Uh Oh a Trump Administration Might Botch a Middle Eastern Invasion
Tyler Cowen linked to this (unintentionally?) hilarious Politico story:
Top Republican political leaders aren’t the only ones shunning their party’s presidential nominee — a vast number of highly skilled managers and policy experts, veterans of recent GOP administrations who would normally be expected to fill key positions for a new White House, are also vowing to sit out a Donald Trump presidency.
…[T]he absence of policy veterans in a new administration would have a substantive effect on the running of government.
POLITICO interviewed nearly five dozen Republicans over the past two weeks — people with experience working in government and who understand how Congress can enact, or shred, a new president’s agenda — and heard the same sentiment expressed repeatedly….
“I would never serve in a Trump administration,” said James Capretta, a former Office of Management and Budget official under George W. Bush. “The person at the top is unfit for the presidency. He’s made that very clear with his behavior.”
Added Matt McDonald, another Bush OMB veteran: “I wouldn’t vote for Trump, much less work for him. I don’t agree with half his ideas, and the other half I don’t really believe what he said.”
One former Republican official who worked in the Environmental Protection Agency put it this way: “You’d have to worry about your future career and the way you’re perceived in these things. You just kind of think of how he deals with people. Would you really want to work for him?”
Remember, the George W. Bush administration didn’t just involve invading another country on the basis of incompetence and/or lies. It also involved:
==> A doubling of the federal debt held by the public (adding some $3.4 trillion over 8 years),
==> “No Child Left Behind” (big increase in federal involvement in local schools) and Medicare Part D (arguably biggest expansion in welfare state since LBJ), which is estimated to cost some half a trillion dollars over its first ten years,
==> The Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007, which increased auto mileage requirements and jacked up the ridiculous biofuels requirements (which you have probably heard described as the “ethanol mandate”).
==> The creation of the TSA.
==> The Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002, which President Bush explained when signing that it was “the most far-reaching reforms of American business practices since the time of Franklin D. Roosevelt. The era of low standards and false profits is over; no boardroom in America is above or beyond the law.” (So just to be clear, this is the reason there have been no false reports of profits on Wall Street since 2002.)
==> Oh and let’s not forget, (partially) nationalizing banks.
You can see why “true conservatives” should be alarmed that the experts in implementing the above policies have their principles and won’t play ball with Donald Trump.
STANDARD DISCLAIMER: I don’t like Donald Trump and think he will be an awful president if elected.
Many of these people will come around by January, and happily take a post.
+1
In the Clinton Administration?
The mistakes of the past would be somewhat less entrenched.
Unless some of those veterans care to point out a few things they got right.
Tel, that was the quote I was going to pull out, but to say… in a good way or bad?
Maybe I will vote for Trump after all. If enough of DC shuns him, maybe absolutely nothing will get done there. I like the sound of that.
It’s your country, your other choice is Hillary.
Over here we only get one choice… which is trusting you guys to do the right thing. Call me cynical, because I am.
I think the only peaceful way out of the mess the Keynesians around the world have tricked us into, including Americans, is to ditch the FRN in favor of commodity monies of your/our own choosing.
Good luck to you guys and to us.
You have good reason to be cynical, since those who should know free markets best – Conservatives, in my view – don’t even realize how much socialism they’ve bought into.
This is a feature not a bug. The appeal of Trump is the chance to say “you’re fired!” to the entitled establishment. Their alarm and disdain are sweet music.
Donald Trump was called a prophet
(Dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb)
He started the Trump religion
(Dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb).
(Dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb)
You know it’s straight penny wise and pound foolish to go around saying to people now running from the party of Bush in droves “Shut up you idiots, there’s no possible way Trump could be worse than your boy Bush, who was basically Satan.”
Most of the actual voters who will balk at Trump can be persuaded to become libertarians and are open to libertarian arguments. Telling them “Nah, I’d rather see you drown with the Trumptanic.” is, shall we say, perhaps chapter 1 in How to Lose Friends and Alienate People.
There is no particular reason to believe that Trump will keep us out of future military action and one particular reason to believe he won’t: As president his power is limited. The main function of the president, beyond enforcing laws passed by Congress, is dealing with other countries. When he learns how limited his real power actually is, he may well focus on the real power of the presidency: dragging us into military confrontation.