KEYNOTE PRESENTATION AT CAGA MEETING

 

NEW INC. MAGAZINE COLUMN BY HOWARD TULLMAN

How to Get Future-Focused in a Nation That Isn’t 

Trumpism is a product of our longing to relive the past. But your business can’t thrive in yesterday. 

EXPERT OPINION BY HOWARD TULLMAN, GENERAL MANAGING PARTNER, G2T3V AND CHICAGO HIGH TECH INVESTORS @HOWARDTULLMAN1

NOV 19, 2024

Every day, people ask me: How did we get here? It’s complicated, but let’s start by stating that too many of us were too comfortable, fell asleep at the switch, and stopped paying attention. Millions of people of all political persuasions were looking for simple, black-and-white solutions to complicated, persistent, and systemic problems. Those kinds of answers simply don’t exist; even more important, they never did.

In times of stress, anxiety, and confusion, it’s so easy to fall into the nostalgia trap: people imagine and pretend to recall the way we never were. And, of course, no one ever exploited this angst and unhappiness better than the Orange Monster. Fed-up and frightened folks desperately want to stop progress in its tracks because they’re threatened by it. They don’t trust the present, they hate the prospect of change, and they fear what the uncertain future holds for them and their children.

The imagined past looks so much better in the rearview mirror.

We find ourselves longing for, and trying to return, to the old and familiar ways because our daily lives have become too complicated, and we’re constantly confronted with too many choices, alternatives, and offerings with no guarantees. This isn’t just a matter of decision fatigue or analysis paralysis or of some kind of FOMO; it’s more a process of denial, blame shifting, and conscious avoidance of the harsh realities of our lives today. Al Gore long ago called these “inconvenient truths” and, if anything, they’ve only multiplied over the past few decades. Nostalgia can be a very powerful narcotic and a way to put a shiny and seductive gloss on the tough times of the past. Nostalgia is like a grammar lesson: you find the present tense, but the past perfect!

It doesn’t really matter what particular evil you care to blame: technology, social media, “woke” colleges and universities, helicopter parents, guns, corrupt billionaires, crooked politicians, or that always reliable villain: constant change. The fact is that millions of us – leaders, managers, politicians and entrepreneurs – simply stopped listening. We were fat, happy, and contented, willing to blame all the ills of society on someone else. And our basic business strategies, especially after the torment and terror of the pandemic, were to cling to the past, rely on our brands, reputation and history with clients, and seize on custom and tradition as excuses to avoid change. No one was excited about moving forward; we just wanted to get back to the pre-pandemic times. Forget it. You can never catch up with the past. And no one is successful in the past.

Old standbys are just old, and the fact that your customers are familiar with you and your products and services has offered a very shallow moat and little long-term protection. If you simply keep coasting and pretending that business as usual is good enough to have customers coming back for more, you don’t understand that we’re facing an upheaval not simply in the political arena but in all our businesses. This upheaval will require all of us to act quickly and dramatically to respond to the new challenges. There is no room for incrementalism.

For too many years, we’ve heard and religiously repeated the tired cliche that “familiarity breeds contempt.” But the way in which we have always understood this expression was incomplete and missing a few essential words. The more accurate and complete reading is that “familiarity first breeds comfort and then eventually, and often abruptly, contempt.” The only ultimate cure for the accumulating anger and mounting despair that threatens to pull the rug out from under your foundation and your future is to get ahead of the curve and change your approach and your behavior before you have to – before it’s too late. This is a lesson that the Democrats unfortunately and painfully learned in spades this year.

For decades in our state and federal governance, we have settled for a bad trade. We held our noses, closed our eyes, ignored obvious and unavoidable signs, and bet on a bunch of old and tired blowhards, do-nothings, and bozos in Washington, D.C., basically because they were familiar, because we were comfortable, and because we thought we knew what we were getting by placing our country and our democracy in their grubby and incompetent little hands. That contentment has now curdled, as it always does, on both sides of the political aisle and more broadly across the whole country into unhappiness and disgust.   

When I look at the sorry state of the antiquated and awful leadership of our political parties, it’s hard to feel much of anything but shame for the shambles that their inaction, ineptitude, and studied ignorance have now left us in. We were repeatedly warned even by the head MAGAt himself. We were well aware of the likely prospects, and we also knew that we’d never ourselves hire any of the incompetent and sorrowful “stewards” we had placed in charge of our democracy to work in our own businesses.

