Over at Esquire, where you can legitimately read it for the articles, Robert Bateman has a profile of the person who is apparently giving Ted Cruz national security advice. You know, Ted Cruz the carpet-bombing glowing-sand tough guy who is vying with The Donald for the top spot in the polls? Here’s Bateman on Cruz’s military background:
...Cruz himself has absolutely no National Security experience. He never served in the military. Sure, after winning a Senate seat in 2012 he was appointed to the Senate Armed Services Committee. But let's do a roll-call check: Out of 50 SASC meetings between '13 and '15 (his first two years in the Senate) he showed up only 17 times. So, when it comes to his presidential campaign, you would think he would assemble a deeply knowledgeable bench in a field in which he is so obviously a neophyte.
emphasis added
Yeah, you would think that. And in a world where what someone actually knows is supposed to matter, that would be the case. But, that’s not the world inhabited by Republicans, where belief and connections trump reality every time.
...So just who is Dr. Victoria Coates, who appears to be Cruz's sole National Security Advisor? Let us start with what she is not.
She has never worked in the Pentagon; never worked in the State Department; never worked in the intelligence community; never served in any branch of the military; never lived overseas representing the United States in any way; never worked for the federal government; never had a security clearance. (Unless, perhaps, for editing. I'll check that.); never written a book, or indeed any academic or professional article, on national security, any aspect of any of the branches of the military, or on modern international relations; never been in a combat zone, one of ours or anybody else's.
So what are her qualifications?
Read the whole thing. As I said in the title of this, it’s a jaw-dropper. Be warned: the next time someone tries to tell you the Republicans are better at keeping the country safe and dealing with the rest of the world, I hope you’re not drinking anything. Avoiding a spit-take will be almost impossible, and you may suffer a bout of involuntary hysterical laughter.