Oh no. Look who's back. It's General Tata

Sarah Palin with Gen. Tata

I first wrote about Gen. Anthony J. Tata back in 2012. Back then it was considered hip for some reason, to put generals and admirals and such, in charge of the schools. We did it here in Chicago when Rahm Emanuel appointed Marine Col. Tim Tyrrell and paid him $180,000/year to run his mass school-closing operation.

Tata, a brigadier general who doubled as a right-wing ideologue, was brought into D.C. by evil corporate school reform demon Michelle Rhee as her second in command. He then became fast friends with Sarah Palin (remember her?) and wrote a glowing review of her book, "Going Rogue," on the Big Hollywood site operated by the late wing-nut journo-goofball Andrew Breitbart.

Tata wrote that Palin "is far more qualified to be president of the United States than the current occupant of the White House" and that she is "precisely the kind of leader America needs."

I guess that wasn't enough of a clue for the embattled Wake County, N.C. School Board that hired Tata as their schools chief to take command of the board's re-segregation initiative. The program, which was pushed mainly by Republican school board members, backed by national tea party conservatives, aimed at reversing years of gains by the North Carolina civil rights movement. Pledging to "say no to the social engineers!" the board rolled back one of the nation's most celebrated integration efforts.

After mass protests by the NAACP and court actions, the school board finally was forced to fire Tata. But he was then appointed by Gov. Pat McCrory to head of the State Dept. of Transportation.

Then there was this in 2015, when Tata was accused of having committed adultery with “at least two” women --- but I digress. 

FAST FORWARD...So quite naturally, who should pop up yesterday as Trump's proposed appointee to the third-highest post in the Pentagon? None other than Brig. Gen. Tata himself. The job includes managing policy decisions on everything from Afghanistan and the Middle East to China, North Korea, and Russia, as well as artificial intelligence, hypersonic weapons, and more.

Tata would succeed John Rood, who was ousted as undersecretary for policy in February after being viewed as insufficiently loyal to Trump.  TaTa could even become next in the line if the secretary of defense and the deputy resigned or were removed.

Only this time, the recommendation caused the shit to hit the fan. 

Tata, a frequent guest on Fox News and ardent defender of President Trump, was accused of making Islamophobic and inflammatory remarks against prominent Democratic politicians, including falsely calling former President Barack Obama a Muslim and a "terrorist leader".

In several tweets from 2018, Tata said that Islam was the "most oppressive violent religion I know of" and claimed Obama was a "terrorist leader" who did more to harm the US "and help Islamic countries than any president in history." 

 Tata, in one radio appearance, speculated the Iran deal was born out of Obama's "Islamic roots" in an attempt "to help Iranians and the greater Islamic state crush Israel."

Here's more Tata tweets.

Many among the top brass are worried about the "politicization of the military", especially after Trump used the military against the protesters in D.C. following the police killing of George Floyd. 

At least three retired Army generals have now pulled their support for Trump's nominee after the embarrassment of seeing Tata's comments.

If they would have asked me, I could have told them I knew him back then.