Happy New Year! Have you made a resolution?

You know, I’m gonna get back to the gym or I’ll be more patient with the kids or Lord, I will never, ever, ever take another tequila shot as long as I live — if you’ll just make the projectile vomiting stop. Or this one, which I believe we’ve all vowed at least once over the years.

No more coldblooded killing of petty criminals after blowing their little boat to smithereens in the Caribbean.

Right? Practically a cliche. I mean, let’s say you were a rogue government in deep political shit over a bad economy that you destroyed with an asinine tariff regime, and let’s say even your Cult of Deplorables were getting fed up with all the abductions, arbitrary layoffs, dictator fellating, healthcare dismantling and vengeful starvation of poor children. And let’s say your pathetic campaign for the Nobel Peace Prize was laughed off the world stage like a reality-show contestant made up like Douche-O the Addled Orange Clown.

And, mostly, let’s say you needed to distract your citizens with a deadly demonstration of your bold and macho leadership. Who can resist the temptation to use the military’s most lethal weapons to murder possible marijuana smugglers in a speedboat traveling in international waters in the opposite direction of your country? That will make your mouth-breathing political base forget that, unfairly, poor white children get hungry and sick, too. But here’s the beauty part: If the first strike doesn’t kill all of the communist terrorist WMD boaters clinging to the unnavigable wreckage to threaten our sacred homeland, hit ’em again, harder!

America! America!
God shed His grace on thee
And crown thy good with brotherhood
From sea to shining sea!

But, that’s exactly where bad habits come from. When you run a regime expressly constructed to dismantle the rule of law, and you exercise absolute control on the justice department and legislature that could otherwise hold you accountable, and the judiciary has granted you impunity, you still have to go through the motions to have a plausible and defensible alibi. Because, while not as tyrannical as mandating vaccines to prevent millions of citizen deaths in a mass pandemic, 1st-degree homicide against helpless survivors can leave a bad taste. Remember how the radical-left thugs got their knickers all in a twist over the My Lai massacre?

So you’d have expected Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth (R-Haircut) to prove his contention that the guys holding on to explosion detritus were still “posing a threat.” But when even Republicans in Congress demanded to see video of those ferocious and dangerous warriors in their hulking container-transport vessel, he refused.

“Of course we’re not going to release a top-secret, full, unedited video of that to the general public,” Hegseth said.

Top secret, eh? That’s a bit hard to swallow. Maybe not My Lai, but definitely “me lie.” I mean, the Pentagon certainly didn’t worry about secrets when it triumphally released the first tap, which looked like this:

It was also pleased to soak in the good vibes from attacks in Nigeria …

… Yemen …

… and Somalia …

I’m sure this whole double-tap thing is just the usual fake news about war crimes — or, actually not-war crimes — but mustn’t we all take care about observing the 6th Commandment? Or at least covering our tracks. Yes, our great friend and ally Vladimir Putin did praise Trump’s “great resolve.” But considering how his other promises have played out, I think there may be room for improvement.