So, you could say that we’re only beginning to get what our apathy and passivity have brought about and that the unfortunate fact is that we largely deserve it. We waited too long to wake up and now our country is about to pay the price. Don’t delude yourself into thinking that this new attitude and consumer activism is going to be bound by the borders of the political arena. Time’s up and it’s coming for you and your business as well. Time has an ugly way of turning your assets into liabilities and it’s relentless. As David Bowie said: “Time may change me, but I can’t trace time.” Translation: If you don’t get started on the critical changes now, you’re in for a rude awakening and a rough ride.

The Democratic election debacle may be bad news for our country, but at least it provides some object lessons and some important guidance for the rest of us in what not to do and how not to act if you want your company to succeed.

1.     Look and listen to what the world is telling you. Don’t ignore the bad news.

2.     Don’t try to please everybody – it’s not possible and it’s a waste of time and money.

3.     Don’t take your customers or your partners for granted. Reassure and reward them.

4.     Change for the better before you have no choice.

5.     Change is expensive, but not changing is a choice you can’t afford.

6.     Don’t try to do cheaply what you shouldn’t do at all. Today’s consumers and customers know the difference.

 

Biden should order background checks of Trump’s Cabinet picks

 

Biden should order background checks of Trump’s Cabinet picks

The FBI has conducted background investigations of White House nominees since at least the tenure of President Dwight Eisenhower’s time in office.

 

Nov. 18, 2024, 4:29 PM CST

By Frank Figliuzzi, MSNBC Columnist

We had fair warning. Last month, The New York Times reported that then-candidate Donald Trump’s advisers were telling him to skip FBI background investigations for his high-level selections for nominees. Last week, CNN, citing “people close to the transition planning,” reported that Trump doesn’t plan to submit the names of at least some of his Cabinet-level picks for FBI vetting. Whether you’re Republican, Democrat or independent, and regardless of whether you’re energized or enraged by Trump’s controversial picks, you should be concerned about the possibility of a vetting process that’s really no process at all.

Whether you’re energized or enraged by Trump’s picks, you should be concerned about the possibility of a vetting process that’s really no process at all.

The FBI has conducted background investigations of White House nominees since at least the tenure of President Dwight Eisenhower’s time in office. Even so, there’s no law clearly mandating presidents or presidents-elect to submit their nominees and appointments to the FBI for investigation. In 1953, Eisenhower issued Executive Order (EO) 10450, calling for investigations of prospective federal employees. Yet, executive orders don’t have the full effect of a law and are only binding on the executive branch. Worse, Eisenhower’s executive order is subject to interpretation. Consider Section 2, “The head of each department and agency of the Government shall be responsible for establishing and maintaining within his department or agency an effective program to ensure that the employment and retention in employment of any civilian officer or employee within the department or agency is clearly consistent with the interests of the national security.”

There’s lots of wiggle room there. Section 3 of that executive order reads, “The appointment of each civilian officer or employee in any department or agency of the Government shall be made subject to investigation … but in no event shall the investigation include less than a national agency check (including a check of the fingerprint files of the Federal Bureau of Investigation).” That means that Trump, who claims he’s using private firms to conduct background inquiries, might get by with having whatever firm that is simply checking FBI fingerprint files. Yet, despite there being no mandate, the intent here was a government inquiry involving the FBI.

Subsequent presidents, including Bill Clinton and Barack Obama, revised Eisenhower’s edict to mitigate intrusive inquiries into sexual orientation in the granting of security clearances, but still missing is a specific mandate for FBI investigation of White House nominees. And again, an executive order isn’t quite a law. Clearly, the intent in these executive orders has always been for a government agency, particularly the FBI, to conduct these inquiries, but we have an incoming president who thumbs his nose at rules and intentions.The Presidential Transition Act of 1963 directs the FBI to conduct such background checks “expeditiously” for “individuals that the President-elect has identified for high level national security positions.” But what if he never formally identifies and submits his picks to the Department of Justice and the FBI? In his last administration, Trump overrode security adjudicators who denied clearances for his son-in-law, Jared Kushner, and many others, after FBI background checks resulted in national security concerns. This time, he appears poised to dispense with the FBI checks and potentially with the Senate confirmation process by making recess appointments.

That leaves us with two pertinent memorandums of understanding (MOU) which should enable President Joe Biden and/or the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee to quickly do something to preserve national security and the Constitution’s advice, and consent powers conferred on our elected lawmakers.

This time, he appears poised to dispense with the FBI checks and potentially with the Senate confirmation process by making recess appointments.

First, Biden should rely upon the existing MOU between the Department of Justice and his office, as well as the Presidential Transition Act, to investigate the people Trump says he wants to put in office. The MOU sets out procedures for requesting background investigations of nominees “at the request of the president.” It doesn’t say the president-elect, it says “president.” That’s you, Joe. As for the transition act, it reads as applying to people “…the President-elect has identified” for high-level positions. Well, the president-elect has already publicly identified those people. And Biden should respond.What happens if a nominee refuses to cooperate, won’t provide his consent to be investigated or won’t fill out any forms? The MOU has a remedy for that: “The DOJ and FBI may consider a request from the President for a name check or BI without the consent of the appointee if justified by extraordinary circumstances.” I’d say with some of these nominees named by Trump, and the fact that Trump may forego FBI vetting of them, we have extraordinary circumstances.

The Senate Judiciary Committee has its own pertinent MOU with the Counsel to the President. That document says the committee “shall have access to” the FBI reports on nominees for attorney general, FBI director or summaries for “all other DOJ nominees and non-judicial nominees.” Emphasis on all other and non-judicial. We know senators want the details of the House Ethics Committee inquiry into former Rep. Matt Gaetz, Trump's pick for attorney general. An FBI background investigation would certainly include a request to review that report, as well as the DOJ criminal investigation, now closed, into Gaetz. The Senate Judiciary Committee should make a bipartisan request for an FBI background check of Trump's picks now. Regardless of party affiliation, if senators relinquish their advice and consent authority or confirm a nominee without benefit of knowing the risk they pose, then they set a precedent for never again exercising their constitutional powers.

You’d be right to ask, “What’s the point?” After all, Trump is unlikely to read, let alone act upon, any derogatory information developed in FBI reports. The point would be to force Trump’s hand. Drop the reports on his desk and let him go forward with nominees who potentially are either found through investigation to be unqualified, at risk of compromise, or even a national security threat. Let Trump order White House security clearance adjudicators or his hand-picked agency heads to grant security clearances to seemingly unqualified candidates. Let the Senate affirm nominees after they’ve read details about the kind of people who may lead the DOJ or serve as the director of national intelligence.

Don’t take it from me. Here’s what Founding Father Alexander Hamilton said about the Senate’s advice and consent role, and the need for checks and balances against a president’s nominees. “…the president would be 'ashamed and afraid' to bring forward unmeritorious candidates, whose only qualifications would be [hailing] from particular states, or being personally allied to the president, or 'possessing the necessary insignificance and pliancy to render them the obsequious instruments of his pleasure.'”

Biden should be neither ashamed nor afraid to thoroughly investigate Trump's picks, given the signs that Trump may not. Through executive order, he should mandate that the FBI conduct background investigations on Trump’s picks and instruct the FBI to begin the process now. The U.S. Senate should use its power to request the same of the FBI.

The clock is ticking.

Frank Figliuzzi

Frank Figliuzzi is an MSNBC columnist and Senior National Security and Intelligence Analyst for NBC News and MSNBC. He was the assistant director for counterintelligence at the FBI, where he served 25 years as a special agent and directed all espionage investigations across the government. He is the author of "The FBI Way: Inside the Bureau's Code of Excellence."

Trump Demands A Blood Sacrifice

 

Trump Demands A Blood Sacrifice

 

Rick Wilson

Nov 18, 2024

 

If you’re a GOP Senator, few nominations in your career will carry the historical weight—or the stench—of Matt Gaetz, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Pete Hegseth, and Tulsi Gabbard. Once the master of the Senate, Mitch McConnell has been reduced to a bitter old man muttering ineffectually about “no recess appointments” in a last, sad burble before he drowns in the toxic legacy he so carefully curated.¹

Behind closed doors, even the Trumpiest of Senate Republicans pray for the reprieve of a Trump tantrum that sends Congress into recess, sparing them the political horror of voting for any of these four rodeo clowns.

And why not? The other names bubbling up from Trump’s Team of Lackeys are worse than you think—dangerous, unqualified, and breathtakingly unfit—but less visible.

Yet Trump, in his monarchical fervor, doesn’t just want the Senate to confirm this gallery of grotesques; he demands it. He wants their names in blood, their votes on the record. He wants them on their knees, not as co-equals, but as collaborators in his crusade to shatter the guardrails of democracy.

This isn’t about governance; it’s about submission.

It’s a spectacle designed to crush what’s left of Senate resistance, while Trump’s sycophantic media enablers sanitize these choices into just another “Washington appointment fight.” The stakes—democracy, stability, the rule of law—are drowned out by the daily horse race coverage.

Trump’s bet? The media will do what it has always done: focus on the noise and ignore the existential threat Trump poses. Yes, Trump won the election; no, nothing about who and what he is changed with that victory. It says more about the parlous state of the American Republic than about him.

And so far, he’s right.

The Senate’s quiet, nervous whispers are mainly off the record, while the public statements of even his critics carry the same spineless refrain: “Well, the President has a mandate, and we will advise and consent…” Translation? “Please, sir, don’t send the mob to burn me alive.”

There’s a plan here; it is sinister, not stupid. Trump’s picks aren’t just about trolling the libs or owning the deep state. They’re the foot soldiers in a very deliberate campaign to dismantle the Constitution, weaponize the government, and monetize the wreckage.

Breaking the Constitution

Trump’s obsession with unchecked power—think Louis XIV but dumber—clashes directly with America’s constitutional framework.

His solution? Smash it. For decades, the GOP has claimed to be the party of the Constitution while gazing wistfully into the middle distance as Trump openly declares his intent to undo it.

Trump doesn’t see the Constitution as a guiding document but as an obstacle to his impulses. Why shouldn’t he? The post-Constitutional ethos of the Red Caesar clique—Thiel, Yarvin, Deneen, and their ilk—defines the mindset and philosophy of his enablers, and it’s frankly Trump’s fantasy world. In this place, power is reposed in the hands of a post-modern king by the new tech royalty. Shame about those serfs.

After skirting consequences for everything short of cannibalism and incest (the jury’s still out on the last), Trump knows the law will never touch him. Between a corrupt Judge Cannon and an utterly impotent Merrick Garland, he knows he’s legally impervious. Why should constitutional limits bother him?

Expect immediate, aggressive challenges to checks on executive power, especially concerning the military. Today’s Constitution-breaking experiments will become tomorrow’s playbook.

Trickle Down Terror

Authoritarians know one thing: fear is the glue that holds their empires together. Trump’s strategy is clear: create an atmosphere of uncertainty and dread. Special counsels, regulatory investigations, tax audits, committee subpoenas, secret probes —it’s all fair game in the coming chaos. It will start with his name-brand enemies, and the era of trickle-down terror will begin.

His deportation fantasy of rounding up 25 million “illegals” isn’t just about immigrants; it’s about normalizing the use of military power against civilians. Anyone who thinks the slow-witted but snappily dressed Pete Hegseth will say, “No, Mr. President. That’s against the law,” is living in a dream world. He’ll eagerly endorse it.

As election attorney and LP General Counsel Mario Nicolais wrote: “Once the military is mobilized to act with force within our own country's borders, Trump will use it in any way he sees fit against ‘threats’ he proclaims.”

Once those doors start getting kicked down, it’s not a stretch to imagine that power being turned on political opponents. Mission creep is a feature, not a bug.

Weaponizing the Government

In Trump’s world, loyalty isn’t just expected; it’s enforced. By weaponizing the DOJ, FBI, DHS, the Intelligence community, and the IRS, Trump will create an unholy program of vengeance, fear, and reward.

Despite knowing full well why he was investigated for the various Russia matters, the Flynn/Comey matter, January 6th, stealing classified documents, state and Federal election fraud, and his corrupt Ukraine shakedown scheme Trump persisted in bleating about the weaponized Deep State.

It must have been a mysterious cabal of Deep State Trump haters, not his behavior, right?

It’s because every lie about the government being weaponized against Trump was pure projection.

Some have had trouble processing why Trump would pick Matt Gaetz, a singularly unqualified hack and low degenerate, as Attorney General. Not this writer.

His task? Punish enemies, protect Trump, and purge anyone who dares stand in the way. Like all autocrats, Trump craves control over domestic intelligence and law enforcement.

