A Brief
Consideration of Trump's 100 Day Plan
By Dave
DeMars 4/1/2017
Just
looking over Trump's plan for the first 100 days of his
administration. I went
to his website – the one he touted on some interview- and the
first 100 days isn't
there anymore (Ha ha –
April Fool – the joke is on me).
So I found another site at NPR.
http://www.npr.org/2016/11/09/501451368/here-is-what-donald-trump-wants-to-do-in-his-first-100-days
. You can check it out
for yourself. At
first glance, it looks and sounds impressive – until one gets into
the nitty gritty. I know. Trump says he is not a wonk – he is not
a detail guy. He is a big picture guy. And that is scary. Why?
Because
big picture government is what they teach all of us in high school
civics and government classes. Executive, Legislative and Judiicial
branches of government. They are suppose to counter-balance one
another. Checks and balances the chapter had as a sub heading if I
remember correctly. So this essay is a kind of open letter to
Donald. It's a critique about the stuff he wants to do in his first
100 days in office.
Dear
Donald,
One
of the first items your proposed was “a
Constitutional Amendment to impose term limits on all members of
Congress.”
Hmmm! How is a constitutional amendment passed? There are at least
10 websites that tell us how to go about it. I took the first one.
“The
Congress, whenever two thirds of both houses shall deem it necessary,
shall propose
amendments to
this Constitution....”
Not
good Donald. See you can't propose an amendment. So either you
purposely told a fib, or you didn't do your homework ( or even worse,
someone on your staff didn't do his or her homework – maybe
Baron?). But even if you could propose an amendment to the
Constitution, Mitch
McConnell, Majority Leader (your party) in the Senate said "It
will not be on the agenda in the Senate." And
then added, "I
would say we have term limits now — they're called elections."
And
really, Donald, a Constitutional Amendment needs to be ratified by
the states. That's why we only have 27 amendments in the 229
years since the Constitution was ratified. There have been 11,372
proposed amendments to the Constitution so far. Your chances are
slim and none.
Donald,
do you remember that guy – that Muslim guy with his wife at the
Democratic convention? He asked you a question. “Have you even
read the Constitution?” Article V of the Constitution. If you (or
Baron) would have read it, you would have known. You ought to do
your homework, Donald. Maybe you could fire somebody – ohh, I'm
sorry. It would have to be you. It's okay Donald, we'll go on to
the next item on your list.
Next
you proposed “a hiring freeze on all federal employees to reduce
federal workforce through attrition (exempting military, public
safety, and public health);” Not bad. Hiring freezes work
well. And conservatives get all goosey and pee in their pants
thinking of the money that will be saved. I do think we tried that
though. A 10% across the board cut in every department necessitated
lots of cuts in staff. Lines got longer, waits to get things
processed got longer. Some departments sacrificed new technology to
save personnel, and when the technology that they had went bust, they
had an even worse problem. Yup – Congressional conservatives (Tea
baggers mainly) pushed the 10% across the board cut and it kicked
them right in the cajones.
Just
by way of experience, we did that here in Minnesota under Gov.
“Plenty of nothing ” Pawlenty. He even increased all the fees on
things like fishing license, teacher's license and car licenses.
Didn't work. People got mad. People got irritated. And
when the current governor took over, we were still $2 billion in
debt.
And
you know, looking further down the list where you say you want to “
grow the economy 4% per year and create at least 25 million new
jobs,” a lot of those jobs are going to have to be government jobs.
Just saying, Donald. I know you don't like to take advice, but I'm
just saying it doesn't make a lot of sense to me.
Now
your next idea strikes me as kind of cool -
“a requirement that for every new federal regulation, two existing
regulations must be eliminated.”
Not bad Donald. I'm not quite
sure what you mean by a regulation. Maybe you are talking about laws
– you know the kind that Congress makes. In which case, don't hold
your breath.
Now
if you are talking about regulations like the IRS or the EPA makes,
that's not a bad idea. But consider this Donald. Regulations are
words on paper. Each regulation is given a number. It's clear. So
the question is how does one eliminate two regulations and still keep
those same regulations? The answer is simple. Let me show you.
