Can Trump Govern?
By Daniel Henninger - a relatively sane WSJ columnist
The answer to the questioncan President Trump govern?is yes, but the window is closing.
In recent days, events outside and inside the White House have combined to produce an environment toxic to governing. The Comey circus, the internal tensions created by Mr. Trumps tweets on the travel ban and Qatar, and Attorney General Jeff Sessionss reported offer to resign: All this turbulence is pounding a ship of state that needs calmer waters if its going to get home in one piece.
This column raised the question in February of whether the Russia story was becoming Mr. Trumps Watergate. Forever Trumpers objected to the analogy, arguing correctly that the legal particulars of the two events were not the same. The point, however, was not about the law or facts but about politics, which respects neither. A presidents blood is in the water, and a feeding frenzy is on.
(snip)
In the Trump trial, James Comey is playing the role of John Dean, the earnest lawyer who presented himself to the Watergate Committee as the last honest man in the Nixon White House. The medias dramaturges love to fashion political saints, thus the elevation of Jim Comey.
The dangers to the viability of the Trump presidencys agenda at this pivotal moment should not be underestimated. Successful governing means putting multiple players in motion toward a common goalWhite House staff, Congress and its staffs, and the administrations political appointees, whose job is to push presidential policy through the bureaucratic swamps. That effort goes forward on the shoulders of a skeleton crew.
We are into the sixth month of the Trump presidency, and of 558 key positions requiring Senate confirmation, 427 have no nominee, according to the tabulation by the Partnership for Public Service. The permanent bureaucracy is running much of State, Defense, Justice and Education.
At the State Department, virtually every position below Secretary Rex Tillerson and his deputy John Sullivan has no nominee, including assistant secretaries for every region of the world.
(snip)
The appointee holdup at State is due, in part, to the Trump White Houses virtual ban on anyone in the foreign-policy community who publicly opposed Mr. Trumps candidacy. Presumably this is about loyalty. After this week, though, the White Houses fastidiousness may be irrelevant.
Three things happened that bear on the administrations ability to recruit or retain good people: Attorney General Sessionss reported offer to resign over the presidents unhappiness with his recusal from the Russia investigation; Mr. Trumps tweet repudiating his Justice Department lawyers handling of the travel-ban case; and his tweet taking personal credit for Saudi Arabia breaking relations with Qatar. That required a stabilizing intervention from Secretary Tillerson because the U.S. has 11,000 troops based in Qatar. Welcome to team Trump.
One relevant footnote is George Conways unexpected decision to withdraw last week as Mr. Trumps nominee to lead the Justice Departments civil division, followed by his Twitter statement supporting the departments handling of the travel-ban litigation. Who needs House of Cards?
One simply cannot duck the corollary question to these events: What top lawyer or professional at this juncture will join an administration whose ability to calm the political storms, execute policy or support its own people is in doubt?
https://www.wsj.com/articles/can-trump-govern-1496875130
MontanaMama
(23,337 posts)I don't think he wants to govern. I think he wants to cause chaos. I think he is drunk with power and was promised the world by Putin if he could hand over the keys to the castle. He's a stupid empty failure of a man and we are in danger of him taking us all down.
Girard442
(6,084 posts)Can WSJ columnists write anything that makes sense? Right now the Trump presidency is in the same state the Titanic was when it's bow was fully underwater. The only question that matters now is how many of us will survive when the U.S.S. Trump finally goes to the bottom.
yurbud
(39,405 posts)like Reagan.
He really thinks he's the shit when he is just shit.
That's the problem with great inherited wealth as Molly Ivins said about Baby Bush, "He was born on third base and thought he hit a triple."
Nitram
(22,869 posts)That's the silver lining. Once Trump has his own political appointees in charge, he can powerfully influence policy in all those areas. At this rate, that may never happen.