Trump nominee's 'right-wing nuttiness' makes him unfit to serve in high-ranking Pentagon job: columnist

Recently unearthed social media posts should disqualify a retired U.S. Army general and Fox News contributor from a high-ranking post at the Pentagon, according to a conservative columnist.

Anthony Tata called former President Barack Obama a "terrorist leader," slurred Islam and insulted Democratic lawmaker in a series of since-deleted Twitter posts later unearthed by CNN's Andrew Kaczynski, and the Washington Post's Max Boot said the retired brigadier general was unfit to serve as President Donald Trump's nomination for undersecretary of defense for policy.

"Tata argued that Obama negotiated the Iranian nuclear deal because he had 'Islamic roots' and wanted 'to help Iranians and the greater Islamic state crush Israel,'" Boot wrote. "In addition, he lashed out at Reps. Maxine Waters (D-CA) and Nancy Pelosi (D-CA), calling them 'violent extremists' and accusing Waters of being a 'vicious race baiting racist.'"

The three-part series of CNN reports found Tata claimed Obama was "a manchurian candidate" for “Hamas & Muslim brotherhood,” and he also accused the previous administration of treason and called for the execution or suicide of former CIA director John Brennan.

"Many of the Democrats on the Senate Armed Services Committee announced their opposition to Tata’s nomination for undersecretary of defense for policy," Boot wrote. "After the second story, several of the retired generals who had initially endorsed him ... pulled their support."

Tata tried to walk back his past tweets, which echo claims made by the president and many of his close associates, but Boot said his nomination should be withdrawn.

"Anybody who displays such pervasive racism, Islamophobia, paranoia, incivility and sheer right-wing nuttiness is not remotely fit to fill a senior Defense Department post," Boot wrote. "It isn’t as if Tata misspoke once or twice. There is an extensive record of his making crazy comments that reveal he is better suited to run a QAnon bulletin board than the Pentagon’s policy shop."