… you often mistake one thing for another. Rebecca Ingber takes on the topic of the “Deep State” on Lawfare:
So then what about that dastardly career bureaucracy, twiddling its thumbs inside its sealed SCIFs from D.C. to Virginia? Do they share any of the blame? Let’s break down the reasons the Deep State is not out to get the President: First, assertions about a “Deep State” within the U.S. government do not begin to describe the reality of working for this large, disaggregated, messy bureaucracy. (In the interests of full disclosure, I formerly served as a career attorney with the U.S. State Department, the mother of all bureaucracies, where I worked for several years and across two political administrations.) Second, what the President sees as a resistance movement directed at him personally is largely, though probably not exclusively, what I call the “neutral friction” of a huge organization that does not change course on a dime, regardless of who sits in the Oval Office. And third, while it is exceedingly difficult for anyone to steer the mammoth executive branch bureaucracy, the President is himself making a difficult job impossible by not only failing to make his own appointments at every level throughout that bureaucracy, but openly antagonizing those individuals who continue to work in it.
The Deep State as such does not exist.
The Real Bureaucrats of DC likely find it partly amusing and partly bewildering that so much of the country imbues them, collectively, with such power, and such organized power in particular. They may also quite reasonably find it insulting that, having in many cases given up higher salaries and certainly better offices for the privilege of working long nights and weekends to serve their country through multiple presidencies across political lines, they are being painted as traitors or at the very least political hacks. But far from an organized cabal of conniving puppeteers, these faceless bureaucrats are just people like you and me. (And, as I mentioned, one of them once was me.) They go to work every day, put dinner on the table at night, procrastinate, gripe, and generally do the best they can at their jobs, whether or not they are enamored of their boss that day. There is a certain degree of organization among the career ranks, but look at an org chart: the real, organized ties between offices and agencies, and up from the line officials to the cabinet secretaries, are drawn through individuals who are politically appointed. As I’ll discuss below, those placements are within the President’s power to control. And at the moment, those seats are generally vacant, leaving those offices rudderless, often run by career officials trying to keep the ship afloat the best they can, at times without support or direction from or clear lines of communication to those above them.
Transplant a real estate mogul into the Presidency, with so little preparation that it probably counts as nothing – and what did you expect? The problem, of course, was making Alice in Wonderland promises, and that enough people were gullible and desperate enough to believe them.
But as important as it is to get the Nation through this period of incompetency and mendacity, we also need folks who are thinking somewhat more long-term: What comes next?
Is it still viable to run a nation using the political amateurs? Conversely, is it ever safe to run a nation using professional politicos? (I use that phrase to emphasize the politicos who run for office, not the members of the bureaucracy.) This might characterize the politicians of Britain and Australia, who appear to see everything in terms of politics and not necessarily reality.
In the end, we have the often overworked and overwhelmed ignorant selecting power-hungry politicians who hardly understand the institutions for which they run, but they happen to know how to pander to the local biases. Our Founding Fathers believed in a wisdom of the masses (or at least recognized that incompetent government was better than pitchforks and torches in hands of the angry mob).
But, honestly, who’s going to run for the Presidency from either party – and be worthy? There’s no one in the GOP, no one at all. Their “deep bench” of last year was really quite horrid, in my view. And the Democrats, now that Clinton is too old and – barely – rejected, are also lacking. O’Malley doesn’t seem to be getting traction, and I can’t tell if he’s competent in any case. He needs to demonstrate he can do the job. And after him? Lincoln Chaffee? Elizabeth Warren? I suspect she’s more effective as a Senator than a President, but maybe they’ll have to run her for lack of anyone else.
I might consider Joe Biden, simply because he knows the job and isn’t too much of a loon – but he’s too old as well. So’s Bernie Sanders.
And this should serve as a partial blueprint of the next campaign. Sure, you have ideology, you have too much, in fact – show us your competency. Show us you’ve studied government and understand what it’s about. You’ve looked at the current issues and you know who to consult.
This is what I worry about.
