Month: November 2024

Notwithstanding the sound and fury, both Biden and Trump agree that the Ukraine war will end with Russian control of some Ukrainian territory and the Ukrainians remaining out of NATO. Does that mean they support the same policies?

No, for two reasons. First, Trump wants to impose an unfavorable peace on Ukraine by withholding assistance. Biden’s changing stance on particular weapons at particular times had some of the same effect, but it was motivated by a fear of World War III, not by any desire to force Zelensky to accept a bad deal. Second, Biden almost certainly would agree to American security guarantees to Ukraine as part of any deal. Trump probably won’t. That represents the difference between South Korea after the cease-fire agreement and Czechoslovakia after Munich.

Trump literally could not have picked an AG nominee with less chance of getting confirmed than Matt Gaetz. That clearly was the point; the man on golf cart wanted to see if the Senate had any lines at all when it comes to his behavior. The answer, we are slightly relieved to see, is yes.

But two questions linger. First, we need to know if Gaetz is the only one over the line; will the Senate accept DOD and National Intelligence nominees who are clearly unfit for their positions and will put national security at risk? Second, who will Trump nominate as his second choice AG? Will it be a GOP grandee with expansive views of executive power (i.e., someone like Barr), one of his personal attorneys, a right-wing ideologue who fought for him after the 2020 election, or someone decent and respectable?

The least likely option is the last one.

UPDATE: Trump has nominated Pam Bondi, who falls into my second and third categories; she has personally represented Trump and said irresponsible things on TV about the 2020 election. That said, she is actually qualified for the job, and she–at least to my knowledge–hasn’t taken any outrageous positions in court. She will and should get some hard questions during the confirmation process about taking direction from Trump and prosecuting his opponents, but my guess is that she will be approved fairly easily.

Life in the time of Trump.

His AG pick was Gaetz.

He really wants to own the libs

And shatter the deep state.

But Matt was tripped up by his past

And now he has dropped out.

Will Trump select another clown?

He still has norms to flout.

Imagine that you are Vladimir Putin. In a sense, the war in Ukraine has been a huge strategic failure; you only control about 20 percent of the country’s land mass (not the most valuable part) after suffering huge losses, and NATO has been expanded to try to stop you. You have also lost influence to the Chinese in the near abroad. And yet, your economy is humming, you’re gaining ground, and you succeeded in creating the thoroughly fascist state you always wanted in response to the war. It’s a mixed bag, to be sure.

Trump is trying to impose a deal on you and the Ukrainians that ratifies your gains and keeps Ukraine out of NATO. Should you go for it?

On the one hand, your country could use a break, and if Ukraine is genuinely left without any guarantees of NATO support in the future, you can swallow it later. On the other hand, if peace breaks out, your people will be demanding some relief from your new restrictions, which is a minus for you. In addition, Trump will be taking credit for the peace. Why not just keep going, particularly since Trump is bound to cut off American aid to Ukraine regardless of what you do?

Both choices have some appeal. It probably comes down to the degree to which the Americans promise not to aid Ukraine in the future. In other words, does the agreement look more like the ceasefire in Korea or Munich? TBD.

WE’RE REALISTS, EXCEPT FOR ISRAEL, WHICH GETS OUR UNQUALIFIED SUPPORT: A realist would look at the Middle East and see that our interests are limited to preventing terrorism and keeping the oil flowing. The GOP, however (this is not limited to Trump) wants to give a blank check to Israel; Nikki Haley even argues that America needs Israel more than Israel needs us, which is ludicrous, as Iran only represents an existential threat to the Jewish state. Why are the Israelis so exceptional?

If the GOP position is based on the fact that Israel is an island of democracy in a sea of despotism, it violates the realist principle that I discussed in a previous post. I think it is more likely that Israeli exceptionalism is grounded in two things: first, the fundamentalist base loves Jews, as long as they are in Israel and not here; and second, the GOP admires swagger, and the Israelis are very good at kicking ass in their neighborhood.

It is worth noting that while Trump will give the green light to Israeli military adventures, it is far from certain that he will want to join them. Bibi clearly doesn’t want to take on Iran without active American involvement. As to that, we will have to wait and see.

I was charged with identifying and eliminating unnecessary regulatory overlap for a local government about thirty years ago. That makes me unusually qualified to give my old friends Elon and Vivek some unsolicited advice about dealing with “waste” at the federal level.

There are two kinds of “waste.” The first–and this is you find the real money–is in expensive federal programs that CLs think are unnecessary. The problem here is that the decision to get the federal government involved in these fields was made decades ago, has been ratified by Congress many times over, and typically was intended to address a legitimate market failure. In short, these are political, not technical, issues that should be addressed by Congress rather than the DOGE. The best Elon and Vivek can do is to make a clear case for getting rid of the programs and turn the issues over to the politicians.

But there are also issues relating to process that should be addressed. In some cases, money is actually wasted because the government’s ability to use technology to find facts is inadequate; in others, there may be problems with overstaffing or overlapping org charts that don’t really make sense. Elon and Vivek will be doing the public a service if they can address these problems. They will need help, however, from insiders who are actually familiar with the issues. Outsiders with a limited understanding of the way government works will just be thrashing around without results if they go it alone.

One other thing: to the extent that obsolete technology is the problem, it will have to be addressed by spending more money up front. Eliminating waste in the long run may well not provide immediate gratification for fiscal hawks.

BIDEN OVEREXTENDED AMERICA BY PUTTING TOO MUCH EMPHASIS ON THE PROTECTION OF DEMOCRACY. WE NEED TO PULL BACK AND FOCUS ON CONTAINING CHINA: On its face, there is some merit to this argument; Biden did in fact use rhetoric about protecting democracy on a regular basis. In reality, however, the argument fails, because Biden’s actions were frequently at odds with his words. Biden changed course on Saudi Arabia, embraced an increasingly illiberal India, and said very little about human rights violations in China. His support for Ukraine was based more on concerns about imperialism and the international rule of law than supporting democracy. He also made far more effective efforts to contain China through the use of alliances than Trump did. Whether the new Trump team will continue these efforts or isolate America by offending our Asian friends remains to be seen.

Trump made it clear yesterday that he has every intention of using the military to build deportation camps and conduct raids. It is highly likely that a federal district court–probably one in the Ninth Circuit–will enjoin him from doing this. Then what?

I expect Trump to ignore the court order and move forward. At that point, having blown through the rule of law for what he considers a higher purpose, there will be no obstacles to despotism except his imagination and the willingness of the American people to risk their lives for the cause of liberal democracy.

If that doesn’t chill you to the bone, you haven’t read enough Hitler books.

THE ALLIES NEED TOUGH LOVE: While Trump frequently makes comments about how our allies just rip us off, his acolytes insist that America First doesn’t mean America alone; the man on golf cart just has a colorful way of telling the allies that they need to contribute more to their own defense. Tough love, in the long run, is actually in their interests. Does this ring true?

Trump doesn’t just complain about having to pay for the defense of our friends; he plans to impose large tariffs on them, force Ukraine to make a bad deal that they will oppose, and roundly ignore their concerns about climate change. This doesn’t sound like tough love; it sounds like outright hostility to me.

I suspect Trump believes, in the long run, the allies have to fall in line, because they have no other viable options, given their unwillingness to pay for military protection. That isn’t true. China does not present a military threat to the EU, so it could start taking positions on economic issues that are closer to China’s than ours. Japan and South Korea could decide that becoming Chinese vassal states is safer than supporting America. Then what? America First will, in fact, mean America alone.

C: I haven’t talked to you since a few weeks before the election. How are you feeling today?

S: Great!

M: Anxious. Very anxious.

C: Let’s start with you, Mark. In the end, did you vote for Trump?

M: Yes, I held my nose and voted for him.

C: Why?

M: I convinced myself that he would cut taxes and regulations, and that all of the noise about tariffs, deportation, and retribution was just that–noise. He wouldn’t actually do any of that. He talks a lot, but his actions aren’t as bad as his words.

C: So you’re part of the large group who voted for him because you didn’t believe he would do what he said he would do?

M: You could say that.

C: So what has happened since then to make you anxious?

M: We haven’t seen his economic team, so the jury is still out, but the rest of his domestic team is a bunch of crazoids. Matt Gaetz? Really?

C: And these choices make you think he really will try to burn it down?

M: Yes. I didn’t vote to burn it down. I want to keep what I have. America has the strongest economy in the world. It just needs a little adjustment, not a bonfire.

S: Too bad, RINO. The bonfire is coming.

C: So I take it that you want Trump to burn it down. Is the Gaetz nomination proof that he will?

S: What more evidence do you need?

C: What exactly is your understanding of burning it down?

S: We need to get rid of the cultural and economic elites. We need to throw out the so-called experts and replace them with real Americans. That’s what burning it down is about.

C: And what should be built in its place? What is your end game here?

