THERE IS STILL NO BOTTOM

On his Substack, Damon Linker talks about the politics of national despair, embodied in Trump’s cabinet picks, calling them “The Bestial Politics of Masculine Self-Assertion:”

“Put in Nietzschean terms, Trumpism is seeking to advance a revolutionary transvaluation of values by inverting the morality that undergirds both traditional conservatism and liberal institutionalism. In this inversion, norms and rules that counsel and enforce propriety, restraint, and deference to institutional authority become vices, while flouting them become virtues. The result is a radical form of political action that gives a central governing role to ‘bad’ men who enjoy provoking the outraged indignation of those incapable of their own similarly bold acts of defiance.”

French historian Marc Bloch, one of the founders of the Annales school of historiography (and one of my favorite history philosophers), wrote a book - “Strange Defeat”- published posthumuously in 1946 (he was killed by the Nazis in 1944 for being Jewish), in which he detailed how the ruling élite of France failed in 1940 because its generals, the press, the politicians, and its educators “were incapable of thinking in terms of a new war.”

“It was not only in the field that intellectual causes lay at the root of our defeat. As a nation we had been content with incomplete knowledge and imperfectly thought-out ideas. Such an attitude is not a good preparation for military success. Our system of government demands the participation of the masses. The destiny of the People is in their own hands, and I see no reason for believing that they are not perfectly capable of choosing rightly. But what effort had been made to supply them with that minimum of clear and definite information without which no rational conduct is possible? To that question the answer is ‘None’. That particular dereliction of duty constituted the most heinous crime of our self-styled democrats. The matter would be less serious if what we had to deplore were merely the lies and half-truths inspired by party loyalties openly avowed. Wicked these may be, but, on the whole, they can be fairly easily discounted. Far graver is the fact that our national Press, claiming to provide an impartial news-service, was sailing under false colours. Many newspapers, even those which openly wore the livery of party beliefs, were secretly enslaved to unavowed and, often, squalid interests. Some of them were controlled by foreign influences. I do not deny that the common sense of the ordinary reader did, to some extent, counterbalance this, but only at the cost of developing an attitude of scepticism to all propaganda, printed and broadcast alike. It would be a great mistake to think that the elector always votes as ‘his’ paper tells him to. I have known more than one humble citizen who votes almost automatically against the views expressed by his chosen rag, and it may be that this refusal to be stampeded by printed insincerities is among the more consoling elements of our contemporary national life. It does, at least, offer some hope for the future. Still, it must be admitted that such an attitude provides a poor intellectual training for those who are called upon to understand what is at stake in a vast world struggle, to judge rightly of the coming storm, and to arm themselves adequately against its violence. Quite deliberately—as one can see by reading Mein Kampf or the records of Rauschning’s conversations— Hitler kept the truth from his servile masses. Instead of intellectual persuasion he gave them emotional suggestion. For us there is but one set of alternatives. Either, like the Germans, we must turn our people into a keyboard on which a few leaders can play at will; or we can so train them that they may be able to collaborate to the full with the representatives in whose hands they have placed the reins of government. At the present stage of civilization this dilemma admits of no middle term. . . . The masses no longer obey. They follow either because they have been hypnotized or because they know.”

The most significant of Trump’s terrible nominations is Russell T. Vought to lead the Office of Management and Budget (OMB). OMB is part of the Executive Office of the President and is charged with creating the budget and oversight of federal agencies to ensure compliance with the president’s policies and spending authority. Although the job sounds “in the weeds,” OMB is where the hard work of implementing the president’s policies takes place. Vought served as acting director of OMB for two years during the first Trump administration, and is . Vought is an “architect” of Project 2025. Per the NYT:

“Mr. Vought was a leading figure in Project 2025, the effort by conservative organizations to build a governing blueprint for Mr. Trump should he take office once again. Mr. Trump tried to distance himself from the effort during his campaign, but he has put forward people with ties to the project for his administration since the election.

“Mr. Vought’s role in Project 2025 was to oversee executive orders and other unilateral actions that Mr. Trump could take during his first six months in office, with the goal of tearing down and rebuilding executive branch institutions in a way that would enhance presidential power.

