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Sunday, April 30, 2017

A Hundred Days and Counting

The first artificial and arbitrary deadline for judging new governments was upon us this weekend, and it seemed like a good time for me to reflect on the good, the bad and the all too plentiful ugly that has characterized this period. To be honest, President Trump was absolutely right when he said that the hundred day period is meaningless, though he had set that benchmark for himself repeatedly, and then promptly claimed that he'd had one of the most successful opening acts of all time. That claim, like so many others, is all hyperbole, of a pattern readily recognizable in his utterances. But what is the reality?

As a liberal, I'm not really in a position to render impartial judgment; my own biases ensure that I will judge harshly. And given the chaos that undeniably swirls around this administration, it is easy for a critic to find fault with almost everything that President Trump has done. I will start with the low-hanging fruit - the lack of government appointees (or rather, lack of nominations for numerous positions), the constant overheated rhetoric, the inability to leave campaign mode and settle down to actual governing, the increasingly shrill attacks on the press, the seeming lack of understanding on any and every topic that affects the country, and perhaps most scary of all, the careless and offhand use of military force with no thought of the consequences of any US action. There is plenty to choose from, and be scared by in that list but for me, the greatest failure is that refusal to acknowledge even the slightest need for course correction, or personal accountability, be it in ordering a bloody military raid on Yemen or firing his National Security Advisor for numerous lapses in judgment and behavior, or in making wild and unsubstantiated (and probably totally false) charges against the former president. That President Trump is unprepared for the role he has sought and won is beyond doubt, and his own words admit as such. He has admitted, seemingly with absolutely no self-awareness, that healthcare policy is difficult and then absolutely and casually reversed his position on China as a currency manipulator when he was schooled in monetary policy by the visiting Chinese president - he again quite offhandedly admitted that he'd known nothing about Chinese government policy on a topic that had formed a huge part of his campaign promise. Then just this past week he said in an interview that he'd never expected the job to be so difficult; it is a toss up on whether to be more scared that he is casually admitting this with one breath and claiming undeserved mantles of greatness and accomplishment in the next, blithely ignoring the yawning contradictions in his own statements, or that he truly believed his own campaign rhetoric that the job of president was so easy that an accomplished businessman could walk in and do a better job without even exerting himself.

And yet, I am forced to admit that the apocalyptic terms employed by my fellow liberals are widely off the mark - this president's track record is a lot less terrible than it might have been. Much of what he's done, and most of his cabinet appointees are in line with his campaign promises and general GOP policy line. He has tried to rescind the Affordable Care Act, a promise and priority of both his campaign and the whole Republican Party; and yet, with the whole government controlled by one party, they've failed to even get legislation to a vote in the House, never mind passing it or getting it to a Senate vote. Tax breaks have been a GOP staple for more than three decades. Appointing a climate denier to head the Environmental Protection Agency, a private school advocate and anti-regulation partisan to the Department of Education and other similarly Orwellian appointments are well in line with prior promises. Liberals need to admit that none of this is surprising and that any GOP president would have done the same; they also need to admit that the US electorate, in their wisdom or lack thereof, has endorsed President Trump's policies. One might claim that Trump did not win the popular vote, or that only 27% of eligible voters (46% of 58% turnout) supported him, but the bottom line is that he won, and over 40% of the electorate did not object to his stated policies enough to even vote. Voters, though endorsement or apathy, also delivered the House and Senate to the GOP, giving President Trump full control of the government. In 2009, President Obama won a similar mandate to enact a liberal policy and did so. It is only fair, that no matter how dangerous we think this president's ideas and actions, we still respect the will of the people. That does not mean standing down and giving the GOP a free hand, but simply acknowledging that much of what is being now enacted is the choice of the American people, through their acts of commission or omission.

It is also important to note that President Trump has not done all that much in overturning the previous administration's policies. There have been some highly publicized executive orders, signed with much fanfare, but in the end, President Trump has not enacted but a fraction of the conservative and populist agenda he promised and most of the acts that liberals most fear have remained in abeyance. This is not a mark of approbation for his restraint however, but a censure of the strongest degree - things are not so bad, because this president is terrible at his job, and not really interested in the business of governing. The GOP sponsored alternative to Obamacare has sputtered in part because Trump is not invested in actually replacing it with a real alternative; unlike Speaker Ryan or the Freedom Caucus, Trump has no strong conviction on the matter and his lack of a core belief impacts his ability and willingness to force new legislation through Congress. For all his talk about making deals, he has shown absolute disinterest in actual negotiations, with holdouts in his party and much more so with the opposition, and is quite happy to see the matter die in Congress so long as he can deflect the blame to someone else. For most part, his impact will be through acts of omission rather than overt commission, a lack of action that certainly shapes public life as much as active intervention, and his largely invisible Cabinet is in keeping with that path. He has appointed people with less government experience to some positions, actually reducing the impact they might have on changing government policy; in many cases, most policy will remain in the hands of career bureaucrats for a while, and things will continue unchanged till his appointees gain full understanding and control of their departments, and that situation is delayed further by the lack of supporting cast for many of those Cabinet members.

The other, and significantly overlooked aspect of President Trump's government is how closely is reflects his own personality and business model. While President Obama won plaudits for creating a Cabinet of Rivals by keeping Defense Secretary Gates, and appointing his party opponent Hilary Clinton to Secretary of State, his cabinet reflected his broad policy vision and was guided by him. By contrast, it is not clear what the corresponding vision is for President Trump, and his closest advisors appear to share very different worldviews on many different topics. His own overriding interest is not public policy or political promises so much as TV ratings and public adulation, and he seems content to pass off photo opportunities and bombastic claims as perfectly acceptable alternatives to actual achievement. At some point he may have to deliver or risk losing the support of his most fervent supporters, but that day is not now and it will be long past a hundred days before the bill is due. Till then, I am simply grateful that his lack of experience and even greater lack of interest ensure that he will do much less real harm than a true believer with skills to match may have achieved.

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