Month: January 2025

Life in the time of Trump.

The rule of the tech bros.

They want to shatter the deep state.

What comes next, no one knows.

They’re battling the MAGA base.

We don’t know who will win.

And Uncle Donald loves the fight.

They all bow down to him.

To the CLs, American tech supremacy is the natural outcome of a state that minimizes taxes and regulations on business. To the tech oligarchs, it is validation of their right to rule the country; they delivered the goods and should be rewarded for it with power and deference. They earned their right to be the masters of the universe.

With that as background, how should we react to DeepSeek? With a mixture of fear and satisfaction. The Chinese have proved that the low tax, low regulation, tech-friendly state doesn’t have to win the race.

It would, of course, be absurd to blame Trump for the crash, since he has been in office for less than two weeks. Nevertheless, we need to remember that when Trump and Musk talk about making dramatic reductions in the federal workforce and breaking things, there will be real life consequences to the public, and events like this will be one of them.

Just because Musk and Trump think a few disasters here and there are worth the price of admission doesn’t mean we have to agree.

J. Edgar Hoover was a reactionary without loyalties to any party or politician; he struck fear in the hearts of presidents of both parties. Kash Patel is a reactionary with boundless loyalty to Donald Trump. Does that make him worse?

Yes, because it broadens his list of potential targets to anyone of either party who opposes Trump. Just imagine the havoc he can wreak at the FBI during the 2028 campaign. He will know that his job depends on it.

After the inevitable backlash, the new administration withdrew the memo ordering the freeze on trillions of dollars of federal spending. This issue will return sooner or later, however; Trump is still determined to push the envelope on impoundment and create a constitutional crisis. It’s just a matter of time.

The Democrats now have a big problem deciding what to do when Mike Johnson comes to them to keep the government open and raise the debt ceiling. How can they make a deal that involves spending when Trump can overturn it afterwards by impounding funds?

Legally binding guarantees on impoundment will have to be on the table when the debt ceiling and spending authorizations are being negotiated.

Large numbers of left-leaning activists–most notably, Arab-Americans and trans activists–spent the last several years beating up liberals rather than reactionaries on social media. Why? Because the justice of their cause was so self-evident that the beliefs of hundreds of millions of people on the right side of the spectrum were not worthy of discussion, of course. The possibility that reactionaries might use their unpopular opinions to win power and make their lives much worse seems never to have occurred to them.

The election was primarily lost on inflation, but the division over Gaza and the trans issue didn’t help. As a result, we have a president who is openly musing about ethnic cleansing in Gaza and issuing a blizzard of orders attempting to deny trans people medical treatment.

Such is the wisdom of making the perfect the enemy of the good.

The new Trump order mandating a freeze on all federal payments that may in some way promote Marxism or wokeness created chaos, probably to the delight of the man on golf cart. It has already been blocked temporarily. What comes next?

A few observations are pertinent here. First, while the administration is arguing that the freeze is not an attempt at impoundment, the supposed constitutional right to impound is inherently implicit in it. Second, if the pause truly is very temporary, it may well escape meaningful judicial review this time around. Third, if impoundment is ultimately reviewed against the legal standard applied in the Truman-era Youngstown case, as it should be, Trump will lose at every level of the judiciary, including “his” Supreme Court. Will that cause him to stop? If he doesn’t, and I have my doubts, we will have a full-blown constitutional crisis on our hands, because legislative control of the power of the purse goes back to the days of the English Civil War and is at the heart of our system.

For Elon Musk, China is, well, complicated. On the one hand, it is a major source of his wealth; on the other, it represents an existential threat to Tesla, as Chinese EVs are reputedly better and much cheaper than his cars. Given Musk’s proximity to Trump, what does this mean for American policy towards China?

You will have noticed that with all of the sound and fury during Trump’s first days in office, very little has been said about China; it is a dog that isn’t barking. That may be due to Musk’s influence. Musk will probably be a voice advocating for some sort of grand bargain involving managed trade, not unrelenting hostility towards the Chinese.

Steve Bannon will not be pleased.

But you already knew that.

There are parts of the right that are almost as dedicated to Taiwan as to Israel. To some extent, this is based on sound strategic reasons; if you doubt it, find Taiwan on a map relative to Japan and South Korea. But there is an element of passionate ideological loathing of Chinese communism as well, along with a sprinkling of racism.

If Trump makes anything like the grand bargain I have described in a previous post, it will be viewed as a betrayal by this part of the right. Will that result in a rebellion with meaningful results? If the event occurs towards the end of Trump’s term, and Trump is clearly viewed as a failure by the electorate, maybe. Otherwise, history tells us that GOP politicians are way too fearful of the MAGA base, which is indifferent to Taiwan, to do anything seen as hostile to Trump.

California is burning. Hurricanes are getting worse. Insurance rates are soaring. And yet, the left isn’t even trying to use climate change as an issue, and Trump is engaging in open energy hypocrisy by discriminating against renewables while proclaiming a fictitious “emergency.” Why is this happening?

A big part of it is the reactionary dream of the Godly Society, in which real men exploit fossil fuels and make lots of money, while real women stay home and have lots of babies. Part of it is self-interest on the part of wealthy extractors of fossil fuels. But part of it is fear of the American equivalent of the French “gilets jaunes;” people in rural areas bear a disproportionate amount of the burden of transitioning to renewables and turn their anger into political power.

For the nation as a whole, turning our back on sources of energy that will be, in the long run, limitless and cheap as well as more planet-friendly is insane. If Musk actually wants to do some good for America, converting Trump on this issue would be an appropriate place to start.

Imagine this scenario: Xi offers Trump a free hand in the Western Hemisphere and a managed trade package which eliminates the American trade deficit in exchange for a free hand in Asia. Does Trump take the deal?

No other American leader would even consider it. The dividing of the world into spheres of influence would be viewed as a betrayal of American values by moralists; realists would say America was giving up the more valuable parts of the world and losing influence; and history tells us the deal–particularly the managed trade part–would be unenforceable in any event. But Trump is a mercantilist who loves making deals and believes American interests revolve around dominating our back yard, not Asia. He might go for it.

Roll over, Thom Tillis.

Tell McConnell the news.

—–with apologies to Chuck Berry

As I expected, Collins and Murkowski did the right thing. So did Mitch McConnell, who seems comfortable in a Mitt Romney for the second term role. No one else did, however, including Thom Tillis, who was the most likely fourth GOP no vote.

If Hegseth and Trump turn our military into a right-wing militia that is better suited to fight left-wing Americans than foreign enemies, the people of North Carolina will know where the blame lies.

C: I haven’t seen you in a few months. What did you think about Trump standing with the tech aristocrats at the inauguration?

S: It was great! They were kissing his ring. They were bowing down to him. They know who’s boss.

C: Do they? Have you been following the story about the visas for foreign tech guys?

S: I don’t care about tech guys. I just don’t want foreigners coming over the border, taking our jobs, and driving up the cost of housing.

C: Trump seems to be siding with the tech guys over the MAGA stalwarts. Doesn’t that bother you?

S: I trust Trump. He knows who his real friends are. He won’t sell us out. This is just a phase.

C: What did you think of his friend Ramaswamy basically saying Americans were stupid and lazy and should be kicked in the butt by immigrant Asians?

S: That’s offensive, of course, but it’s Ramaswamy, not Trump. Trump would never say that.

C: I assume you’re looking forward to the tariffs.

S: Of course! They’re the key to bringing back the economy of the 1950s. Men will be respected again, and women will be able to stay home and have lots of babies. It can’t happen without big tariffs.

C: But we don’t have them yet. And Trump’s economic team contains lots of really rich establishment types. Aren’t you worried that they will talk him out of tariffs just to keep the markets happy?

S: It worries me a bit, but I trust Trump. He’ll give us the tariffs sooner or later. He just needs some time.

C: Did you see the quote from Musk about running off reactionaries from the Republican Party? What did you think of that?

S: Musk might be spending a lot of time at Mar-a-Lago, but he’s just a guest. Trump’s in charge.

C: Did it ever occur to you that after Trump burns it down, he might turn things over to Musk and his big tech friends?

S: No! Never! I trust Trump! He would never sell me out!

C: What if you’re wrong? After all, Trump has screwed over more people than he can count. What will you do then?

S: I refuse to even think about it. Trump won’t let me down. Period!

C: I guess we’ll just have to wait and see.

I am reading now that DOGE has become an entity whose purpose is to improve the use of technology within the federal government. In that role, it can actually be useful. Why has the focus shifted from cutting spending and regulations?

Because, as I have pointed out previously, technology cannot be the solution to the regulatory problem. The big savings that Musk promised can only be achieved by cutting safety net programs; the initiative for that has to come from Congress. In addition, simply repealing or refusing to enforce regulations is a highly inefficient way of dealing with ambiguities in statutes. What the right really wants is to interpret statutes in a more business-friendly way, not to get rid of regulations altogether. That requires legal expertise, knowledge of the regulatory subject matter, and a lengthy slog through the APA. Trump and Musk lack the patience and the background to do that.