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The Duffel Brief · the free edition, Monday, Wednesday and Friday

Vol. 15 · No. 123 · Wednesday, 14 October 2026

Veterans

Vetbro apparel company pivots from stupid shirts to aggressively homoerotic ones

AI deemed ‘too smart’ to replace infantry

Hegseth opens up new TradWife MOS

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Vol. 15 · No. 123

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Vol. 15 · No. 123 · Deployed worldwide

Wednesday

14 October 2026

0239 Zulu

Next edition Friday

← Front page
· Page 2

First E4 senator holds up nominations until DoD allows hands in pockets

E4 Mafia makes power move in US Senate

Filed · 0826

Legislators and Service Leaders band together to keep the E4 Mafia down.

CAPITOL HILL, Washington DC – Using the Senate’s tradition of unanimous consent to block nominations of civilian appointees and military promotions to colonel and above, Senator Brandon “Wintergreen” Hoffman (I-E4), the nation’s first E4 Senator is defying Senate rules and norms until the Department of Defense changes the policy denying service members their fundamental right to place their hands in their pockets.

“I was elected to this office solely to represent a traditionally underserved population. Sent to Washington by the great E4 mafia of Fort….Fort…well, I can’t remember the names of the Forts anymore after the base renamings. But the point is the same,” Hoffman told Duffel Blog. “It was an honor to serve my country as a soldier, but that experience has long been sullied by unreasonable pocket expectations driven by a corrupt political pro-glove agenda. I will not bend to the will of a tyrant government using our troops in an anti-pocket crusade.”

In an undated photo, Sen. Hoffman (I-E4) fights the power

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