As Horrifically Crazy As This Is, It’s Still Not The Onion

Posted on by vlrock

These days, the news is so unthinkable it almost seems fake … like fodder for The Onion. If only it was funny and not frightening as hell.

  • Steve Bannon, an extreme-right, white nationalist and Breitbart publisher has been tapped for trump’s chief strategist.
  • Reince Priebus, former RNC Chairman, has been announced as trump’s Chief of Staff
  • Michael Flynn, a retired army general who holds an incoherent worldview and virulent Islamophobic conspiracy theorist has been tapped to fill the role of National Security Advisor.
  • Rep. Tom Price( R-GA), a Teapublican and leading critic of Obamacare has been tapped to lead the Department of Health and Human Services. Price is also an advocate of privatizing Medicare which leave Seniors to the mercy of the Insurance industry, consuming whatever voucher might be provided and delivering little if any coverage for actual healthcare.
  • Steven Mnuchin, a billionaire Goldman trader turned hedge fund manager (vulcher capitalist) who made a fortune foreclosing on working families’ homes during the recession and who thinks the “Volker Rule” is just to complicated, is trump’s pick for Treasury Secretary.
  • Wilbur L Ross, Jr., a billionaire investor in distressed assets (a vulture capitalist), has been chosen to run the Commerce Department. Todd Rickets, owner of the Chicago cubs will be joining Ross as his Deputy Commerce Secretary.
  • James “Mad Dog” Mattis, a retired marine corps general is his pick for Secretary of Defense, but it will take an law passed by Congress to enable him to even be nominated for a “civilian” post since he’s a retired general.
  • Elaine Chao (Senator McConnell’s wife and Labor Secy under GWB), who has deep business and political ties to China is his pick for Transportation Secretary (wonder just how much Chinese Steel he plans on having her ship to the US for his special infrastructure projects to “make America great.” Considered a Washington insider, she is also connected to a 90 old seizure of cocaine from one of her father’s shipping vessels.  So much for “draining” that swamp — looks more like he’s stocking it up with some serious alligators.
  • Betsy Devos (former chair of the Michigan Republican Party), a billionaire philanthropist who never attended a public school, who has no experience in education and  who ardently believes we should gut and scrap public education in favor of privatized charter schools (via which she could profit) and home schooling, has been tapped to lead the Department of Education.  So much for that investment in our children’s and our nation’s future.
  • Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-AL), who was once rejected for a judicial appointment on racial grounds and who has touted that his approach to immigration reform would prevent people (of color?) from entering this country, is trump’s pick as attorney general. Sessions also has some serious prejudices when it comes to LGBT issues. You can pick almost any LGBT rights issue, and chances are Sessions has voted against it
  • Rep. Mike Pompeo (R-KS), a Teapublican partisan who graduated from West Point and Harvard, is trump’s pick for Director of the CIA, an agency that is supposed to operate above politics.  That might prove to be an unsuccessful stretch for Mr. Pompeo given his aggressively partisan attacks on Clinton during the 2016 election.  If you’re fond of bulk collection of your phone records, Pompeo is your guy.
  • Gov. Nikki Haley, who has extremely limited foreign policy experience has been selected as US Ambassador to the United Nations

That’s the people, then there’s his policy positions

  • Muslim Americans now fear being added to a national registry.
  • Millions of hardworking immigrant families fear deportation.
  • trump wants flag burners to be jailed or lose their citizenship — never mind our 1st Amendment protection in the U.S. Constitution.
  • trump plans to fill the Supreme Court with justices who will overturn Roe v. Wade.
  • And, anti-choice Republicans are poised to finally defund Planned Parenthood, privatize Medicare, shred Medicaid and advance a federal 20-week abortion ban, that is, if they don’t make abortion illegal altogether making it a criminal act.

It’s just too much. trump’s only getting started, and the kinds of policies he promises to advance would cause grave harm to women and families.

It begs the question: What’s next?  Will Michelle Bachmann turn up in his list of nominees?

Under Consideration

Secretary of State: Laundry list of candidates being considered includes Rudy Giuliani, John Bolton, Bob Corker, Mitt Romney,  and David Petraeus (who was convicted of and currently on probation for disseminating Top Secret information to his mistress and who would need to get permission from his probation officer to take the job and move to Washington, D.C. — a bit hypocritical in my book after all the bogus crap we endured about Hillary’s emails)

Secretary of Homeland Security: Michael McCaul and David Clarke are in the running.

Secretary of the Interior: Half-Gov. Sarah Palin (R-AK) and Gov. Mary Fallin (R-OK) are believed to be finalists, with Fallon being the frontrunner

Secretary of Veterans Affairs: Half-Gov. Sarah Palin (R-AK) is also being mentioned for the VA, as is Gov. Rick Perry (R-TX).

Secretary of Agriculture: Gov. Rick Perry (R-TX) and Sid Miller are believed to be under consideration.

Secretary of Housing and Urban Development: Ben Carson has been offered the position but has not accepted.

Secretary of Agriculture  ??

Secretary of Labor  ??

Secretary of Energy  ??  Expect an appointment leaning more toward developing more production in fossil fuels and hostile toward clean energy technologies.

Environmental Protection Agency Administrator  ??  Expect an appointment who thinks Climate Changes is a colossal hoax, who is hostile toward President Obama’s Clean Power Plan and who would loosen environmental regulations allowing corporations to frack and pillage at will, polluting not just our water resources, but our air as well.  Will Myron Ebell, the head of trump’s EPA transition team be his choice for pillaging our nation’s resources? Only time will tell.

Office of Management and Budget Director   ??

United States Trade Representative   ??

Council of Economic Advisors Chairman   ??

Small Business Administration Administrator  ??

Further Reading: