President Trump: Making America Great Again...

[Harry Tic]

If nothing else, the incoming administration may offer us a chance to expand our vocabulary:

kakistocracy
noun [ C or U ]
us /ˌkæk.ɪˈstɑː.krə.si/ uk /ˌkæk.ɪˈstɒk.rə.si/

a government that is ruled by the least suitable, able, or experienced people in a state or country.

[Jeff Lebowski]

If nothing else, the incoming administration may offer us a chance to expand our vocabulary:

kakistocracy
noun [ C or U ]
us /ˌkæk.ɪˈstɑː.krə.si/ uk /ˌkæk.ɪˈstɒk.rə.si/

a government that is ruled by the least suitable, able, or experienced people in a state or country.

Holy cow. Welcome back, stranger.

[Jeff Lebowski]

Hmmm...

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[LVAllen]

Hmmm...

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Think that's reason enough to vote against his confirmation?

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[Harry Tic]

Holy cow. Welcome back, stranger.

I slipped out to grab a pack of smokes and lost track of the time.

[SteelBlue]

Think that's reason enough to vote against his confirmation?

Any republican resistance is over. If you haven't read Ionesco's Rhinoceros, now is the time.

[PaloAltoCougar]

Compare Gaetz's resume with that of ANY previous AG, Repub or Dem, and he comes up sorely lacking. An undistinguished academic career, no judicial clerkships, no prosecutorial experience, no significant administrative experience, pretty much nothing to suggest he'd be a worthy add to the Justice Department as a staff member, much less as its leader. Putting aside the current ethics investigation into several kinds of his alleged misconduct and adolescent behavior like showing to colleagues on the House floor nude pics and videos of his sexual conquests, this nomination goes well beyond the pale and is Trump's way of giving the anti-MAGA crowd the finger.

[frank ryan]

Compare Gaetz's resume with that of ANY previous AG, Repub or Dem, and he comes up sorely lacking. An undistinguished academic career, no judicial clerkships, no prosecutorial experience, no significant administrative experience, pretty much nothing to suggest he'd be a worthy add to the Justice Department as a staff member, much less as its leader. Putting aside the current ethics investigation into several kinds of his alleged misconduct and adolescent behavior like showing to colleagues on the House floor nude pics and videos of his sexual conquests, this nomination goes well beyond the pale and is Trump's way of giving the anti-MAGA crowd the finger.

Oh lord, he is corrupt child sex abuser. He'd a be nightmare.

[Jeff Lebowski]

Compare Gaetz's resume with that of ANY previous AG, Repub or Dem, and he comes up sorely lacking. An undistinguished academic career, no judicial clerkships, no prosecutorial experience, no significant administrative experience, pretty much nothing to suggest he'd be a worthy add to the Justice Department as a staff member, much less as its leader. Putting aside the current ethics investigation into several kinds of his alleged misconduct and adolescent behavior like showing to colleagues on the House floor nude pics and videos of his sexual conquests, this nomination goes well beyond the pale and is Trump's way of giving the anti-MAGA crowd the finger.

Yeah, you don’t need to explain why he is the worst possible pick. Ugh…

Brace yourself for MTG on the Supreme Court.

[PaloAltoCougar]

Any republican resistance is over. If you haven't read Ionesco's Rhinoceros, now is the time.

An apt reference. I haven't read that since high school and my mind started looking for a witty response that would have included Rhinos, RINOs, and even an Invasion of the Body Snatchers reference, but I grew weary and depressed and instead will devote my energies to preparing mentally for tipoff in thirty minutes.

As JL noted, only the most deluded Trumpist can argue the pick is anything better than horrible. Not sure MTG is Court-ready. Maybe give her the Space Force to combat the Jewish Space Lasers.

[frank ryan]

Gabbard, who tried to trade on her Bernie bonafides for credibility has been a fake moderate for a minute and is under the sway of some adversarial influences whether it's convenient to admit it or not.
She is a great pick for national intelligence, if are you sitting in the Kremlin

[Northwestcoug]

A reason to consider that though bad, Trump’s picks are not dangerously bad. From Ken White, who is still very bearish on the future of America:

Trump’s decision shows his tendency to vent his spleen. Appointing Gaetz owns the libs, humiliates the hated Justice Department, elevates someone who is a vulgar elbow-thrower like him, and is a thumb in the eye to the Republicans who hate Gaetz. It’s not a decision reflecting self-control; it’s a decision reflecting unconstrained anger and resentment. It’s like making your horse a Senator. The point isn’t that the horse will vote the way you want it to. The point is to humiliate the senate and show them you can do what you want. It’s bad, but it’s not smart bad.

