The verdict's in! All the grotesque Democrat smears and hysterical rants at Pete Hegseth's hearing have finally backfired, writes JOSH HAMMER

Democrats set the tone early in Tuesday's highly anticipated confirmation hearing for President-elect Trump's embattled Defense Secretary nominee Pete Hegseth: Double, triple, and quadruple down on bogus allegations and discredited smears.

He's an alcoholic! He's a rapist! He's a misogynist! Oh, and he also ran a veteran's charity into the ground!

Rhode Island Senator Jack Reed, the top Dem on the Armed Services Committee, led the Banzai charge and his colleagues followed: the hysterical Kirsten Gillibrand, the dim-witted Mazie Hirono, the self-righteous Tim Kaine and the shrieking Elizabeth Warren, numbering among the legislative lightweights.

Senator Hirono fabricated a fantastical scenario that no sane person would find plausible and ludicrously accused Hegseth of scheming to invade Greenland and forcibly retake the Panama Canal.

Virginia Man, Tim Kaine, clutched his pearls and excoriated Hegseth for being, at the very least an adulterer, if not quite (but maybe!) a literal rapist. This, from the party of Bill Clinton!

For his part, Hegseth, who has been victimized by the most egregious coordinated Democrat-mainstream media smear campaign since Brett Kavanaugh's 2018 Supreme Court nomination fight, was backed by a phalanx of Navy SEALs and veterans. Democrats, in turn, were flanked by Code Pink psychopaths—two of whom interrupted Hegseth's opening remarks.

One protester shouted, as he was dragged out of the room, that the former Army National Guard was a 'Christian Zionist!' and another condemned him for his support for Israel's war on Hamas.

Hegseth proudly said that both claims were true.

If these are the people who opposed his confirmation, then the entire nation should rally behind him.

So, what gives? Well, there's an adage in the legal profession: 'If you have the law on your side, pound the law. If you have the facts on your side, pound the facts. And if you have neither on your side, pound the table!'

Indeed, the Democrats's objections to Hegseth ranged from the merely overwrought to the outright deranged and have been previously addressed here at the Daily Mail.

First is the lie that Hegseth is 'unqualified' – a smear advanced by none-other-than Connecticut's Richard Blumenthal, who has admitted to 'misspeaking' (read: lying) about having 'served in Vietnam.' In truth, Blumental received five deferments before serving six years in the Marine Reserves but never leaving US soil.

Truthfully, it's hard to find a recent nominee more qualified to lead the Pentagon than Hegseth. He holds a Bachelor of Arts degree from Princeton and a Master of Public Policy degree from Harvard's John F. Kennedy School of Government. He served in combat honorably in both Iraq and Afghanistan and was awarded two Bronze Stars for his service. He led a major veteran's advocacy group and honed his communications skills as a smooth-talking Fox News Channel host.

Sounds pretty qualified to me! And as for the specific argument that Hegseth lacks experience maneuvering around the byzantine Pentagon bureaucracy? That actually sounds like more of a credit than a debit on Hegseth's balance sheet. Moreover: God forbid Donald Trump, who ran and won on a populist 'drain the swamp' campaign message, actually nominate to his Cabinet someone who isn't a career bureaucrat. Democrats profess to care a lot about 'democracy,' yet they deny that a democratically elected president can give the people what they voted for. Square that circle.

Second, Democrats claim Hegseth ran the non-profit group Concerned Veterans For America (CVA) into the ground when he ran the organization. What nonsense. His CVA successor, my colleague Mark Lucas, has repeatedly said that, when Hegseth left CVA in 2014 to join Fox News, he did so on good terms. 

Even more to the point: When in the world did Democrats start pretending to take seriously private-sector management skills, such as avoiding organizational indebtedness? It doesn't pass the laugh test.

Third, the Democrat-mainstream media information operation has tirelessly defamed Hegseth as an alcoholic, philanderer, and rapist. They claim that Hegseth raped a woman at a political conference in California in 2017. 

Hegseth denies the charges and says his extramarital sexual encounter was consensual—though he regrets it, has since repented, and is now a committed churchgoer. Anonymously sourced allegations of excessive drinking were also thoroughly rebutted—on the record.

But what is definitely true, as Oklahoma Senator Markwayne Mullin said yesterday, is these sanctimonious Democrats are a bunch of hypocrites. 

'How many senators have showed up drunk to vote at night? Have any of you guys asked them to step down and resign from their job?' Mullin asked his fellow committee members. 'And then how many senators do you know have gotten a divorce before cheating on their wives? Did you ask them to step down? No, but it's for show.'

The Democrats turned the Hegseth confirmation hearing into a grotesque circus. It was everything that ordinary Americans have come to despise.

In reality, Hegseth is a brilliant pick to helm the Pentagon. At a time when reversing plummeting military recruitment is the single most important task for any would-be defense secretary, America could do a lot worse than a telegenic, two-time Ivy League alum, 44-year-old, Bronze Star-winning warrior who vows to end wokeness in the military and kick greedy defense contractors to the curb.

If the goal is to inspire young people, and above all young Southern and Midwestern men, to pick up arms to serve their country, Hegseth is a picture-perfect messenger.

It will soon be clear that Democrats' Brett Kavanaugh-style smear campaign to derail the Hegseth nomination has failed—bigly.

Iowa Senator Joni Ernst, an early Hegseth skeptic, announced Tuesday evening that she will support his nomination. And it is entirely possible that he ultimately garners a Democrat vote or two; perhaps John Fetterman, who recently met with Trump at Mar-a-Lago, has finally had enough following his colleagues' confirmation hearing hysterics.

In reality, Democrats will only have themselves to blame for coming up so pathetically short—for going out with a whimper, not a bang, as they did in their nonstop smearing of Trump as a fascist Nazi throughout the 2024 election cycle.

How many times will Democrats cry wolf? How many times will they rerun the weathered Kavanaugh playbook?

No one knows. But Democrats seem to lose every time they do this.

On second thought, maybe they should keep it up.