We Won’t be fooled Again

By Supittra @Adobe Stock

Shallow or Sinister Motives

In the USA, unlike what many of us were taught since grade school, we do not have a pure Democracy. Instead, we rely on a Constitutional Republic, where there are various limitations on government powers. In our Republic, thanks to our Founders, power sharing is necessary among the government’s branches.

In the elements of Democracy, people have the ability to demand a change of direction by exercising their power at the ballot box. As Francis Menton notes, this is a big part of the system – at least in theory.

Yet, during (Menton’s) post-World War II lifetime, despite the theoretical promise of Democracy, the ability of the people to get some change in direction of the government through exercise of the franchise has been extremely limited.

Maybe the majority approved of what they were getting, but most often when there seemed to be a vote for change, little changed.

“The biggest change agent by far in this period was Ronald Reagan, but to be honest, the Washington establishment fought him mostly to a draw,” recalls Mr. Menton

Nixon and the two Bushes largely continued the status quo. Trump, in his first term, was far less effective at “draining the swamp” than Menton would have hoped.

And yet, during his post-World War II lifetime, contends Mr. Menton, despite the theoretical promise of Democracy, the ability of the people to get some change in the direction of the government through the exercise of the franchise has been extremely limited. Maybe the majority approved of what they were getting, but most often, when there seemed to be a vote for change, little changed.

Now there is Donald Trump in the White House. Trump in his 2^nd term second term, suddenly showing us what Democracy can mean in our system.

It’s a big change of direction, decisively approved by the voters at the ballot box. In other words, Democracy.

Francis Menton, known better in some quarters as the Manhattan Contrarian, notices that now it seems the media outlets had something different in mind than when they talked during the campaign about saving “our Democracy.”

The Manhattan Contrarian cites two examples:

1. An op-ed by Ruth Marcus on February 4 in The Washington Post with the headline “Trump 2.0: the most damaging first two weeks in presidential history.”
2. A February 6 piece by Susan Glasser in The New Yorker headlined “Elon Musk’s Revolutionary Terror.”

Rith Marcus basically has made her entire career as an editorial writer and columnist for The Washington Post. Floating in that stew for a few decades can do some serious damage to your brain. Marcus’s piece is full of one howler after another. From the opening:

No president in history has caused more damage to the nation more quickly. . . . The country survived Trump 1.0. Now, it faces a real threat that the harm he inflicts during his second term will be irreparable. The United States’ standing in the world, its ability to keep the country safe, the federal government’s fundamental capacity to operate effectively — all of these will take years to repair, if that can be achieved at all.”

Where’s the Damage

The “damage,” it seems, consists of imposing the policies of a newly elected President upon an entrenched bureaucracy that wants to do things its own way:

And it is a piece of a larger presidential power grab. . . . The onslaught against government itself has been the most alarming. Some of it involves the operations of Elon Musk’s “Department of Government Efficiency,” operating with unclear legal authority as a kind of roving strike force to terrorize the bureaucracy.

Perhaps you don’t agree with “kindergarten-level constitutional analysis.” How can the policies the voters voted for now be a “power grab” and an “onslaught against the government itself? 

Ruth Marcus argues that Mr. Menton is not about to address such deep questions. In “kindergarten level constitutional analysis,” Ms. Marcus seeks to have a bureaucracy that implements the policies the voters voted, accusing it to be a “power grab” and an “onslaught against the government itself.”

Doesn’t the Constitution give the elected president the power to set the policies and the bureaucracy no policy-setting power at all? But scoffs Mr. Menton, “Don’t expect Marcus to address these deep questions.”

Implementing the policies of the newly elected CEO is now “executing a hostile takeover” of the government, writes Mr. Menton.

The newly elected President’s closest associate is supposedly disqualified from carrying out the new boss’s wishes because he is “unelected.” It’s all a whole new concept of “Democracy” where the permanent bureaucracy gets to call the shots by some kind of holy writ from God, while the democratic election as provided for by the Constitution of a new guy with new and different policies just doesn’t count for anything. Marcus seems to have no self-awareness of what she is saying or advocating.

This is so reasonable it seems unreasonably simple. Mr. Menton, can you explain to us why, over the past weekend, DOGE operatives forced out a senior Treasury Department official and gained access to the government’s highly sensitive centralized payment system? Didn’t this potentially expose vast amounts of personnel data? 

Well, muses Mr. Menton, where in the country is there a CEO or staff that doesn’t have access to the “central payment system” and the “personnel data”? How can any organization operate without that?

USAID Created to Never End

USAID was established by Congress, and that “can’t be disappeared without congressional action.” 

According to the unelected Elon Musk, “USAID is a criminal organization. Time for it to die.”

Susan Glasser seems to be joining Ruth Marcus in not explaining what she is talking about. There is the idea that Musk’s actions are an “illegal power grab.” what about those actions is “illegal,” let alone a “power grab”?

As far as I know, in legal form DOGE is just a re-named and re-purposed agency formerly called the U.S. Digital Service, which was duly created and funded by Congress. From Trump’s January 20 Executive Order “Establishing and Implementing the President’s Department of Government Efficiency,” Section 3:

Sec. 3.  DOGE Structure.  (a)  Reorganization and Renaming of the United States Digital Service.  The United States Digital Service is hereby publicly renamed as the United States DOGE Service (USDS) and shall be established in the Executive Office of the President.

Nothing illegal there, as far as Menton can see:

If Susan Glasser is going to be tossing about accusations of “illegality,” doesn’t she owe readers an explanation of what she thinks is the legal issue? How can it be a “power grab” if the President was duly elected by the people if the President is exercising powers granted to him by the constitution?

Mr. Menton “loves the concept that our elected leader should be prohibited from having access to the federal payment system.”

Sure the voters elected him, and only him, but we absolutely must not allow him or his people to find out what the money is being spent on! That would allow chaos to break loose! Give that argument an obvious nomination for stupidest constitutional argument of the year.

Reduced to Endless Sputtering

It they are going to fuss about and toss out the term “illegality, “shouldn’t they be prepared to expound and defend? It’s easy to throw around “illegal power grabs” without clarification.

They desperately want what Trump and Musk are doing to be an “illegal power grab,” but they can’t even think of or articulate a reason why.