Gaetz will be the blunt instrument Trump wields with glee. Even if he’s stuck with a recess appointment, he’ll launch a dozen special counsel investigations, stack the DOJ with Trump stooges, throw open the FBI counterintelligence files to Tulsi Gabbard (and thence, Russia), and deploy the FBI and DOJ against anyone who

One thing Matt probably won’t do at DOJ is investigate teenage sex trafficking.

Unless they take Venmo, of course.

The Death of Expertise, Part Duh

Trump’s contempt for expertise isn’t just personal; it’s cultural. Trump hated having people around him in the first Administration who knew things. It’s not just a disdain for intellectuals, scientists, and legal expertise; it’s his jealousy of those with more intellectual horsepower than the average household appliance. Remember, Trump is barely literate, lacks all intellectual curiosity, and is a stranger to the world of ideas. He has feral cunning, but little else.

He has weaponized America’s addiction to algorithmically-reinforced stupidity, elevating the loud and the trollish over the competent and the principled. Appointing incompetent hacks to critical positions isn’t a bug; it’s a feature.

Modern fascism really, really depends on a large cohort of people who Can’t Read Good and Don’t Want to Read Good. It’s easy to convince them that their lives are somehow expertise, knowledge, and principle are their enemies.

This is why RFK is the perfect Trump pick for the Department of Health and Human Services; he combines crackpot pseudoscience antivax woo with outright malice. The cost in lives won’t even register on his broken moral radar, but the pwnage of experts will be priceless fodder for the MAGA media cloud.

When first hundreds, then thousands of American children die from his “just asking questions” attacks on vaccines, the obvious, objective benefits of vaccines in eliminating deadly childhood diseases will be nothing but regrets.

One smart pharmaceutical executive I’ve known for decades said, “Watch who goes in below him. They make RFK look like Edward Jenner.”

Departments that require expertise will instead get zealots, dipshits, arsonists, and sycophants—ideal for dismantling their functionality while spinning populist fairy tales about bringing “common sense” to government.

Monetizing the Presidency

Corruption isn’t just incidental to Trump; it’s core to his crapulous ethos.

The grift of his first term was merely a preview. Protected by the Supreme Court’s enabling decisions, Trump’s second term will be a master class in turning the presidency into a cash cow for himself and his cronies.

Do you think Jared will settle for just $2 billion from the Saudis this time? Think again. Trump will want much, much more than having foreign governments just pay for overpriced rooms at his hotels? Hardly. Leave the money on the nightstand.

The merger of political power and personal profit will be so blatant that it will make his first term look quaint.

Breaking Systems

Trump thrives on chaos.

Breaking governmental, institutional, and societal systems isn’t a side effect; it’s the entire disease. Every shattered norm is an opportunity to consolidate power, punish enemies, and profit. Every broken social contract between the citizens and the state makes it harder and harder to return to the Before Times.

Expect a cavalcade of destructive, dumb, and impossible recommendations from the unconstitutional Department of Government Oversight as Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy — whose primary goal will be to punish Trump’s enemies and enrich his allies, like Elon himself —make endless, splashy pronouncements about how we can easily cut government by 75, 85, maybe 95%.

Just be ready for some pain.

Oh, not pain for them, silly rabbit.

The pretense that this agency will somehow cut costs will come at a price for millions of Americans; the only improved efficiency here will be in the transfer of wealth to companies and allies of Trump and the deprivation and cruelty it will deliver to veterans, the elderly, and the poor.

The Senate Won’t Stop This.

They’ll barely even try.

Trump’s picks will largely sail through their incompetence and malice rationalized as “the will of the people.” Gaetz and Gabbard may go down if Sen. John Thune knows what’s good for him, but I’ve long stopped betting on the GOP to do the right thing, even in their self-interest.

Mostly, no matter how far off the rails these nominees are proven to be, the Senate will cheerfully and briskly impose them on America. The GOP isn’t just complicit; they’re co-conspirators, gleefully enabling the destruction of the systems that once restrained executive power. What’s left will be a hollowed-out government run by lackeys, grifters, foreign assets, neo-monarchists, and chaos agents.

And if you think they’ll stop with just breaking the system, think again.

They’ll profit from its ashes.

1

Chuck Schumer isn’t off the hook, by the way. The idea of “give ‘em enough rope" doesn’t work here: Schumer should be leading a loud, front-and-center fight over these monstrous picks.