Here are
four Regulaltions: I, II, III, IV. I used Roman numerals to impress
you. How do I keep Roman numeral number II, and III and make it
possible to create an entirely new regulation?
That's
right – I create I (a) and I (b). So now I have I (a) (b) II and
III. It's called subordination, not elimination. They do this all
the time in Congress. Sometimes they eliminate whole legislative
actions in part (a) and introduce brand new legislation 180 degrees
in reverse in part (b). It ain't rocket science (not that you would
know anything about science.)
Your
next idea really is a winner, Donald.
“A
5 year-ban on White House and Congressional officials becoming
lobbyists after they leave government service.”
You should start with
that Donald, maybe get Congress to pass a law to enforce that idea.
But first, Donald, you need to show us that you really are committed
to the idea of a government free of lobbyists who worked in Congress.
Here's how.
Get
rid of the hacks that that you nominated for positions such as
Attorney General, EPA, Secretary of Health and Human Services,
Secretary of Transportation, Secretary of Energy, and so on. Most of
them have already worked as lobbyists, so make a clean sweep of it
and get rid of the political hacks.
One
other thing about this “5 year ban” - you know some dude or
dudette is going to allege that this is an infringement on their
right to earn a living as a lobbyist. They will hire a team of
lawyers who will file a suit, lose, appeal, lose again and finally,
appeal to the Supreme Court. The Supremes in their peculiar wisdom
will find that indeed, this is an infringement and your attempt to
get lobbyists out of politics will ultimately fail. That is my
prediction.
I
really like number five - “a
lifetime ban on White
House officials lobbying on behalf of a foreign government.”
Unfortunately, you
hired or wanted to hire people who did exactly that. Take the
numb-nut you hired as your National SecurityDirector, Michael Flynn.
He was already working for a foreign government when you nominated
him. Maybe you didn't get the memo on the guy or maybe you just
didn't read it. Or maybe you just didn't care and all the promises
are so much bull-puckey. And he wasn't the only one. You nominated
several others who took money from foreign governments to lobby on
their behalf. Even your son-in-law Jared Kushner looks tainted in
this regard.
If
you really want to impress us, try doing this. Work toward getting
Citizens United overturned. Get the big money out of politics so the
country can finally have a chance at electing a real government
official instead of the Billionaire Wall Street/ Military Industrial
rubber stamped candidates we get now.
Oh,
I forgot. You are one of the rubber stamped candidates, so it's not
likely you'll touch that.
How
about your sixth promise - “a
complete ban on foreign lobbyists raising money for American
elections.”
It sounds like you are really on to something here, but as they say,
“actions speak louder than words,” and your White House and the
way it operates is such a cluster-fuck, I can't see how you
can be serious about this one. I mean, at least half a dozen of your
shitty pals are under investigation for “collusion with the
Russians.” A
bunch of them took money from the Russkies, and Tillerson, oil man
that he is, made deals for Russian oil. And you expect me to believe
that you and the guys actually have the best interests of the people
of the United States at heart? Better think that one through again.
You have created a plutocracy. It's taken 70 some years, but the
cycle has come round again. And you -lucky devil that you are –
have benefitted (at least in the short term) from it.
In
the song “When Princes Meet” by Tom Paxton,
(https://www.google.com/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ion=1&espv=2&ie=UTF-8#q=when+princes+meet+lyrics)
he writes:
“When
princes meet
The poor little men must tremble
In judgment seat
The poor little men must tremble
In judgment seat
They
speak of their wars
While great armies assemble
Their armor shines
To shame the sun
While great armies assemble
Their armor shines
To shame the sun
They
move like gods
They do resemble
All bow their necks
To iron feet when princes meet”
They do resemble
All bow their necks
To iron feet when princes meet”
Though
there are some who brazenly deny that this is what you are about,
your actions reveal the truth about you Donald. And ignorance ( a
path chosen by people as opposed to stupid which is a God-given
commodity distributed in excess) of the American people will keep you
and your cronies in power until there is an uprising. And then the
pendulum will swing again and there will be a purging of sorts such
as there was in the 1930's and again in the '60's.
Well,
I see I am getting long winded, so I will end this letter and take
up the rest of your 100 Day Promises at a later date.
Dave