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'Drain the Swamp'? Trump's Potential Cabinet Fills Out With Washington Insiders

The transition team includes campaign CEO Steve Bannon, Silicon Valley titan Peter Thiel, RNC chair Reince Priebus, three of Trump's children — Donald Trump Jr., Eric Trump, Ivanka Trump — and his son-in-law, Jared Kushner. Sources tell NBC News that Texas Rep. Mike McCaul, chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee, is being considered for Secretary of Homeland Security; former Michigan Rep. Mike Rogers, a past chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, is on the list for Director of the CIA; while Texas Rep. Jeb Hensarling, chairman of the Financial Services Committee, is in the mix for Treasury Secretary.

http://www.nbcnews.com/politics/201...cabinet-fills-out-washington-insiders-n682341

One of the more unexpected names to come up Thursday was JP Morgan CEO Jamie Dimon. Dimon's chief of staff confirmed to NBC News that, though Trump has had no formal conversation with him, some of Trump's senior advisers have told Dimon he would make an "excellent" Treasury Secretary.
 
Emily's Cat said:
Yes,. well some of this is also Washingtonians being, well, very strange people. It hasn't been the rural areas that keep voting down local initiatives for mass transit. Seriously, Why the heck don't we have some reasonable mass transit? The density and the geographic concentration would argue for it. And why exactly do people in Seattle get to vote to put the replacement for the Alaskan Way viaduct underground? That's such an incredibly inane idea - we're in an earthquake zone, Seattle is built on landfill! But oh tnoes! It might interrupt the view - the view that keeps their property values so high and helps support the gentrification of the city, forcing ever more of the poor and under-served to move further out from the city, garnering immense commutes through ridiculous traffic... oh and yes - furthering your irritation that those poor people elsewhere have too much influence over what the wealthy Satellites get to do with their oodles of money...

*** Might be a good idea for us not to have this argument ***
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You're not an engineer. Tunnels and underground structures are significantly safer during earthquakes than anything built above ground as they move with the earth. And in fact very little of Seattle is built on landfill. Only at the Southern portal and along the viaduct is there fill and the tunnel bores down and under the fill.

There are valid questions about building a tunnel there. Earthquake safety is not one of them.

FYI: Soundtransit 3 passed easily on Tuesday.
 
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Captain_Swoop said:
'Drain the Swamp'? Trump's Potential Cabinet Fills Out With Washington Insiders

The transition team includes campaign CEO Steve Bannon, Silicon Valley titan Peter Thiel, RNC chair Reince Priebus, three of Trump's children — Donald Trump Jr., Eric Trump, Ivanka Trump — and his son-in-law, Jared Kushner. Sources tell NBC News that Texas Rep. Mike McCaul, chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee, is being considered for Secretary of Homeland Security; former Michigan Rep. Mike Rogers, a past chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, is on the list for Director of the CIA; while Texas Rep. Jeb Hensarling, chairman of the Financial Services Committee, is in the mix for Treasury Secretary.

http://www.nbcnews.com/politics/201...cabinet-fills-out-washington-insiders-n682341

One of the more unexpected names to come up Thursday was JP Morgan CEO Jamie Dimon. Dimon's chief of staff confirmed to NBC News that, though Trump has had no formal conversation with him, some of Trump's senior advisers have told Dimon he would make an "excellent" Treasury Secretary.
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Oh look at that, Trump conned his voters. What a shock. I am shocked. This is shocking. Nobody saw this coming
 
Minoosh said:
Maybe some pollster did do this, but the idea of "lost tribes" of angry white people was often met with disbelief or ridicule. It turns out that yes, there were quite a few such voters and I'm not sure it should have come as such a surprise.
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Trump got fewer votes than Romney did four years ago. It's not as if there was a wave of new voters sweeping him to victory. Hillary simply didn't get people to turn out for her.
 
Captain_Swoop said:
'Drain the Swamp'? Trump's Potential Cabinet Fills Out With Washington Insiders
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IMO the media has to go back to "show don't tell." Don't make every headline something about Trump not following through on a promise. The media are miffed, I get that, they hate being wrong. But trying to spin headlines against Trump is just piling on more arrogance, IMO. Leave out "drain the swamp," that was always code for "defeat Hillary." Supporters* never expected him to blow up the federal government. Disrupt it, yes.

