Jan-Werner Müller in The Guardian notes of the amateur circus that is the Trump Administration:
The background noise to the official letters has been a steady stream of social media posts from the president, throwing invective at Harvard instead of conducting the serious government business of maligning Bruce Springsteen and Taylor Swift. The founder of a university whose attendees received a $25m settlement has accused the US’s oldest university of “scamming the public”, constituting a “threat to democracy”, and exposing innocent young Americans to “crazed lunatics” (as opposed to non-crazed lunatics). It is a well-known pattern in authoritarian regimes that underlings try to please the leader by anticipating his wishes and imitating his style. Official letters, posts, and press statements from DHS and the Department of Education not only fail to provide evidence and violate procedural safeguards; they not only make up ad hoc demands that have no basis in law; they also contain the signature capital letters, spelling mistakes, and kindergarten-level invective familiar from the president’s rhetoric. It is governance driven by a desire to please Fox viewers, online Maga mobs, and the Avenger-in-Chief.
In what might be called the anti-apotheosis of the Republican Party’s embrace of the Gingrichian principles that Democrats cannot be permitted victories, that only policy stands are important, that it’s loyalty over competency.
That last one may be the most obvious in view of Mr. Müller’s observations. Are any of President Trump’s appointees quietly competent individuals? Noem and habeas corpus, Kennedy and anything to do with health, Hegseth and his arrogant belief that he knows better than anyone else, that clown Luttnick and his grandma not caring about Social Security, even Treasury’s Bessent doesn’t seem as bright as word had him.
And Rubio seems to have become an idiot.
The Republicans have scurried right over to where I predicted: Mass incompetency, as the fringe rode in on their broken tricycles. And they don’t even seem to know it; they arrogantly believe they’re as good, or better, than their predecessors, Democrat or Republican, over the last fifty years. Meanwhile, they open their yaps and prove otherwise everyday.
The question du jour is to ask: what’s next? Will the Democrats do they same thing? Will the Republican Party meltdown in the elections of 2025 (a couple of gubernatorial elections), 2026 (Congressional), or 2028 in the Presidential?
Just what sort of clown could think they’ll succeed Trump? The mind boggles.
