John Kelly’s half-assed, just-the-tip critique of Donald Trump on Wednesday night was too little, too late, and too lame from the retired Marine Corps general turned Everything Trump Touches Dies poster boy.

At best, the former White House chief of staff displayed an l’esprit de l'escalier that is insufficient for the gravity of the moment. At worst, he looked like one more ex-Trump chickenshit in a barnyard full of them.

How Trump draws in these men and women of solid military and business careers and spits them out as moral eunuchs is a mystery. Their silence and their denial make me question whether they ever took seriously the military principles they swore to uphold. Sure, Kelly’s late, limping arrival on the side of truth is a small relief, but the obvious question is, “Where the fuck have you been, John?”