Trump MAGAts

 

JUNK

 

HARDBALL - BIDEN,SCHUMER,GARLAND AND DURBIN CAN'T CONTINUE TO BE THE NORMALIZING WEAKLINGS WHO ENABLE TRUMP

 

It’s Time for Outgoing Democrats to Play Hardball

Much can still be done between now and Inauguration Day to put limits on the excesses of the incoming Trump administration.

 

Paul Rosenzweig

Nov 15, 2024

 

IN THIS CRUCIAL PERIOD between the election and the inauguration, opponents of the president-elect need to use every feasible lever of power to defeat Trump’s movement, lest the country fail.

In this, they would be correcting a past mistake. The original response to Donald Trump’s rise was based on a strategic error. His critics and opponents thought he was an aberration, not a phenomenon—a recipe for quietism.

In the context of culture, we had Michelle Obama’s initial response: “When they go low, we go high.” The comforting conceit was that if Trump’s opponents continued to hold the moral high ground, Americans would eventually tire of the man’s shenanigans and return to their better natures. If you get down in the mud with a pig, the saying goes, you only get dirty.

In the political context, this misconception contributed to the Democrats’ recent defeat. Biden and congressional Democrats saw Trump as an exception, so when they took power in 2020, they returned to traditional, normal leadership activities. They performed admirably. Like a well-drilled baseball team turning a double play, the Democratic Congress, despite its narrow majority, passed valuable legislation aligned with typical Democratic priorities, like the Inflation Reduction Act.

The problem is that Trump was playing dirty. The Democrats may have turned a double play, but the runner had gone to second anyway and was punching the second baseman in the face. Had Democrats recognized the transformational meaning of Trump’s movement, then instead of prioritizing “normal” legislative activities, they would have put their focus on reforming electoral rules to prevent Trumpism from taking root. Drastic options would have been on the table—things like adding two states to gain four Democratic senators or beginning the effort to abolish the Electoral College (not that the latter would have helped them in 2024). They did none of those things.

Likewise, in the context of law and policy, the Democrats’ idea was to continue to adhere to the norms of conduct that undergird formal legality. The very first piece I wrote after the 2016 election was titled “Defending Norms by Defending Norms,” and it critiqued (of all people) Preet Bharara, who was then the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York. He had (in my then view) transgressed normative expectations by refusing to resign, forcing Trump to fire him. Bharara was within his legal rights to do this, of course; my criticism at the time was rooted in my belief that the best response to Trump was to keep up traditional standards of conduct and restraint.

Boy, was I wrong. And so were other critics. We’d misjudged the situation and made a strategic error—one that opponents of Trump are still making today. It’s time to correct that error. If we want to have a real hope of reversing Trump’s authoritarian course, we all need to stop playing tee-ball and start playing legal hardball. Trump’s opponents need to stop showing automatic deference to historical norms and limitations that ought, in a good and just society, be adhered to—not because those norms are bad, but rather because it behooves us to suspend normal decorum when the building is on fire.

NO ONE SHOULD WELCOME the coarsening of normative behavior that will result. Nonetheless, opponents need to deploy every legal tool in their toolkit to oppose Trump’s encroachments, whether or not it is “appropriate” or “traditional” or “historically legitimate” to do so. If opponents of Trump don’t fight to win, they will lose, plain and simple.

What do I mean by this? Here’s an easy example: Trump abused the pardon power for personal gain and for the benefit of his cronies. We can readily expect he will do so again. As I recently wrote in the Atlantic, it is now that Biden needs to throw aside the constraints of “good governance” and use the pardon power liberally, not to benefit his cronies but rather for the ethical and moral reason of protecting his supporters and allies from Trump’s revenge. Everyone from Liz Cheney to Gen. Mark Milley should be offered as much protection from Trump as Biden can possibly give them before he leaves the White House.

The range of unilateral options open to President Biden in his remaining few days is surprisingly broad. All options—to skip the inauguration, to provide more weapons to Ukraine, to make legally binding commitments to NATO, and still others—should be on the table.

