Ok, two months without a post, but barely a day without a freak-out. This heap of appointments just keeps getting worse -- who thought that even an Education Secretary could feel like a threat to the future of the nation?!? I can hardly write about it, but I thought maybe I'd feel better if I did a blog dump of everything that's been wiring me up, so here it is.
Bad news about the Trump era:
- Policy hints, competence
- Remember that call with the leader of Taiwan that threatened to upend decades of diplomacy with China? Trump Team Planned Call With President Of Taiwan For Weeks. Not just a novice mistake -- part of a plan...
- Congressional Republicans sucker punch American steel workers, scrapping 'Buy America' provision -- sorry, working class!
- Trump Receiving Intelligence Briefings Just Once A Week. He prefers his briefs only a page long too, with bullet points. This job is just too hard...
- Trump To Nominate Far Right Lawyer David Friedman As Israeli Ambassador
- Trump Meets With Billionaire Donor David Koch At Mar-A-Lago -- let's see what Voldemort can add...
- Bush EPA Chief Slams Trump's Pick As 'Disdainful Of The Agency'. On the other hand, Here Are All the Climate Deniers and Oil Flacks Who Love Trump’s EPA Pick. Should be great.
- Trump’s Pick for Interior Secretary Was Caught in “Pattern of Fraud” at SEAL Team 6
- Trump Prepping Ominous Moves to Gut US Intel Capacity
- McConnell Not Following Confirmation Process He Demanded From Reid In '09 -- who cares about ethics anyway? Apparently some Senators agree: things are different for Republicans.
- No secret safe with Trump when it might interest Putin? Hall of Mirrors
- Get Health Insurance Through Your Employer? ACA Repeal Will Affect You, Too -- made more overt here.
- In a new interview, Trump reveals he has no idea what’s going on with Obamacare -- this stuff is easy, right? get 'er done!
- Trump's (and Putin's) Plan to Dissolve the EU and NATO. -- alliances, peaceful cooperative structures, pffft.
- Here's a summary of Trump's nominees and their (un)fitness for their offices. waah.
- Betsy DeVos was asked a basic question about education policy — and couldn’t answer -- but honestly, the ones she DID answer were even worse.
- Perry Didn't Fully Understand Role Of Energy Secretary At First -- not just promoting sales of US oil; there's all that nuclear weaponry to keep an eye on...
- Only speculation, but compelling: Maybe the Answer Is That He Can't Divest (because his finances are upside down). Related: All of Donald Trump’s known conflicts of interest in one place
- How the fight against “normalizing” the Trump presidency could totally backfire
Donald Trump probably won’t cancel elections, but he could — and is relatively likely to — oversee a sweeping rollback of voting rights. His administration may not throw journalists in jail, but it could easily step up surveillance of domestic protesters. His appointees may not entrench a permanent oligarchy, but it could still — for millions of people in America — reduce the willingness and ability to participate in public life to zero.
These wouldn’t flout the law; they’d be under color of it and even in concert with it. But they would, nonetheless, be a tragedy for democracy.
- Edited to add this terrifying list of proposed structural and funding changes to government: Trump team prepares dramatic cuts to follow a Heritage Foundation blueprint.
The departments of Commerce and Energy would see major reductions in funding, with programs under their jurisdiction either being eliminated or transferred to other agencies. The departments of Transportation, Justice and State would see significant cuts and program eliminations.
The Corporation for Public Broadcasting would be privatized, while the National Endowment for the Arts and National Endowment for the Humanities would be eliminated entirely.
Holy cow.
- Flashes of fascism
Good news about/in these troubled times:
- Resistance
- Actual positive signs. We can use them.
