Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth promised an overhaul of military physical fitness standards — and accountability to ensure that those standards are met — in an X post on Friday, declaring that on his watch, service members would be “FIT, not FAT!”

Hegseth was responding to a Military Times report published Thursday revealing that the overwhelming majority — more than two-thirds — of reserve troops did not meet the prescribed weight standards.

“Completely unacceptable. This is what happens when standards are IGNORED — and this is what we are changing. REAL fitness & weight standards are here. We will be FIT, not FAT,” Hegseth declared in an X post, noting that part of the problem was the fact that even the existing standards were not being enforced.

Completely unacceptable.

This is what happens when standards are IGNORED — and this is what we are changing. REAL fitness & weight standards are here.

We will be FIT, not FAT. pic.twitter.com/KWMlFbS1c8

— Pete Hegseth (@PeteHegseth) April 25, 2025

Citing a new study released earlier this week by the American Security Project (ASP), The Military Times reported that an estimated 68% of National Guard and reserve troops would be classified as either overweight or obese. The problem was slightly more pronounced among National Guard members, where some 21% of all personnel are estimated to be obese.

The ASP noted in the study that a large percentage of Active Duty service members are also considered to be overweight or obese. But because National Guard and reserve service members serve and train on a part time basis, enforcing physical fitness standards can be a much more complicated issue than when dealing with those serving in an active duty capacity — but the risks, in addition to the impacts on military readiness, remain high.

“These service members experience heightened risk for a wide variety of serious health conditions, such as type 2 diabetes, cardiovascular disease, chronic kidney disease, and osteoarthritis, which may lead to life-threatening health events such as stroke and heart failure,” the ASP report stated.

Hegseth has stated repeatedly that his main goal is to restore the United States military’s reputation as the most lethal fighting force on the planet, and as such, he plans to overhaul and enforce fitness standards that will bring about that end.

Help us, George Clooney … you’re our only hope!”

No one actually shared that plea with the Oscar-winner, but he’s been assuming someone did for a while. Over the course of four decades, the 63-year-old went from the mulleted handyman on “The Facts of Life” to an award-winning actor, director and film producer.

Clooney has every right and intention of using his celebrity gravitas. That’s despite the 2024 election proving voters no longer hold stars in high regard. At least at the ballot box.

Plenty of people listened to Clooney last summer, a time when his unofficial Save America tour kicked off. He took to the pages of The New York Times to call for President Joe Biden to end his rematch against President Donald Trump.

Clooney’s Op/Ed, and his choice of platform, rocked the Democratic establishment. Clooney shared how the Biden he once knew was no more, and that it was time for a younger Democrat to take the fight to Trump.

It’s devastating to say it, but the Joe Biden I was with three weeks ago at the fund-raiser was not the Joe ‘big F-ing deal‘ Biden of 2010. He wasn’t even the Joe Biden of 2020. He was the same man we all witnessed at the debate.

Breaking News from 2021, right? Except it came on the heels of Biden’s disastrous June 27 presidential debate and endless videos revealing the leader’s rickety health.

When Biden eventually stepped aside ( maybe pushed?), Clooney looked like a Democratic soothsayer.

As a result, the star’s ego grew three sizes. and we’re now getting a good dose of it  during Clooney’s “Good Night, and Good Luck” press tour.

Bruce Glikas/WireImage

The actor brought his 2005 film of the same name to the Great White Way earlier this month. His never-ending publicity for the show, along with the production itself, has given Clooney even more opportunities to lecture reg’lar Americans on The Way Things Ought to Be.

Let’s start with the show, a love letter to journalist Edward R. Murrow during his ‘50s-era battles with Sen. Joseph McCarthy. Their clashes mattered then, and now, and the play (and film) justly honor that.

Except Clooney backloads the production with a clip brigade that touches on everything from the silly to the surreal. It’s meant to remind us why the Fourth Estate matters, even though the clips include video of Elon Musk raising his arm in a manner that some of the far-Left dubbed Nazi-adjacent.

A real journalist wouldn’t suggest the billionaire’s awkward gesture was anything but an awkward hand gesture. Nor would he use that clip as an example of something noteworthy in modern times.

A better example? A shot of a burning Tesla?

Valerie Terranova/WireImage

Clooney has used every media interview to remind us why journalism matters now – more than ever – in the era of Trump.

Here he is genuflecting to the Fourth Estate:

It’s a subject matter that is very close to our hearts, which is what [the press] does. Telling the truth and holding truth to power. It’s a play we’re very excited to do.

He wagged his perfectly manicured finger at us anew during a chat with CBS about the Broadway show. Once again, he defended modern journalists:

Governments don’t like the freedom of the press. They never have,” he said. “And that goes for whether you are a conservative or a liberal or whatever side you’re on. They don’t like the press.

He played the same note during a chat with the far-Left “Late Show” on CBS:

We have had this issue where power, kind of, hates the fourth estate. They hate journalism and my father’s an anchorman and news man and we’ve always believed in the idea of when the other three estates: the judiciary branch and the executive branch, when they all fail you, you need that fourth estate, right.

Screenshot: YouTube/The Late Show with Stephen Colbert. George Clooney.

He’s right. So where was it during the last four years? Not only did brave, truth-telling journalists ignore President Biden’s mental decline, some actively covered it up. Remember the brief “cheap fakes” era of media damage control?

Biden’s mental decline was like his son’s missing laptop. Nothing to see here. Move along.

That’s journalism at its worst, and Clooney was part of that cover-up. Clooney palled around with President Biden during a June 2024 fundraiser, something he alluded to in that New York Times open letter. He saw Biden’s sorry state and said nothing for weeks until Biden’s poll numbers sank too low to ignore.

Is that what the son of a truth-telling journalist would do? Of course not.

Yet here he was thumping his chest about his play, the state of modern journalism, and his role in boosting both as if he had done nothing wrong.

It took a member of the “new media” to set Clooney straight about his cover-up.

“That’s not journalism, George. That’s cowardice, followed by naked partisanship,” said Megyn Kelly on her self-titled podcast about his actions.

Clooney remains both handsome and charismatic, and he effortlessly embraced his first major role on Broadway. That’s not easy. He might try putting his partisan blinders on the shelf the next time he waxes philosophical on journalism.

We’ve seen the very worst of it over the past decade, and any attempt to suggest otherwise is just theater.

* * *

Christian Toto is an award-winning journalist, movie critic and editor of HollywoodInToto.com. He previously served as associate editor with Breitbart News’ Big Hollywood. Follow him at HollywoodInToto.com.

The views expressed in this piece are those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.