Many of Trump’s appointments so far seem to be made out of frailty and not out of calculation. Kristi Noem at Homeland Security is a lightweight whose dubious competence will interfere with plans to genocide immigrants. Pete Hegseth’s chief qualification to be Secretary of Defense is that Trump saw him on the teevee a lot and his tattoos are not, technically, Nazi symbols. Mike Huckabee is a wholly owned trademark of Jack Chick Enterprises Inc. All of these people are ostentatiously evil and shame the institutions they will lead and are a disgrace to the Republic and so forth but do they have the skills or patience to achieve their weird goals? Institutions are very difficult to change. The populist sentiment “send in an outsider and have them clean house” requires an outsider smart and disciplined enough to overcome the fact they don’t understand what they’re changing. Otherwise the inside stubbornly and passive-aggressively thwarts the outsider. You can burn the institution to the ground but that doesn’t leave you with an institution you can use effectively as a weapon.

[BigFatMeanie]

That “making your horse a Senator” comparison slayed me.

[YOhio]

Gabbard, who tried to trade on her Bernie bonafides for credibility has been a fake moderate for a minute and is under the sway of some adversarial influences whether it's convenient to admit it or not.
She is a great pick for national intelligence, if are you sitting in the Kremlin

This is such a slanderous thing to say about a decorated combat veteran who served for 20 years. The US Army didn’t seem to have any doubts about her allegiances when they promoted her to Lt Col a couple years ago. Disagree with her. Dislike her. But have a little respect for service and patriotism. It’s super easy to make the case against her appointment without villainizing her. For instance, she served in a medical or PR unit her entire military career. In her four terms in Congress she didn’t sit on an intelligence committee. She consistently demonstrates poor judgment on international security issues. She seeks a ban on first-use, antagonizes the Saudis, and has demonstrated minimal capacity or experience on intelligence matters. But there is absolutely no evidence she commits treason and repeating it diminishes the case against her.

[Maximus]

https://www.theatlantic.com/newslett...n1DBP97Q9Wb2pU

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).

In early 2017, while still a member of Congress, Gabbard met with Assad, saying that peace in Syria was only possible if the international community would have a conversation with him. “Let the Syrian people themselves determine their future, not the United States, not some foreign country,” Gabbard said, after chatting with a man who had stopped the Syrian people from determining their own future by using chemical weapons on them. Two years later, she added that Assad was “not the enemy of the United States, because Syria does not pose a direct threat to the United States,” and that her critics were merely “warmongers.”

Gabbard’s shilling for Assad is a mystery, but she’s even more dedicated to carrying Putin’s water. Tom Rogan, a conservative writer and hardly a liberal handwringer, summed up her record succinctly in the Washington Examiner today:

She has blamed NATO and the U.S. for Russia’s invasion of Ukraine (again, to the celebration of both Russian and Chinese state media), has repeated Russian propaganda claims that the U.S. has set up secret bioweapons labs in that country, and has argued that the U.S. not Russia is wholly responsible for Putin’s nuclear brinkmanship.

When she appeared on Sean Hannity’s show in 2022, even Hannity blanched at Gabbard floating off in a haze of Kremlin talking points and cheerleading for Russia. When Hannity is trying to shepherd you back toward the air lock before your oxygen runs out, you’ve gone pretty far out there.

A person with Gabbard’s views should not be allowed anywhere near the crown jewels of American intelligence. I have no idea why Trump nominated Gabbard; she’s been a supporter, but she hasn’t been central to his campaign, and he owes her very little. For someone as grubbily transactional as Trump, it’s not an appointment that makes much sense. It’s possible that Trump hates the intelligence community—which he blames for many of his first-term troubles—so much that Gabbard is his revenge. Or maybe he just likes the way she handles herself on television.