By
Opinion writer
May 19, 2020 at 8:30 a.m. CDT
President
Trump is such a menace to the country’s health, to its institutions and to its
democracy that it is easy to forget he is just as dangerous to his own
political survival and to his advisers.
Trump
remains a threat to public health because of the reckless behavior and contempt
for science he demonstrates daily. On Monday, Trump bragged about taking the
drug hydroxychloroquine, which has not shown to be effective against covid-19
and which the Food and Drug Administration has warned can be dangerous. As
he said at a roundtable event at
the White House: “I asked [the White House doctor], what do you think? He said
if you’d like it. I said yeah, I’d like it. … A lot of front-line workers are
taking hydroxychloroquine.”
If he
was actually given that advice, he might consider getting a different
physician. But it is distinctly possible Trump is lying. “The best-case
scenario to Trump’s admission Monday is that he is, in fact, taking a risky
medication with his doctor’s consent for which he’s not seeing repercussions
and which his supporters will not see as a green light for seeking it out
themselves,” my colleague Philip Bump writes.
“The worst-case? Trump claimed to be taking the medication to make a point,
inadvertently triggering a new embrace of the medication among those who take
his words at face value — putting lives at risk.” In either event, he once more
proves he is the worst person possible to be leading us during a pandemic in
which science is our only salvation.
Trump
was also back to making entirely incoherent accusations against President
Barack Obama. “Obama knew everything that was happening," Trump said to reporters about
the cockamamie non-scandal he likes to call “Obamagate.” “I don’t think Obama
knows where he, where he, uh, you know, is in a lot of ways,” Trump said. I
would strongly suggest the Trump campaign not bet on an effort to paint former
vice president Joe Biden as mentally feeble. The comparison will not be kind.
Trump
further made a mess of matters when asked about his firing of State Department
Inspector General Steve Linick, as reports circulated that Linick had been
investigating Secretary of State Mike Pompeo’s alleged misuse of government
funds and the administration’s greenlighting an $8 billion arms deal with Saudi
Arabia that Congress attempted to block. Trump first said he didn’t know
anything about it but simply fired him at Pompeo’s request. (He thereby
confesses to his own lack of interest in governance and puts the onus on
Pompeo.)
Would
it be a conflict of interest if Pompeo asked Linick to be fired for
investigating him? Nah, said the man who repeatedly wanted to fire former
special counsel Robert S. Mueller III and already fired three other IGs. “I think maybe he
thinks he’s being treated unfairly,” Trump said in an unintentional accusation
of his secretary of state. Trump went a step further, confessing that he told
his Cabinet officials to get rid of IGs a long time ago, since they were Obama
appointees. In fact, IGs serve in administrations of both parties and are there
specifically to act as quasi-independent investigators, rooting out corruption,
waste, incompetence and abuse.
Pompeo
later insisted he did not
know he was being investigated. (Really?! Didn’t he refuse to cooperate with
an investigation into his role on pushing forward on the Saudi arms deal?). He
claimed that Linick was not performing in an “additive” way.
Linick’s
job is not, of course, to serve Pompeo’s or Trump’s ideological or partisan
missions but to act as an ethical and legal check on misconduct. Pompeo
recited, as any believer in the “unitary executive theory” would, that IGs
serve at the pleasure of the president. Well, not quite. A president is
required to give Congress 30-days’ notice and to show “cause” for firing one of
these watchdogs. Not being “additive” does not sound like it qualifies. Democrats
in Congress vow to investigate. Sen. Charles E. Grassley (R-Iowa), who used to
be a fierce advocate of IGs, sent a letter (oh my!) to Trump demanding to know
the president’s rationale for firing Linick.
Both
Trump and Pompeo now cavalierly demonstrate their conviction that the
government and its resources are there to serve their own agendas. They seem
indifferent if not actively hostile to the notion that others have higher
moral, professional and constitutional obligations. “L’etat c’est moi!”
has always been the guiding principle for this crowd. Their corruption is so
brazen, they no longer try to conceal it.