Let facts speak for themselves and stick to factual headlines, not "he said that, but now he's doing this!" His voters already know it and his detractors will "get it" without the additional nudge. Trump's inexperience at picking teams will show, IMO, but the media should let that play out with a minimum of editorializing. "Lock her up? Clinton investigation officially closed" is a weaker headline than "Clinton investigation officially closed." Let people connect a few dots on their own.

ETA: *Most supporters, IMO. Unfortunately there is a significant minority who are hard-core anti-Semitic white nationalists. I suspect that these folks will become disenchanted with Trump; no reason to hit them over the head with it.
 
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Captain_Swoop said:
'Drain the Swamp'? Trump's Potential Cabinet Fills Out With Washington Insiders

The transition team includes campaign CEO Steve Bannon, Silicon Valley titan Peter Thiel, RNC chair Reince Priebus, three of Trump's children — Donald Trump Jr., Eric Trump, Ivanka Trump — and his son-in-law, Jared Kushner. Sources tell NBC News that Texas Rep. Mike McCaul, chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee, is being considered for Secretary of Homeland Security; former Michigan Rep. Mike Rogers, a past chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, is on the list for Director of the CIA; while Texas Rep. Jeb Hensarling, chairman of the Financial Services Committee, is in the mix for Treasury Secretary.

http://www.nbcnews.com/politics/201...cabinet-fills-out-washington-insiders-n682341

One of the more unexpected names to come up Thursday was JP Morgan CEO Jamie Dimon. Dimon's chief of staff confirmed to NBC News that, though Trump has had no formal conversation with him, some of Trump's senior advisers have told Dimon he would make an "excellent" Treasury Secretary.
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But let's be clear: it's better that Trump's cabinet have some experience in it, since Trump has none. Now, his transition team has a lot of unexperienced folks like Bannon and family members, but I'd like that his cabinet have some Washington folks.

Of course, I'm not a Trump supporter, and they may have different ideas.
 
Distracted1 said:
One might take the opposing view that his supporters being much more likely to be armed than his detractors could make the transition easier for him.
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Yeah, except that a pretty good chunk of those right-wing gun nuts very deeply and profoundly believe that their right to bear arms is in place so that such a thing cannot happen. A huge portion of them are strict constitutionalists who take the threat of a tyrannical government far more seriously than most liberals normally do (at least until someone they really dislike gets elected, I guess). Yet somehow you think that they'll magically and spontaneously act against the very premise that underlays their strict defense of the second amendment?

Honestly, liberals need to get to know their enemy better. They spend so much time deriding and mocking the caricature that they've created, the image of what they think conservatives ought to be, that they don't actually understand their position at all. They don't understand their fears and desires, they don't understand their motivations.

**Edited to make more general. I realize that I'm assuming you're a liberal but actually have no idea, and nothing in your post provides enough information to make a reasonable assumption.
 
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acbytesla said:
I'm saying that they will SELL and GQ is not going to suffer as a result. I LOVE naked women but this is wrong in my book. But then again, so is Trump as President but both are facts of life.
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:D Yes, it will sell. I'm saying that their reason for publishing them is to make Trump look bad because he's with a woman who would dare to bare all :eye-poppi - I mean, look how bad his judgment is if he can't even pick a proper, well behaved, modest woman! I'm inferring motivation, of course, and I hope that my inferred motivation backfires :p
 
Argumemnon said:
You really think that would make any sort of difference?
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Yes.

His supporters are exactly the cohort of people who deeply believe that we have the second amendment in order to defend ourselves from usurpers and tyrants. They firmly believe that it is the duty and obligation of the citizenry to protect themselves from a government that overreaches.

Why would you expect them to meekly support a tyrant overreaching?
 
Emily's Cat said:
:D Yes, it will sell. I'm saying that their reason for publishing them is to make Trump look bad because he's with a woman who would dare to bare all :eye-poppi - I mean, look how bad his judgment is if he can't even pick a proper, well behaved, modest woman! I'm inferring motivation, of course, and I hope that my inferred motivation backfires :p
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Yea, I don't buy that as their rational. It's fiduciary only. I could care less if the first lady did porn. I just think it's kind of seedy publishing them now.
 
