Dwain Northey (Gen X)

Is anyone—anyone at all—surprised that the nation’s most prolific draft dodger, the guy who bravely battled bone spurs while other men battled, you know, actual wars, has once again found himself pointing the trembling finger of “treason” at someone who actually served? I mean, let’s take inventory here. We’re talking about a man who once declared that John McCain, a man who endured years of torture in a POW camp, “wasn’t a hero because he got captured.” A statement so grotesque that even the ghosts of basic decency rolled their eyes. And now this same patriotism cosplayer—with a sidekick reserve captain who must’ve lost the plot somewhere between OCS and reality—has the audacity to accuse Mark Kelly of treason.

Mark Kelly.

Retired Navy captain.

Combat pilot.

Astronaut.

Actual American hero.

Married to an actual American hero.

A man whose résumé is so stacked with service it should make any normal person with a conscience feel humbled—yet somehow, somehow, it triggers the rage of people who think saying “support the troops” is exactly the same thing as actually doing it.

And what’s Kelly’s crime? What high betrayal of the republic did he commit? Did he sell nuclear secrets? Stage a coup? Launch a rocket labeled “Democracy” directly into Mar-a-Lago? No. He participated in a public service announcement reminding U.S. service members of something so basic it’s literally printed in the UCMJ:

You do not follow unlawful orders.

This is not radical. This is not insurgent. This is not “stab-in-the-back” mythology. This is Rule Number Freaking One in a functioning chain of command.

But apparently, we now live in an era where reminding people of the law is treasonous, while demanding absolute obedience to the whims of a man who thinks the nuclear triad is a 1950s doo-wop group is considered patriotism.

The math ain’t mathing.

It’s almost poetic—if poetry were written by a drunk bald eagle holding a crayon. We have a man who dodged Vietnam like it was an unpaid tab, a man who views the military as a personal cosplay squad, a man who treats loyalty as a one-way street paved with gold toilet fixtures—accusing Mark Kelly of being anti-American. You’d laugh if it weren’t aggressively stupid.

And the reserve captain in question? Oh, he’s just the cherry on top of the irony sundae. Standing there saluting like a bobblehead on a bumpy dashboard, desperately auditioning for a future cabinet spot in the Department of Yes Sir Whatever You Say Sir.

Meanwhile, anyone with a passing knowledge of military ethics—or a functioning prefrontal cortex—knows that refusing unlawful orders is not treason. It’s the safeguard that prevents authoritarian meltdown. It’s how the military stays a professional force instead of someone’s private goon squad.

But sure. Let’s ignore the heroic astronaut with decades of honorable service and instead believe the guy whose closest brush with combat was getting into a verbal firefight with a bald eagle during a photo op.

Is anyone surprised? Really?

Because at this point, the only shocking thing would be if he didn’t accuse someone better, braver, and more accomplished than him of treason.

And given the entire population of the United States fits that description…

Well. Buckle up. There’s going to be a lot more “treason” where that came from.