Blog Credo

The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary.

H.L. Mencken

Monday, March 27, 2017

"Run Like A Business"

The tired mantra that we need a President who can run America like a business is about to get its acid test.  Der Obergropenfuhrer just went to his Cabinet of Nepotism and plucked Jared Kushner to lead his equivalent of Al Gore's National Performance Review. 

A few thoughts.

First, Al Gore has one big advantage over Kushner.  He's not a neophyte with no governing experience.  Gore knew how government function - and what's more important - why government should function.  He understood that government actions were intended to help as many people as possible, but that there were efficiency problems. But in the end, the point of the NPR was make government work better and more efficiently AS GOVERNMENT.  It's unclear that Trump's Gang That Can't Shoot Straight even understands how government works, much less why it should work.

Second, Kushner is supposed to lead a SWAT team of high profile business execs to come up with solutions.  Again, this is treating the bureaucracy as the opposing camp, which is natural for business leaders to do.  There's dynamic tension that's healthy between the private and public sector; each has a role to play.  But once you eliminate that tension by giving all the power to private sector actors, you create real problems.

Third, who is going to want to work the Trump White House?  Names in article mentioned Tim Cook, Bill Gates and Elon Musk.  These are Democratic donors.  What's more, the demographic disadvantage that Democrats labor under - the Dems are clustered in cities - also means that Democrats control a large portion of the consumer economy.  Every time a business leader cozies up to Trump, he gets boycotted.  Look at Uber.

Fourth, as I'm typing this a news flash notes that Jared Kushner is being swept up into the Russia probe, because he's the only person Trump really seems to trust and was used as a go-between at several instances.

Trump has filled almost none of the administrative positions he needs to.  Whenever he wants something important done, he outsources it to Jared Kushner.  Jared Kushner is just as incompetent as Trump, though at least he does not appear to be as mentally and emotionally stunted as his boss.

This isn't "bold reform."  This is more nepotism and likely more incompetence and certainly yet another huge giveaway to the 1% at the expense of those Working Class, Economically Anxious voters who gave us this shitshow.

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