't you love to hear what he says to his husband about her?
''Throughout the globe, the United States is becoming associated with the unjustified use of force'' and is ''giving birth to an anti-American century.''
Brave of him. Perhaps right too. What's he doing nowadays?
P.S. Braver than many serving officers, it would seem.
Much bigger story in San Francisco, as anti-gun state Senator charged by feds with facilitating Chinese tong arms trafficking.
giving birth to an anti-American century
Interesting choice of words...
I think JOhn Simon also resigned from the Cabinetin 1914 because he opposed the war.
I've wondered for a long time about why CLinton's Deputy Attorney General lasted less than a year before resigning. He was a Harvard prof, a clean character, and my guess was that he didn;t want to further involve himself in a sordid Reno-VinceFoster-Clinton Justice Dept after the Waco coverup, the firing of hte US Attorneys, and other affairs that started almost instantly. The Administration seems to have smeared him as incompetent, which was funny given how administratively inept the CLinton Administration was:
http://www.nytimes.com/1994/01/28/us/reno-s-top-deputy-resigns-abruptly-citing-differences.html
I think JOhn Simon also resigned from the Cabinetin 1914 because he opposed the war.
I've wondered for a long time about why CLinton's Deputy Attorney General lasted less than a year before resigning. He was a Harvard prof, a clean character, and my guess was that he didn;t want to further involve himself in a sordid Reno-VinceFoster-Clinton Justice Dept after the Waco coverup, the firing of hte US Attorneys, and other affairs that started almost instantly. The Administration seems to have smeared him as incompetent, which was funny given how administratively inept the CLinton Administration was:
http://www.nytimes.com/1994/01/28/us/reno-s-top-deputy-resigns-abruptly-citing-differences.html
Note how nobody resigned after 9/11. Did the military commanders resign? The secretary of defense? The commander of the air force? The head of the FBI? Or the CIA?
Had America been a parliamentary country like Britain they would probably all have been gone the next day. But in the USA, this simply doesn't happen.
Don't know why you consider Williams Bryan a hayseed Mr. sailer. He was a principled man. Had he been listened too, and had America stayed out of the Great War, many of the greatest tragedies of the twentieth century would have been avoided.
Who can forget when Steve sailer so bravely resigned his position at national review. Oh wait nope he got canned. Everyone's always so brave at call for other people to resign on principle. But when their jobs on the line well that's different they've got a mortgage after all.
Thomas Meehan,
You're thinking of Representative Robert Livingston of Louisiana, who was in line to be Speaker of the HoR after Newt's resignation.
Some people get fired, or not renominated, on principle: Federal Reserve Chairman Paul Volcker (1979-1986; last goy to hold the job) and Secretary of the Treasury Paul O'Neill (2001-2) spring to my mind.
He's leaving Gomorrah to join "his husband" in Sodom. Excuse me while I lose my own pastries…
explain how Bryan resigning to protest Wilson leading the country into war showed he was a hayseed, please. I always thought it was the only intelligent thing he ever did.
Anonymous:"Don't know why you consider Williams Bryan a hayseed Mr. sailer."
Steve was being ironic.
Anonymous:" He was a principled man. Had he been listened too, and had America stayed out of the Great War, many of the greatest tragedies of the twentieth century would have been avoided."
Probably not.
You don't get sarcasm do you?
anonymous:"explain how Bryan resigning to protest Wilson leading the country into war showed he was a hayseed, please."
I think that Steve was being ironic.
Didn't David Stockman resign because he thought Reagan's economic policy was nonsense?
“I don’t want to demonize cream, butter, sugar and eggs,”
He should be nominated for Surgeon General.
Who can forget when Steve sailer so bravely resigned his position at national review.
Because as we all know NR sits at the heart of foreign and domestic policy formation.
Don't know why you consider Williams Bryan a hayseed Mr. sailer.
Look up there pal. Yep, it's the irony plane flying overhead.
2 guys resigned from the justice department in 2009 to protest eric holder dropping the black panther voter intimidation case.
giving birth to an anti-American century
The long-awaited Canadian century?
James Webb resigned as Secretary of the Navy under Reagan because Reagan wouldn't fund a 600-ship navy.
The Senator with an "affair of his own" who is said to have dared Clinton to resign as he had, was, no surprise, from Weezieanna. I worked near the Pentagon for several years and the officers there had a phrase for refusing to do something bad for the country but good for their career, they called it falling on their sword. So it is a documented Washington tradition to do the right thing, at least for some.
By the way, even realizing that Bob Livingston was a Speaker of the House rather than a Senator, it is more literate to call him a Senator, because of the long tradition of real and fictional Weezieanna Senators in American humorous and "lets keep the politicians honest about themselves" literature....
By the way, even realizing that Bob Livingston was a Speaker of the House and not a Senator, it is more Americanly correct to call him a Senator, based on the long tradition of humor and perspective from fictional and legendary but sadly real Weezieanna senators ...
Anonydroid at 7:11 PM said: I worked near the Pentagon for several years and the officers there had a phrase for refusing to do something bad for the country but good for their career, they called it falling on their sword.
Hunsdon said: A relic of an old Roman tradition that was much more literal than the sense your Pentagon correspondents used.
The pastry chef is in a stronger position than most at the White House - he has skills useful outside of Washington.
Yes of course that most roman or Romans king Saul. Honestly I can't remember one instance where you got anything right fact wise.
There was an old time phrase from the 1950s and 1960s:
"Guns versus butter"
To summarize how much governments should spend on the military versus social welfare.
Nowadays, the modern leftist hates both.
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