Television’s left-wing gatekeepers tried to stage a public humiliation this week when The View’s Sunny Hostin demanded an apology from Stephen A. Smith after he slammed Senator Mark Kelly’s video telling troops to refuse illegal orders. The exchange exposed once again how the coastal elite treat strong opinions as punishable offenses instead of engaging with the underlying concerns about politicizing the military.
Smith’s reaction was blunt and unapologetic; he called out Kelly for recklessly stepping into a minefield by telling service members to ignore the commander-in-chief, even while acknowledging the difference between unlawful and lawful orders. That wasn’t theater — it was a sober warning that former service members who wade back into partisan fights risk creating confusion and endangering the very troops they claim to protect.
Hostin’s attempt to pressure Smith into recanting and to lecture him on military protocol looked less like a search for truth and more like performative virtue signaling from a show that traffics in manufactured outrage. When civilian commentators try to referee military judgment through the lens of partisan loyalty, the fallout is predictable: distrust in institutions and a politicized uniform that should never have been dragged into cable-TV theater.
Conservative critics aren’t the only ones who see the danger; many observers warned that a sitting senator and combat veteran giving loaded political advice to active-duty personnel could have real legal and disciplinary consequences. Democrats who parade former service members in activist videos are weaponizing their service for political cover while treating military rules like optional guidance when convenient.
The spectacle on The View also revealed a glaring double standard: liberal pundits eagerly lecture others about patriotism while casually endorsing political interventions into military affairs when it suits their narrative. Stephen A. Smith was right to push back; the question isn’t whether service members should follow unlawful orders — it’s whether partisan politicians should be telling them what counts as unlawful in the heat of a political fight.
If anything, the episode underscores how out of touch daytime TV has become with the serious responsibilities of national defense. Americans deserve commentators who will defend institutions from dangerous politicization, not hosts who join the chorus of entitlement and then demand apologies when someone tells an inconvenient truth.
At a time when Americans are already exhausted by elites reshaping every civic institution to suit their tribal aims, Stephen A. Smith’s refusal to bow to manufactured outrage was a reminder that common sense and respect for the military’s role must trump cable-TV grandstanding. Let the debates rage, but don’t let the partisan performatives dictate how our armed forces are talked to or treated.