Here’s one creative idea: At the end of his first administration, Trump proposed to create a new “Schedule F” that would convert many civil service positions to at-will positions whose appointment he, as president, would control. The proposal was based on a novel interpretation of a statutory authority that had never been used in that way before.¹

One of the principal promises Trump has made is to re-implement his Schedule F proposal as a first swing of the axe against the deep state. Of course, the fired employees will sue—but Trump’s “fire first, litigate later” strategy would have significant effects, even if the employees eventually won. Some employees would resign rather than fight; others would be cowed into grudging subservience. And, in the end, even if only for a brief period of time, Trump would be able to begin populating the civil service with his sycophantic toadies.

There might be a way to forestall that eventuality—if Biden is willing to play a little hardball. What would happen if, hypothetically, the unions representing civil servants sued preemptively (in, as the Republicans are wont to do, a district where a favorable jurist sits) to seek a declaratory judgment that Trump’s legal interpretation was wrong? And what if, instead of contesting the suit, the Biden DOJ conceded the point and accepted a binding consent decree with enforceable terms favorable to those who would be affected by Trump’s Schedule F order?

After such a decree, the litigation posture of any effort by Trump to implement Schedule F would be quite different: Instead of issuing an executive order premised on a novel interpretation of a statutory text, he would need to directly challenge a binding court ruling. Trump might, of course, still win out in the end, but there is no reason to make it easy on him by sitting back and waiting for him to dictate the terms of legal engagement.

The options for Democrats aren’t limited to the administration. As Norm Ornstein points out, the Democrats still control the Senate for the next two months. Not only should they fill as many judicial and regulatory positions as possible, but they should also hold preemptive hearings on Trump’s worst cabinet picks and most odious policy proposals.

William Kristol and Andrew Egger recently observed that, for different reasons, neither Republicans nor Democrats in Congress seem eager to push back against Trump’s predations on the rule of law, competent governance, and even the prerogatives of Congress itself. But if congressional Democrats are lax now, when do they expect to reconstitute their strength? They should act to the very limits of their legal power to prevent Trump from exceeding his.

Why not use what power is available to erect barriers to authoritarianism, even if it means getting down in the mud to fight with the pig? Please, Democrats, with all the time you have left in power: Play hardball, damn it.

 

1

For those interested in the details, Trump proposed to use a provision that exempted certain positions “of a confidential, policy-determining, policy-making, or policy-advocating character” from civil service protections. Before Trump, everyone understood the language to apply only to a small number of positions traditionally filled by political appointees.

GaetzGate - Joe Klein

 

GaetzGate

The Sky Is Falling

Joe Klein Nov 15

 

There I was, two days ago, blithely typing these words, “I find, rather amazingly, that I’m making a pretty good face of non-despair at the moment,” at which point the news arrived that Trump wanted Matt Gaetz to be Attorney General of the United States of America. And that he wanted Tulsi Gabbard to be Director of National Intelligence. And now, that he actually wants to endanger the nation’s children by appointing Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to run Health and Human Services.

Suffice to say, I have stopped making a pretty good face of non-despair. Edvard Munch’s Scream has nothing on me: I could spare the alphabet and just launch a page of infuriated exclamation points (!!!!…you get the picture) and dumfounded question marks (?????….). But words are all I got. Donald Trump is laughing at us—and he is testing the August and Supine Republican members of the Senate. Taken together with Pete Hegseth’s intention to eviscerate the military of anyone who ever breathed the same air as General Mark Milley, you have, rather quickly, a national crisis. Lindsey Graham has indicated he’s okay with this. I knew Lindsey before he became a puddle of brown sugar. He was an Air Force veteran, a JAG in Kandahar…but he’s now a willing stooge for the dismantling of the U.S. military. Will any Republicans stand up against this obscenity?

We know who and what Gaetz is—and we’ll probably know a lot more when the House Ethics Committee investigation leaks. I just heard a tape of Senator Markwayne Mullen of Oklahoma saying that Gaetz went around the House floor showing nude photos of his teeny-bop paramours and explaining that he would prep for party time with a cocktail of erectile dysfunction drugs and energy drinks (a concoction that hereafter might be known as the Viagra Bull). He could then “go all night.” I’ll bet.

