close
close

Association-anemone

Bite-sized brilliance in every update

    • Make Gaetz Attorney General, who cares? Let Trump be Trump
    asane

    Make Gaetz Attorney General, who cares? Let Trump be Trump

    Online Niel Posted on

    When the Department of Agriculture is headed by none other than the late, great Dr. Hannibal Lecter, I want Republicans in Congress forced to accept fiction.

    play

    In a potential blow to the “Donald Trump is NOT a fascist!” crowd, the president-elect made a borderline fascist demand: He wants install government officials without Senate approval.

    Maybe you’ve heard Trump promotes ‘pause appointments’ lately. This provision allows the president to hold important government posts when Congress is not in session. It is essentially intended for emergencies, not for a president who wants to circumvent checks on who he chooses to lead key parts of the federal government.

    It’s easy to see why Trump wants to do this, since many of his cabinet choices so far I live somewhere between comical and patently absurd. Robert F. Kennedy Jr. – a conspiracy theorist, passionate about anti-vaccine polio and nut-eating-road-kill-bird – as head of the Department of Health and Human Services. Famous gun dog Kristi Noem for Homeland Security. Matt Gaetz, an ethically challenged leader who became a real boy for the Attorney General. A Fox News host with big biceps and problematic tattoos to lead the Department of Defense.

    Most of them couldn’t be hired as local dog catchers — except maybe South Dakota Gov. Noem if he lived in a city ruled by cats — so Trump’s desire to avoid a confirmation process that would pull back the curtain on this parade of lunatics is understandable.

    Of course, Trump wants recess meetings — that’s another rule to break

    But using break programs to store an administration is not at all what the Founding Fathers intended.

    Note the non-liberal Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia wrote in 2014 that recess appointments are “essentially a historical relic, something whose original purpose has disappeared,” noting, “The need it was designed to fill no longer exists, and its only remaining use is the ignoble one of allowing the President to circumvent the role of the Senate. in the appointment process.”

    Opinion: Gaetz for AG? Trump’s cabinet nominees are rightfully starting to worry the GOP.

    Alexander Hamilton – you know, the guy from the musical – wrote why Senate confirmation of presidential appointments is crucial to democracyconcluding that by this process the president “would be ashamed and afraid to bring forward, for the most distinguished or profitable posts, candidates who had no other merit than that of coming from the same State to which he particularly belonged, or of to be in some way or other personally allied with him, or to possess the insignificance and inflexibility necessary to make them the obsequious instruments of his pleasure.”

    If Trump had succeeded, all Republicans would have to get a neck tattoo that read: “Obsequent instruments of his pleasure.”

    The Republicans wanted Trump. They should let him choose who he wants.

    This is why I believe that, against all common sense and despite strong warnings from anyone who understands democracy, GOP lawmakers should go ahead and give Trump his recess appointments. Don’t bother the poor man with things he hates, like ‘norms’ and ‘standards’ and ‘the Constitution’.

    The china shop may belong to all of us, but it’s the Republicans who just unleashed the bull. I say let it rip.

    Will Hannibal Lecter run the USDA? Sure, why not?

    Because when Trump appoints a Tesla on fire to run the Department of Transportation, I want the Republican Party to own it.

    When the current wife of a five-times-divorced ex-con Trump who used to go to strip clubs is named Treasury Secretary, I think the GOP should defend that and the robberies that will inevitably ensue. (No, I don’t know who that person would be, but I’m sure he’s out there.)

    When the Department of Agriculture is headed by none other than the late, great Doctor Hannibal Lecteri want congressional republicans to be forced to embrace fiction.

    Picking Matt Gaetz for attorney general is perfectly Trump

    Trump is what they and most Americans the voters wanted. So Trump should be exactly what they and we all get. Not “Trump, but with his authoritarian tendencies restrained by others.” Not “Trump, but with his terrible judgment, aided by smarter people in the room.”

    Only Trump. Pure and uncut.

    That’s what makes people like Gaetz such a perfect fit for his administration. Gaetz is a man even Republicans dislike and distrust, which is remarkable given the party’s current subterranean standards.

    The Florida congressman resigned this week, days before an ethics investigation into allegations of sexual misconduct and illicit drug use was to be released.

    Opinion: From “Fox & Friends” to the Pentagon? Trump promotes loyalty over experience.

    But if Trump wants to make a wildly unqualified and uniquely unpleasant man like Gaetz our attorney general by appointment, I hope the Republicans let him do it. You all punched your tickets for this ride, can’t wait even when it’s time to board.

    Let the mad king have his choices and we’ll all know who let it happen

    Now, don’t get me wrong, as disgusted as I am with Trump’s return to the White House, I still love the country enough to hope things turn out well. I mean this. I’m not rooting against us. I just want Republicans fully responsible for whatever comes next.

    If Trump uses a burning oil rig to run the Department of Energy, I hope he does the best job any burning oil rig could do.

    If Noem keeps the homeland safe and doesn’t shoot any additional dogs, I’ll be the first to cheer.

    If Fox News host Pete Hegseth, whose arm tattoos were recently described as “a veritable checklist of today’s Christian nationalist folklore,” leads the Department of Defense with honor and character, I will be nothing but glad.

    But if things don’t go well with Trump’s bizarre world government leadership choices, I won’t be surprised. That’s why I’m completely on hiatus programming. Let Trump be Trump. You wanted it. Enjoy it.

    And when someone like Gaetz does something stupid, which he will, or something illegal, which he might, the responsibility for the farce will be exactly where it should be: in the lap of the Republicans.

    Follow USA TODAY columnist Rex Huppke on X, formerly Twitter, @RexHuppke and Facebook facebook.com/RexIsAJerk

    Online Niel
    View all posts

    You Might Also Like