Carly Fiorina Really Likes to Make Shit Up

Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.


Carly Fiorina said this last night:

One of the things I would immediately do, in addition to defeating them here at home, is bring back the warrior class—Petraeus, McChrystal, Mattis, Keane, Flynn. Every single one of these generals I know. Every one was retired early because they told President Obama things that he didn’t want to hear.

In real time, I mentioned that David Petraeus wasn’t “retired early” because he told Obama something he didn’t want to hear. He resigned after it was discovered that he was having an affair. And how about Jack Keane? Here’s what he said on Fox Business:

STUART VARNEY: Did you in fact, general, give advice to President Obama, which he didn’t want to hear and didn’t take?

JACK KEANE: No, I have never spoken to the president. That’s not accurate, and I never served this administration. I served the previous administration.

McChrystal, of course, famously resigned after he and his aides trashed a bunch of civilian officials in the pages of Rolling Stone.

Remarkably, though, Mattis and Flynn really did have disagreements with the White House. So Fiorina was 40 percent right. That kind of dedication to accuracy explains a lot about her tenure at Hewlett-Packard, I guess.

And as long as we’re on the subject of explicit lies, how about Donald Trump doubling down on his claim that he “strongly” opposed the Iraq War? Why is it that none of the other candidates have ever called him on that? Are they really that afraid of him?

DONALD TRUMP & DEMOCRACY

Mother Jones was founded to do journalism differently. We stand for justice and democracy. We reject false equivalence. We go after stories others don’t. We’re a nonprofit newsroom, because the kind of truth-telling investigations we do doesn’t happen under corporate ownership.

And we need your support like never before, to fight back against the existential threats American democracy faces. Fundraising for nonprofit media is always a challenge, and we need all hands on deck right now. We have no cushion; we leave it all on the field.

It’s reader support that enables Mother Jones to report the facts that are too difficult, expensive, or inconvenient for other news outlets to uncover. Please help with a donation today if you can—even a few bucks will make a real difference. A monthly gift would be incredible.

payment methods

DONALD TRUMP & DEMOCRACY

Mother Jones was founded to do journalism differently. We stand for justice and democracy. We reject false equivalence. We go after stories others don’t. We’re a nonprofit newsroom, because the kind of truth-telling investigations we do doesn’t happen under corporate ownership.

And we need your support like never before, to fight back against the existential threats American democracy faces. Fundraising for nonprofit media is always a challenge, and we need all hands on deck right now. We have no cushion; we leave it all on the field.

It’s reader support that enables Mother Jones to report the facts that are too difficult, expensive, or inconvenient for other news outlets to uncover. Please help with a donation today if you can—even a few bucks will make a real difference. A monthly gift would be incredible.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate