Trump once again is telling us who he is
Here’s a little memory test for those of you who are old enough. How many of you remember the bumper sticker, “I know Watt’s wrong”? Or how about the back cover of the October, 1982, issue of Mad Magazine that showed a large picture of a bald-headed, bespectacled man with the words, “WATT … WE WORRY!”? I’ll wait a moment for those of you who need time to think about it.
Okay, time’s up. Those were references to James Watt, Ronald Reagan’s handpicked secretary of the interior. Watt was (possibly) the first modern presidential cabinet member who wasn’t merely unsuited for the job, he was completely antithetical to it. Watt was openly hostile to environmental issues. He eased restrictions on strip mining, opened up nearly all American coastal waters to oil drilling and proposed (unsuccessfully) the selling off of federal lands.
Watt was also a bigot and a bastard with a giant stick permanently up his ass. He became so hotly detested and controversial that he finally was forced to resign in 1983. No one was sorry to see him go. Some twelve years later, as no surprise to connoisseurs of lousy people, Watt was indicted on 18 counts of felony perjury and obstruction of justice and accused of making false statements before a federal grand jury investigating influence peddling at the Department of Housing and Urban Development. In short, Watt was a very, very bad guy.
Watt was also the beginning of a long tradition of Republican presidents making poor and unpopular and inappropriate choices for members of their cabinets. Now along comes Donald Trump saying, in effect, “Hold my beer.” To employ a Trumpism, nobody makes poorer or more unpopular or more inappropriate choices for members of their cabinet than Trump. In fact, nobody has ever seen anything like it.
And now the rest of the world knows, or ought to know, long before he takes the oath of office, that Trump wasn’t kidding when he said he wanted to rule as an extremist strongman. He is making breathtakingly, hideously, disgustingly stupid nominations for his cabinet. Unbelievable wretches such as the child rapist Matt Gaetz for attorney general, the puppy-murdering moron Kristi Noem for director of Homeland Security, science-denying, anti-vaccination creep Bobby Kennedy Jr for secretary of health and human services. These people aren’t just unqualified and inappropriate for those jobs, they’re the worst people imaginable for those jobs. It’s a cabinet composed by a writer at Saturday Night Live, not by anyone seriously thinking of the welfare of the American people.
But that’s finally the point. When Vladimir Putin leaves his calling card on people he has his operatives murder, it’s not by accident. He didn’t slip up. Putin wants us to know he committed those murders, and he’s daring us to do anything about it. Similarly, Trump is picking stupid, hideously unqualified people for his cabinet as a way of sticking two middle fingers up at the American people. He’s a morally depraved exhibitionist, demanding to know what we’re going to do about it.
And the problem is there are so many outrageous early moves like this we hardly know where to start. With controversial figures like James Watt, the path was simple and obvious. A few bumper stickers, a few protests, a little help from Watt’s own stupidity and he was gone before you knew it. As they used to say in Ronald Reagan’s White House, “personnel is policy.” With these picks Trump is telling us exactly who he is, exactly what his “policy” is, and he’s daring us to do anything about it.
Trump ironically picked “Russia’s girlfriend,” the emphatically unintelligent Tulsi Gabbard as director of national intelligence. And if you were one of the lunatics who voted against Biden simply because he wasn’t sufficiently fanatically anti-Israel for your taste, wow do I have some really bad news for you. Trump tapped the Fox News host and ultra-right wing Warhawk and pro-Israel nutjob Pete Hegseth for secretary of defense. But wait, there’s more! If you’re really worried about Israel’s hegemony, try Mike Huckabee on for size, Trump’s pick for ambassador to Israel. Huckabee is an evangelical Christian who believes in Israel right or wrong, and who has publicly proclaimed that he doesn’t believe in the West Bank.
Then there’s Lee Zeldin, Trump’s choice to head the Environmental Protection Agency. As a representative for New York’s first district, Zeldin repeatedly voted against clean water and clean air legislation, and has expressed doubts over whether climate change is “as serious a problem” as people say it is. Are we having fun yet?
So how’s that for an assembly of villains straight out of the Batman TV series from the 1960s? These are our new insect overlords, handpicked by Trump, a man elected by underachievers, morons, incels and bros. Way to go, America. And way to go, mainstream media, you got your 24/7 four-year dumpster fire complete with eternal flame. Just like the one at John F Kennedy’s gravesite. I hope you’re all happy. So enjoy your happiness while it lasts. Because it won’t.
Robert Harrington is an American expat living in Britain. He is a portrait painter.