Dear Jonah Goldberg is still going on about how useless Donald Trump is. In the week of the White House tell-all gossip book, Fire and Fury, Jonah tells us that it is nothing new. We already know that the president spends hours a day "in front of a television." We already know that "the president struggles to complete a line of thought without being distracted." We already know that the president represents himself as the world's foremost expert on everything but he has never been seen "actually talked expertly for more than a minute on any public policy without the benefit of a teleprompter."
Hmm. Remember how everybody knew that Ronald Reagan was an amiable dunce that did not know the details of policy. And remember how Barack Obama represented himself as a better speechwriter than his speechwriters, etc.?
We really cannot know how much of the Trump Administration is Trump and how much is the people he has appointed or how much is serendipity and accident that the right people got into the right places. Or that when you staff up a Republican administration you get the same people from the same think tanks every time.
But the rule of thumb is that, if it happens on Trump's watch, he gets the credit and he gets the blame.
For instance, President Clinton came into office after a mild recession and presided over 8 years of strong growth. You may say that issued more from a Republican Congress that deregulated and cut taxes, but it still happened on his watch.
For instance, President Obama presided over a decade of weak growth. He gets the blame, although I have read that after a big credit panic like 2008 it usually takes the economy a decade to get into its stride again.
Now, according to my view, the actions of Trump administration in rolling back regulations and cutting business tax rates are going to have a strong pro-growth effect on the economy. Also, the recovery of housing prices is going to make it easier for business start-ups to use their home equity as capital. And if all that happens it doesn't matter if the president watches TV or tweets juvenile insults or doesn't understand the details of policy. The good things will have happened on his watch and he will get the credit. That is all.
On the other hand any delay in returning interest rates to normal now that the economy seems to be firing on all cylinders could allow a boom and bubble that could burst before the president runs for reelection in 2020. And that would be the president's fault, just as the current stock bull market is to the president's credit. And don't ask me what happens if and when the Bitcoin bubble bursts. But the president will get the blame.
The truth is that political leaders of every stripe are pretty unsavory characters. Think of JFK, serial adulterer; LBJ, who had hideaway offices in the Capitol to entertain females and got to be senator from Texas courtesy of Box 13; Nixon, an arriviste that "everyone" despised; Bill Clinton, another serial adulterer and a notoriously corrupt politician. Oh then there was George W. Bush, who seems to have been a nice guy. But what good did it do him?
Then there is Barack Obama that got elected twice on the strength of Illinois court divorce records that mysterious went public. What a guy! And we still know nothing of how things went down in the Obama White House.
No doubt Donald Trump is a monster. Politicians and big businessmen usually are. The bottom line is whether their governance benefits the American people and puts the economy on a secure upward arc.
Everything else is gossip and bad faith.
Hmm. Remember how everybody knew that Ronald Reagan was an amiable dunce that did not know the details of policy. And remember how Barack Obama represented himself as a better speechwriter than his speechwriters, etc.?
We really cannot know how much of the Trump Administration is Trump and how much is the people he has appointed or how much is serendipity and accident that the right people got into the right places. Or that when you staff up a Republican administration you get the same people from the same think tanks every time.
But the rule of thumb is that, if it happens on Trump's watch, he gets the credit and he gets the blame.
For instance, President Clinton came into office after a mild recession and presided over 8 years of strong growth. You may say that issued more from a Republican Congress that deregulated and cut taxes, but it still happened on his watch.
For instance, President Obama presided over a decade of weak growth. He gets the blame, although I have read that after a big credit panic like 2008 it usually takes the economy a decade to get into its stride again.
Now, according to my view, the actions of Trump administration in rolling back regulations and cutting business tax rates are going to have a strong pro-growth effect on the economy. Also, the recovery of housing prices is going to make it easier for business start-ups to use their home equity as capital. And if all that happens it doesn't matter if the president watches TV or tweets juvenile insults or doesn't understand the details of policy. The good things will have happened on his watch and he will get the credit. That is all.
On the other hand any delay in returning interest rates to normal now that the economy seems to be firing on all cylinders could allow a boom and bubble that could burst before the president runs for reelection in 2020. And that would be the president's fault, just as the current stock bull market is to the president's credit. And don't ask me what happens if and when the Bitcoin bubble bursts. But the president will get the blame.
The truth is that political leaders of every stripe are pretty unsavory characters. Think of JFK, serial adulterer; LBJ, who had hideaway offices in the Capitol to entertain females and got to be senator from Texas courtesy of Box 13; Nixon, an arriviste that "everyone" despised; Bill Clinton, another serial adulterer and a notoriously corrupt politician. Oh then there was George W. Bush, who seems to have been a nice guy. But what good did it do him?
Then there is Barack Obama that got elected twice on the strength of Illinois court divorce records that mysterious went public. What a guy! And we still know nothing of how things went down in the Obama White House.
No doubt Donald Trump is a monster. Politicians and big businessmen usually are. The bottom line is whether their governance benefits the American people and puts the economy on a secure upward arc.
Everything else is gossip and bad faith.
How you can pass off Trump as just another unsavory character in the oval office is utterly unfathomable. Trump is a madman, a Hitleresque, xenophobic, ignorant, illiterate, brash, and dangerous madman who is as close as he can get to nuclear weapons and war... a bit more than gossip and bad faith I'd say.
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