Emily's Cat said:
Yes.

His supporters are exactly the cohort of people who deeply believe that we have the second amendment in order to defend ourselves from usurpers and tyrants. They firmly believe that it is the duty and obligation of the citizenry to protect themselves from a government that overreaches.

Why would you expect them to meekly support a tyrant overreaching?
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That wasn't my question: You really think that (guns in the hands of citizens) would make any sort of difference?
 
Emily's Cat said:
Yeah, except that a pretty good chunk of those right-wing gun nuts very deeply and profoundly believe that their right to bear arms is in place so that such a thing cannot happen.
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You're being naive, methinks. Such a move would obviously not be sold as a destruction of the Constitution; it would be sold as "taking back the country" or "protecting the national spirit". There are plenty of people who are willing to be convinced to take up arms against their fellow citizens in defense of the country. There are a non-trivial number today who seem to be itching for the opportunity to purge some undesirables.

A huge portion of them are strict constitutionalists who take the threat of a tyrannical government far more seriously than most liberals normally do...
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Except that they willingly elected a man who has openly expressed a desire to suppress the First Amendment as it applies to journalism. So, clearly, they're a lot more flexible about the Constitution than you are trying to claim.
 
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Argumemnon said:
That wasn't my question: You really think that (guns in the hands of citizens) would make any sort of difference?
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Yes - the military are citizens too, and a large number of active duty take their oath to defend the constitution pretty seriously. To disarm the populace, Trump would have to use the military... and the military isn't going to follow that order.
 
Cl1mh4224rd said:
You're being naive, methinks. Such a move would obviously not be sold as a destruction of the Constitution; it would be sold as "taking back the country" or "protecting the national spirit". There are plenty of people who are willing to be convinced to take up arms against their fellow citizens in defense of the country. There are a non-trivial number today who seem to be itching for the opportunity to purge some undesirables.
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I think you're wrong.

Now granted, I'm only speaking from the perspective of someone whose family takes that position, who have a strong military background, and whose friends are almost completely made up of people who are active gun enthusiasts and pro-gun activists. I suppose I could be completely wrong about the beliefs and motivations of what are effectively my own people. You could be right - they could be exactly what you caricature them as.

Cl1mh4224rd said:
Except that they willingly elected a man who has openly expressed a desire to suppress the First Amendment as it applies to journalism. So, clearly, they're a lot more flexible about the Constitution than you are trying to claim.
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Yeah, I don't think any of them think he has any possible chance of doing that. It doesn't matter that he expresses that desire - if they think he has no chance of actually making it a reality it doesn't matter.
 
On the news tonight, they just mentioned that Trump is already walking back his promise to repeal Obamacare.

Steve S
 
I'm hoping his promises were just campaign rhetoric, now it's looking promising. He has walked back "deport the Muslims", is waffling on "Mexicans will pay for the wall", and suddenly is finding things about Obamacare that he likes.

This is one case where I'd rather a politician mot fulfill his campaign promises.
 
steve s said:
On the news tonight, they just mentioned that Trump is already walking back his promise to repeal Obamacare.

Steve S
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I think he just said he liked the provision where kids could remain on their parents insurance, if he kills the subsidy ( which he could do with a simple majority) that would still kill the program

Eta: He also likes the pre-existing conditions thing. Without the subsidies though, the rest of the insurance companies will bail.
 
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Cl1mh4224rd said:
You're being naive, methinks. Such a move would obviously not be sold as a destruction of the Constitution; it would be sold as "taking back the country" or "protecting the national spirit". There are plenty of people who are willing to be convinced to take up arms against their fellow citizens in defense of the country. There are a non-trivial number today who seem to be itching for the opportunity to purge some undesirables.

Except that they willingly elected a man who has openly expressed a desire to suppress the First Amendment as it applies to journalism. So, clearly, they're a lot more flexible about the Constitution than you are trying to claim.
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One only need to revisit history to see how easily we will give up our rights. Trump has suggested that Muslims would be required to register with the government. Now, where have we heard that before? Maybe he'll want them to walk around with yellow crescent moon badges?

FYI Emily, That law would violate the first amendment's establishment clause. Are YOU going to stand up against that?
 
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