To the surprise of no one, Trump's claim during the election that he knew nothing about Project 2025 was a lie. There is almost no one better positioned to advocate for the goals of Project 2025 than Vought—both because of his key role in drafting the agenda and because of the powerful position he will assume at OMB.

Vought has been a vocal advocate for eliminating the “independence” of certain federal agencies such as the Federal Trade Commission, the Securities and Exchange Commission, and the Federal Reserve.

Other nominations deserving scrutiny include:

Sebastian Gorka as the senior director for counterterrorism. Gorka was forced out of the White House during Trump's first administration because he frequently clashed with senior intelligence leaders who saw Gorka as an ideologue with little real-world experience. Interestingly, Gorka is strongly pro-Ukraine; he actually said that the best way to end the war would be to increase aid to Ukraine, while Trump plans to cut all aid off immediately. In 2022, he called DNI nominee Tulsi Gabbard “a whack job conspiracy theorist who sides with killers like Assad.” I wonder when these idiots will get their stories straight.

Marty Makary, has been nominated to lead the FDA. Per The Hill, Makary is a Johns Hopkins’s oncology surgeon who espoused contrarian views about the response to the COVID-19 pandemic. In early 2021, Makary published an op-ed in the WSJ asserting that “herd immunity” would end the pandemic by April 2021. In fact, cases of Covid in the US increased substantially after Makary’s op-ed, with nearly half of the total deaths occurring after his claim that “herd immunity” would end the pandemic. Makary said of the medical professionals who were right about the proper response to COVID, “The greatest perpetrator of misinformation during the pandemic has been the US government. Public health officials were intellectually dishonest and lied to the American people.”

Trump’s Surgeon General nominee already has supporters fuming. They have circulated videos on social media of Nesheiwat during COVID, on Fox where she said, “vaccines, tests, and masks are all beneficial in combating COVID. It’s not just one or the other.” One “influencer” said, “Nesheiwat should withdraw. She’s not a leader. She’s a sheep.” Another said, “This is a slap in the face to the doctors who sacrificed everything to speak up.” Nesheiwat was widely viewed as the doctor specifically brought on Fox to convince people in their audience to comply with protective measures and get vaccinated. She is also very pro-vaccine - all kinds of vaccines.

Dumb fuckhead Dr. Naomi Wolf threatens: “Trump should bear in mind that MAGA won with the alliance of MAHA and that MAHA can walk away again in 2026. Don’t take it for granted. Deliver on implied and overt promises.”

Scott Bessent has been nominated as Secretary of Treasury. Bessent is a hedge fund manager and may have the experience to serve in the position. However, he is a deficit hawk who also wants to extend the costly Trump tax cuts from 2017. Per HuffPo, “Even as he pushes to lower the national debt by stopping spending, Bessent has backed extending provisions of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017. Additionally, all the fine minds of MAGA are in full freakout over the face Bessent is openly gay and married, and that he and his husband have an adopted son. The MAGAscum regularly call this “child trafficking” and are using that against Bessent now.

Remember: these morons only have 18 months to try and put together their dream of destroying the American constitutional democratic republic. Many of them will work at cross-purposes, and none of them rank high in “works and plays well with others.”

Add in Democratic Lawfare - taking them to court over Every Single Thing They Try and using the patented Trump Legal Delay Plan, they can be tied in knots for each and every one of those 18 months. And the 2026 electoral map is as favorable for Democrats as the 2024 map was for Republicans.

Trump is not infallible; he is at best a deluded ignoramus who is proud of the fact he cannot add 2 plus 2 and get 4 on consecutive attempts. And every last one of his gargoyles had to flunk the IQ test to be allowed in as a member. They didn’t win a “mandate” on November 5; once again, more people voted against them than for them.

In closing, I have this to say to those who have posted that it doesn’t matter, we won’t be having elections in 2026: such talk is nothing more than defeatist Vichy bullshit. And if you think such talk makes you “realistic,” then you’re dumb enough to be subject to my subterranean pain threshold for political stupidity. If that bucket of rhetorical icewater was enough to bring you to your senses, stick around - it’s going to be a good fight and we can win.

UPDATE: The CBS poll released today found that 59% of those polled approve of the way Trump is handling the presidential transition. So it’s obvious there’s fuck of a lot of work needs to be done.

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