John Kelly, the retired U.S. Marine Corps general who has been serving as the White House chief of staff since late July, had been heralded as one of the “adults in the room” in the chaotic Trump administration. For some people that assessment changed after Kelly made an emotional speech last Thursday defending Trump and attacking Florida Congresswoman Frederica Wilson in a dispute over the president’s condolence call to one of Wilson’s constituents. During the call, Wilson said, Trump told the shocked widow of slain soldier La David Johnson that her husband “must have known what he was signing up for.” Kelly disparaged Wilson as an “empty barrel.”
Outraged active and former members of the U.S. armed services responded swiftly on Twitter with a hashtagged military epithet that must have struck many civilians as mysterious: “BlueFalcon.”