S: I’m leaving that to Trump. I trust Trump to do what’s right.

C: Let me give you an example. Every respectable economist I know of says Trump’s tariffs will result in more inflation. I assume you hate inflation.

S: Right.

C: Then why did you vote for Trump?

S: Trump says tariffs won’t cause inflation because foreigners will pay them. I trust him. I don’t trust fancy pants economists. What do they know?

C: Do you think Gaetz is a good choice for AG?

S: Absolutely! He’ll do whatever Trump tells him to. He’ll punish the bad guys who stole the 2020 election. That’s what I want.

C: So politicizing the justice system doesn’t bother you?

S: It’s already politicized. At least the good guys will have the power this time.

C: Do you agree with that, Mark?

S: It scares the crap out of me. Whatever Trump does, the Democrats may come back and use it against the right at a later date. Do we really want that? Is it worth the risk to take the checks and balances out of the system just because we have a slim momentary advantage?

C: Sebastian, I want to ask you some questions about what America should look like, but I don’t have time today. It will wait for a later date.

GOOD COP, BAD COP IS AN EFFECTIVE APPROACH WITH FOREIGN LEADERS: Just as Trump tells moderates and the base completely different stories, he believes that speaking to foreign leaders with two voices is an effective tactic, as it maintains his flexibility, keeps the world’s attention on him, and keeps his adversaries (including leaders most Americans would consider our allies) guessing as to his intentions. Trump’s selection of Rubio, an establishment figure if there ever was one, as his Secretary of State is compelling evidence that he plans to continue with this approach in his second term.

Using dissonance as a feature rather than a bug is, of course, a problem for the credibility of the Secretary of State. In addition, it means that nothing Trump says can ever be trusted. This may have some deterrent effect on Xi and Putin, but it will drive our friends away from us. America First will be America alone.

THE MADMAN THEORY WORKS FOR TRUMP, BECAUSE UNCERTAINTY DETERS AMERICA’S ADVERSARIES. There are two problems with this approach. First of all, Trump has a record by now, and he is not nearly as unpredictable as he professes to be. The world already knows that he loves tariffs and trade sanctions, he’s far less keen on war, even though he likes to talk about using nukes, he’s a genuine mercantilist, and he plays good cop, bad cop with the State Department bureaucracy. Putin and Xi, among others, will be prepared for those gambits this time around. Second, whatever benefits uncertainty creates in dealing with your opponents, it has the opposite effect with your allies, who view you as unreliable and move away from you. So it was then, and so it will be now.

Over the last two years, a cadre of right-wing bomb throwers and a handful of moderates made it impossible for the tiny paper GOP majority to govern on its own. All of the essential functions were performed by a coalition of Democrats and a group of mainstream Republicans. Notwithstanding the public perception that the election produced a red wave, the composition of the House, when all of the votes are in, will be almost exactly the same as before. With Trump as president and a GOP majority in the Senate, will the dynamics in the House change?

Yes, because the bomb throwers are likely to be in charge. The good news there is that we are unlikely to endure any more crises on the debt limit; they will serve no purpose with Trump in the White House. The bad news is that the vast majority of Republicans will probably support large cuts to the national safety net. The issue then is whether the remaining handful of moderates, most of whom won by very small margins, will swallow these cuts at the risk of losing their seats. We’ll see.

The Gaetz nomination wasn’t really aimed at the left; it was a preemptive attack on GOP moderates in the Senate. Trump is trying to tell them that he’s in charge, and that their job is to submit meekly to his demands, regardless of how outrageous they are. If he can do that up front, everything else should follow fairly smoothly.

But Trump will actually be a lame duck the minute he takes office, and some of the GOP senators clearly don’t owe their positions to him. Collins and Murkowski aren’t going to vote for Gaetz. Will all of the others fall in line? Will Mitch show some genuine independence, or will he just stick with his usual passive-aggressive approach in the name of party unity? We’ll see.

One of Harris’ favorite jabs during the campaign–as far as I can tell, she always used it in her stump speech–was that Trump was a deeply unserious man whose election would have extremely serious consequences for the American people. Was she right?

Most of Trump’s nominees prove that she was. Trump’s first cast of characters was minimally competent at best, but this one doesn’t even meet that abysmally low standard. He is deliberately choosing people who are good at throwing bombs and defending him on TV; competence is no object, apparently.

Can you really shatter the deep state by putting clueless people in charge of it? If so, what happens to the American people in the meantime? I guess we’re about to find out.