One wonders whether Gaetz is being used as a Viagra Bull in a china shop to divert attention from the other bizarre Trump nominees. You should read David Ignatius on the terrible national security picks. The ever-excellent Tom Nichols has this to say, over at The Atlantic, about Tulsi Gabbard:

Gabbard ran for president as a Democrat in 2020, attempting to position herself as something like a peace candidate. But she’s no peacemaker: She’s been an apologist for both the Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad and Russia’s Vladimir Putin. Her politics, which are otherwise incoherent, tend to be sympathetic to these two strongmen, painting America as the problem and the dictators as misunderstood. Hawaii voters have long been perplexed by the way she’s positioned herself politically. But Gabbard is a classic case of “horseshoe” politics: Her views can seem both extremely left and extremely right, which is probably why people such as Tucker Carlson—a conservative who has turned into … whatever pro-Russia right-wingers are called now—have taken a liking to the former Democrat (who was previously a Republican and is now again a member of the GOP).

Also, Gabbard meets another Trump standard: she’s good looking. As are Pete Hegseth and Gaetz in a hilarious Hollywood villain sort of way.

(N.B.: We have been conditioned by feminists to ignore women’s looks. It is said to be sexist ogling. That should come to an end now. Not when the President relies so heavily on this annoyingly superficial factor when choosing advisors. It is also a natural human reaction: being attractive is a force multiplier that can not be denied and should, from time to time, be remarked upon. One lesson I shall take from this election is that the English language has been bowdlerized in a LatinXy way by the fems. It was never too awkward for me to call mankind “humankind,” but other formulations like “herstory” were just silly. As were the plural pronouns. They/them should be over now, too. The main purpose they served was to annoy people—and annoyed people, it turned out, voted in numbers in 2024. “Kamala is for They/Them” turned out to be a powerful punchline. (See the item below) Tolerance should be the order of the day for any choices people make about themselves, but not to the point of silliness…or political defeat by a thug. The re-correction of the language should extend beyond feminists to the legions of the politically-prissy word abusers: Recently, in a piece I wrote for a mainstream outlet, the word “homosexuals” was edited out and replaced by “the gay community.” I didn’t mind so much, even if it implied a political judgment that not all people might share; in fact, I sort of like the irony inherent in formerly oppressed people calling themselves “gay.” But I draw the line at LGBTQ+. It is the sexual equivalent of “people of color” and “undocumented” immigrants—a politically incorrect imposition on plain speaking. If we are ever to seize back a majority of voters from the Trumpers, we must speak truth to activists. We must be free to call a babe a babe.)

And Then, There Are The Democrats…

What am I? What is my political stripe? I’ll accept liberal in the classical, free speech, free enterprise, rule of law sense—and I considered myself a New Democrat in the 1990s, and a Never Trumper for the past decade. But when I look at the vast wasteland that is now the Democratic Party—an amalgamation of identity activists, post- socialists, teachers union members and deluded academics—I can pretty safely say, I am not one of them. I am not a Republican, either, obviously. As long as there is a binary choice between Trumper and Not, I’ll vote not. But it sure would be nice if Democrats took a look at reality and reformed themselves. What is reality? Well, this post-election poll by the Democratic firm Blueprint offers a solid glimpse:

KEY FINDINGS:

1.      The top reasons voters gave for not supporting Harris were that inflation was too high (+24), too many immigrants crossed the border (+23), and that Harris was too focused on cultural issues rather than helping the middle class (+17). 

2.      Other high-testing reasons were that the debt rose too much under the Biden-Harris Administration (+13), and that Harris would be too similar to Joe Biden (+12). 

3.      These concerns were similar across all demographic groups, including among Black and Latino voters, who both selected inflation as their top problem with Harris. For swing voters who eventually chose Trump, cultural issues ranked slightly higher than inflation (+28 and +23, respectively). [Emphasis mine.]

4.      The lowest-ranked concerns were that Harris wasn’t similar enough to Biden (-24), was too conservative (-23), and was too pro-Israel (-22).

There was all this blather about how Kamala had to “earn the votes” of black men, as if they were some unique category. But she also had to earn the votes of white men and women, and Latinos and Asians any everyone else. And going forward, the Dems are going to have to earn my pantheist, capitalist, cosmopolitan, internationalist, bibliophilic vote, too.

There is one other rule of the road going forward:

As horrific as Trump’s start has been, it is not impossible that he will inadvertently—or even advertently—do some good stuff. I will not be a reflexive anti-trumper. That would be boring for me and for you. And it would be irresponsible. So yes, I am extremely worried about the state of our democracy, but that goes both ways—so long as Democrats insist on confusing equality (of opportunity) with equity (of results). It will not be easy for me to give credit to a man I consider a mortal fool, but if it must be, it will be.