It has long been said that John Kennedy killed the tophat in American men’s fashion when he took his off for his inaugural speech. While almost certainly not true, he helped cement the trend.
His latest successor is apparently following suit, wearing a branded baseball cap to attend the Dignified Transfer of the remains of six soldiers killed under his command.
WaPo (“Trump confronts ‘bad part of war’ as troops killed in Iran conflict return home”):
The remains of the first six service members killed in the war with Iran were carried off a dull-gray Air Force transport plane on Saturday as President Donald Trump and other senior U.S. leaders silently saluted.
[…]
“It’s a very sad day, and I’m glad we paid our respects. It’s a tough situation,” Trump told reporters aboard Air Force One after the solemn event in Dover.
“I hate to do it, but it’s a part of war,” Trump said. “It’s a sad part of war. It’s the bad part of war.”
The other times Trump traveled here to witness the return of the remains of U.S. service members killed overseas, they died in wars he didn’t start.
But the six who were carried off the C-17 Globemaster on Saturday perished in Kuwait in a war of Trump’s choice — one that several of his predecessors considered and dismissed.
“This is a short excursion into something that should have been done for 47 years,” Trump said Saturday, comparing it to taking out a cancer.
Trump spent more than an hour on Saturday afternoon meeting with the families of the fallen soldiers, whose operation center in Kuwait was struck by an Iranian drone six days earlier. Then, in a dark blue suit, a bold red tie and a white baseball cap that said “USA” on the front in gold stitching, he saluted silently.
[…]
His task in Dover was complicated. A president receiving Americans felled by war isn’t there as the head of a political party or one side of a polarized nation, but as the head of state, embodying the country as a whole.
It’s noteworthy that no one else in Trump’s party was similarly attired (though the military personnel were in their service caps).
It’s also noteworthy that this is the same cap Trump wore when he announced the war. He did put on a tie for this.
We need Robin Givhan to weigh in on this.
