I want to thank Steve Bannon for coming out of the White House closet yesterday to give those of us who aren’t familiar with him a closer look. After all, he’s playing maybe the central role in this Administration.
I noticed that before coming out he changed from his presumed White House daily garb of shirt, tie and suit to a sport coat and open-collared black shirt, which I assume is to reinforce the image he wants as a maverick or anarchist, I’m not sure which. Of course, he didn’t mention the millions he made working for Goldman Sachs or getting in on the Seinfeld corporate money machine earlier in his career so he could have the luxury of being an anarchist later in life.
During his presentation with his apparent BFF Reince Priebus, he said that as of August 15th, when he and Kellyanne Conway took over the Trump campaign, they “knew” Donald Trump would win the election putting him not only among the few people in the world who knew that, including I’m guessing Mr. Trump, but, in my view, one more alternate fact he created to further the image of Trump leading a “movement” which very few others believe.
He also, of course, made the obligatory reference to the media covering his appearance as the “opposition party” even though the cable stations were carrying his appearance live and unfiltered before the second friendliest crowd (the other being employees of his former employer Breitbart News) he could find.
He also referred to Trump’s agenda which he apparently prefers to think of as a way to “deconstruct the administrative state.” (according to Wikipedia, the administrative state is: “Dwight Waldo’s classic public administration text based on a dissertation written at Yale in which Waldo argues that democratic states are underpinned by professional and political bureaucracies and that scientific management and efficiency is not the core idea of government bureaucracy, but rather it is service to the public.”
I don’t believe that’s what Trump voters voted for – tearing down the government, the way I take it. They voted for more jobs and more participation and recognition in the system. They want more money in their pockets. Or, according to that other great thinker, James Carville who did not attend Yale, “it’s the economy, stupid.”
Priebus, whose last job was chairman of the Republican National Committee (RNC), along with making kissy face and nicely nicely bro-hugging Mr. Bannon, announced that he and Bannnon “hate politics.” That was not Priebus’ campaign slogan when he ran the RNC for five years. It likely would have hurt his chances at winning the job.
In short, the bromance we saw at the CPAC convention was another alternate fact – I’m sorry, I do not believe these guys are so cumbaya in their behind closed doors lives, though I don’t blame them for trying to display that.
To me, it was just like Bannon changing into a more anarchist costume for his appearance. A nice image but not reflective of the reputation they have – which is not knowing how to run a government effectively because neither has any experience at being in government, nor do many of Trump’s cabinet members.
Maybe that’s what Bannon means by deconstructing the government – making it a chaotic mess that serves no one’s interests. Maybe deconstructing the government means the President saying one thing in the morning (as happened yesterday regarding using “military” force to remove illegal immigrants) while his Cabinet appointees say the opposite in the afternoon.
So, while the first 30 days of the Trump administration seemed to be chaos to many of us, Trump, Priebus and Bannon maybe are correct that it all went according to plan. The plan being the deconstruction of our government.
I noticed that before coming out he changed from his presumed White House daily garb of shirt, tie and suit to a sport coat and open-collared black shirt, which I assume is to reinforce the image he wants as a maverick or anarchist, I’m not sure which. Of course, he didn’t mention the millions he made working for Goldman Sachs or getting in on the Seinfeld corporate money machine earlier in his career so he could have the luxury of being an anarchist later in life.
During his presentation with his apparent BFF Reince Priebus, he said that as of August 15th, when he and Kellyanne Conway took over the Trump campaign, they “knew” Donald Trump would win the election putting him not only among the few people in the world who knew that, including I’m guessing Mr. Trump, but, in my view, one more alternate fact he created to further the image of Trump leading a “movement” which very few others believe.
He also, of course, made the obligatory reference to the media covering his appearance as the “opposition party” even though the cable stations were carrying his appearance live and unfiltered before the second friendliest crowd (the other being employees of his former employer Breitbart News) he could find.
He also referred to Trump’s agenda which he apparently prefers to think of as a way to “deconstruct the administrative state.” (according to Wikipedia, the administrative state is: “Dwight Waldo’s classic public administration text based on a dissertation written at Yale in which Waldo argues that democratic states are underpinned by professional and political bureaucracies and that scientific management and efficiency is not the core idea of government bureaucracy, but rather it is service to the public.”
I don’t believe that’s what Trump voters voted for – tearing down the government, the way I take it. They voted for more jobs and more participation and recognition in the system. They want more money in their pockets. Or, according to that other great thinker, James Carville who did not attend Yale, “it’s the economy, stupid.”
Priebus, whose last job was chairman of the Republican National Committee (RNC), along with making kissy face and nicely nicely bro-hugging Mr. Bannon, announced that he and Bannnon “hate politics.” That was not Priebus’ campaign slogan when he ran the RNC for five years. It likely would have hurt his chances at winning the job.
In short, the bromance we saw at the CPAC convention was another alternate fact – I’m sorry, I do not believe these guys are so cumbaya in their behind closed doors lives, though I don’t blame them for trying to display that.
To me, it was just like Bannon changing into a more anarchist costume for his appearance. A nice image but not reflective of the reputation they have – which is not knowing how to run a government effectively because neither has any experience at being in government, nor do many of Trump’s cabinet members.
Maybe that’s what Bannon means by deconstructing the government – making it a chaotic mess that serves no one’s interests. Maybe deconstructing the government means the President saying one thing in the morning (as happened yesterday regarding using “military” force to remove illegal immigrants) while his Cabinet appointees say the opposite in the afternoon.
So, while the first 30 days of the Trump administration seemed to be chaos to many of us, Trump, Priebus and Bannon maybe are correct that it all went according to plan. The plan being the deconstruction of our government.
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