Who needs a president when you have emoji?
Indignity Vol. 5, No. 54
CURRENT EVENTS DEP'T.
Highlights of the "Houthi PC small group" Signal Chat
YESTERDAY, THE ATLANTIC'S editor in chief, Jeffrey Goldberg, published a story about how top-ranking officials in the Trump administration had apparently inadvertently added him to a chat group on the Signal messaging app in which they discussed, in real time and with specific detail, the planning and carrying out of airstrikes against Houthi militants in Yemen. Goldberg wrote:
I had very strong doubts that this text group was real, because I could not believe that the national-security leadership of the United States would communicate on Signal about imminent war plans. I also could not believe that the national security adviser to the president would be so reckless as to include the editor in chief of The Atlantic in such discussions with senior U.S. officials, up to and including the vice president.
But then the people on the chat said the bombing was going to start, and soon enough, the bombing started. Maybe the most unbelievable part of the whole story was that the administration confirmed the authenticity of the chat when Goldberg asked about it, rather than following its usual protocol of lying about everything—although Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth did accuse Goldberg, in a blustering response to a reporter's question, of being a promoter of hoaxes in general.
The news cycle that followed the story was mostly about what a flabbergasting set of security breaches it involved: holding a conversation about classified subjects outside the mandatory protected channels; using an app meant for the general public, possibly installed on the participants' personal electronic devices; doing all this with a complete outsider in the loop and not even noticing. But the conversation was also a demonstration of how senior members of the Trump administration—who tend to stage their public job performances as live-action role-playing exercises for the president's benefit—carry out their actual business when they think no one is looking.
Here were some of the more illuminating moments, assuming that the people in the chat were all who they appeared to be, with no impostors or interlopers beyond Goldberg in the mix:
"I am not sure the president is aware how inconsistent this is with his message on Europe right now." Not only was Donald Trump not in the chat, he was not even really a secondhand presence in the discussion about whether the Trump administration should use military force in Yemen. Is the Commander in Chief in command? Vice President JD Vance came the closest to hauling the subtext of the conversation up to the surface, when he tried to object to using airstrikes to defend Suez Canal shipping from the Houthis, on the grounds that the canal traffic is far more important to the European economy than it is to the United States. The president, Vance was saying, might object to doing the Europeans a military favor—if Trump could understand that was what the attack would do. Can the president, at age 78, be made to understand things? Or do the White House policy makers simply carry out their own designs, working around the obstacle of the president's non-understanding?
"This [is] not about the Houthis." Why was the United States launching a deadly military attack against the Houthis? According to the Secretary of Defense, it was not because our country had any particular need to fight the Houthis. Instead, Hegseth wrote, "I see it as two things: 1) Restoring Freedom of Navigation, a core national interest; and 2) Reestablish deterrence, which Biden cratered." It was, in Hegseth's conception, a bit of theater, conducted with explosives—killing people for the sake of demonstrating that the Trump administration is willing to kill people.
"if you think we should do it let’s go." At this point in the exchange—as the discussion closed in on the decision to commit an act of war—the notional president disappeared entirely. The Vice President was writing to the Secretary of Defense, with Vance invoking his own authority ("let's go") under deference to Hegseth's judgment ("if you think we should do it").
“As I heard it, the president was clear" Finally, the idea of Trump reemerged, as channeled through, and interpreted by, his deputy White House chief of staff, Stephen Miller. As Miller heard it, the president was clear—the uncertain, conditional, secondhand kind of clarity. The message from Stephen Miller's version of Donald Trump was "green light, but we soon make clear to Egypt and Europe what we expect in return": a decisive action, with the supporting plan to be backfilled later. "That message....effectively shut down the conversation," Goldberg wrote.
👊🇺🇸🔥Shortly after the bombs hit, Goldberg wrote, National Security Advisor Michael Waltz sent the group "three emoji: a fist, an American flag, and fire." Amid other messages of congratulations and celebration, Trump's Middle East envoy, Steve Witkoff, "responded with five emoji: two hands-praying, a flexed bicep, and two American flags." Goldberg added:
The after-action discussion included assessments of damage done, including the likely death of a specific individual. The Houthi-run Yemeni health ministry reported that at least 53 people were killed in the strikes, a number that has not been independently verified.
WEATHER REVIEWS
New York City, March 24, 2025
★★ A rottweiler bounded over the wet crosswalk in the early dimness, its heavy haunches tracing a series of arcs like an antelope in motion. The rain stopped and then resumed, pattering away the day. Not until most of the hours were used up and dinner was overdue did the clouds separate—into luminous and pearl-touched rows at first, then fragments moving fast against suddenly visible blue. A mockingbird perched on a still fully bare tree outside the expensive condo conversion; above it, a high arched window in a swooping sofa caught the day's late luster in its fabric. The view down Central Park West found the buildings at the foot of the Park still shrouded in, and truncated by, a smoky mist. Even as the eye took it in, though, it was already thinning.
EASY LISTENING DEP'T.
HERE IS TODAY'S Indignity Morning Podcast!
Tom Scocca
CLICK ON THIS box to find the Indignity Morning Podcast archive.
TOM SCOCCA
ADVICE DEP'T.
GOT SOMETHING YOU need to justify to yourself, or to the world at large? Other columnists are here to judge you, but The Sophist is here to tell you why you’re right. Direct your questions to The Sophist, at indignity@indignity.net, and get the answers you want.
SANDWICH RECIPES DEP'T.
WE PRESENT INSTRUCTIONS in aid of the assembly of a sandwich selected from Hospitality: Recipes and Entertainment Hints for All Occasions, by Mary M. Wright, author of Candy Making at Home, Preserving and Pickling, Salads and Sandwiches, and Dainty Desserts, published in 1922, and available at archive.org for the delectation of all.
Cheese Sandwiches in Heart-shape
1 cupful cream cheese
1 teaspoonful paprika
1 teaspoonful salt
1/4 cupful butter
Pimientoes
Bread
Cut the bread in thin slices. Mix into a paste the cream cheese, butter, salt, and paprika, and spread on one-half of the bread hearts. With a smaller heart-cutter cut out openings in the other half of the bread hearts. Place on top of the other pieces and fill the heart openings with chopped pimientoes. The effect of a red heart within a white one is very pretty.
If you decide to prepare and attempt to enjoy a sandwich inspired by this offering, be sure to send a picture to indignity@indignity.net.
