DEI has come to imply many issues to many individuals, although it’s not simply an acronym for range, fairness and inclusion. For the Trump administration, it’s change into a canine whistle used to denigrate the achievements of anybody who just isn’t a white male.
How else to elucidate the Division of Protection’s determination to take away a web page on its web site commemorating the service of the late Main Normal Charles C. Rogers, who was awarded the Medal of Honor by President Richard Nixon after he defended a U.S. base in Vietnam regardless of being wounded 3 times?
Rogers, based on the West Virginia Army Corridor of Fame, was the highest-ranking Black soldier to be honored with the nation’s most prestigious medal. Now, if you happen to go to the Division of Protection web page that after detailed Rogers’ accomplishments, you obtain a “404” error message. As well as, the brand new URL options the phrase “deimedal” instead of “medal,” as if to suggest Rogers was acknowledged solely due to his race.
It will be akin to kicking Henry Aaron and Willie Mays out of the Baseball Corridor of Fame, stripping Simone Biles of her Olympic gold medals, or Denzel Washington of his Oscars.
Related however not as galling, contemplating Rogers put his life on the road for his nation.
Author Brandon Friedman posted a screenshot on Bluesky Saturday evening that confirmed the Google preview of Rogers’ DOD web site profile earlier than it was deleted.
It reads, “Military Maj Gen Charles Calvin Rogers served by means of all of it. As a Black man, he labored for gender and race equality whereas within the service.”
You’ll be able to guess which a part of that triggered the diversity-phobic administration.
What makes the state of affairs much more maddening to many is that the choice comes on the behest of a president who by no means served within the army and sought a deferment from the draft for unhealthy toes (thus incomes the nickname “Col. Bone Spurs” from the late U.S. senator John McCain, one other army hero Donald Trump disparaged).
“When a f***ing draft dodging coward tries to erase an actual hero. As a result of he’s black,” posted one fight veteran on X.
“Spitting on the graves of honored U.S. conflict heroes whereas prostrating earlier than Putin, a blood-soaked butcher, a documented conflict felony who loathes all the pieces the West stands for. This isn’t simply shame, it’s a betrayal carved into historical past,” added a commenter.
Such historic smears have change into commonplace beneath the DEI purge supervised by Secretary of State Pete Hegseth, a former “Fox and Mates” host. Greater than 26,000 photos have been faraway from the division’s web site as a result of they have been thought of pro-DEI.
They embody the Tuskegee Airmen, a segregated unit of primarily Black fighter pilots who served valiantly in World Warfare II.
The achievements of girls have additionally been stricken from the file. You’ll not discover photos of U.S. Air Power Col. Jeannie Leavitt, the nation’s first feminine fighter pilot, on the DOD web site.
The absurdity even extends to equipment. At the very least six images of the “Enola Homosexual,” the plane that dropped the primary atomic bomb on Japan in 1945, have been flagged for removing. In keeping with the AP, the bomber was included in a broad seek for information that included the phrase “homosexual,” because the DOD has additionally excised any LGBT-positive materials. The Enola Homosexual was named after Enola Homosexual Tibbets, the mom of the pilot who flew the plane.
Happily, the DOD just isn’t the only real chronicler of army heroes and their achievements.
From the West Virginia Army Corridor of Fame:
“Rogers earned the Medal of Honor for actions that passed off close to the Cambodian border on November 1, 1968. Whereas manning a hearth help base, members of the first Battalion, fifth Artillery, commanded by Lieutenant Colonel Rogers, discovered themselves in a determined wrestle. Enemy forces launched an assault that penetrated the bottom perimeter. Wounded 3 times over the subsequent two days, Rogers directed artillery hearth and led counterattacks till the enemy drive was repelled.”
Rogers retired from the army as a significant basic in 1984, however his lifetime of service wasn’t full. The ordained Baptist minister spent his closing years ministering to American troopers in Germany. He’s buried at Arlington Nationwide Cemetery, and in 1999, a bridge in Fayette County, West Virginia, was rechristened the Charles C. Rogers Bridge.
As one X consumer put it, “Thanks on your service Normal Rogers. What a disgraceful, unhappy day that is in America. Shameful of Trump.”
