Trump is clearly not happy with many of his key hires during his first term in office, regularly slamming former lackeys like Attorney General Bill Barr, Chief of Staff John Kelly, and National Security Adivser John Bolton. Axios reported in 2022 that Trump planned to ensure the loyalty not just of his high-profile appointments, should he win in 2024, but of thousands of mid-level staffers working throughout the government. Political views, rather than credentials or experience, are driving the process.
The outlet reported on Monday that the effort is well underway — and it’s sophisticated. The campaign is contracting “smart, experienced people, many with very unconventional and elastic views of presidential power and traditional rule of law,” according to Axios, to ensure new hires are fully onboard with the brutal policy proposals Trump has floated. It’s also using AI to vet potentail staffers, including by srubbing their social media.
Remember all of these little articles, all the social media posts, and any other media outing. We are baring full witness to the onset of a dictatorship.
Would be nice if Democratic leadership took this as the threat it is. Instead, they see it as an indication that they can do even less, move even further to the right, and demand even more from voters.
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It’s probably best not to engage the “both sides are bad” trolls.
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“The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.”
It’s not “both sides are bad”, it’s pointing out the Democrats are basically letting it happen without much of a fight. You can criticize both sides without being a centrist
Yup, that’s bullshit. It’s not that the Democrats are letting it happen without a fight. It’s that the media aren’t reporting on what Democrats are trying to do as much as they’re reporting on the juicy details of Republican corruption. Better ratings.
In the end, it comes down to elections. Democrats will follow the rules. Republicans won’t. So if we don’t want the worst case scenario, we have to do our part and let the Democrats do theirs.
Like nearly every single “both sides” argument in all of online history, this fulfills one of these two roles:
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Detract from something good about Democrats
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Deflect from something shitty about Republicans
You’ll hardly ever see a “both sides” argument in the wild that does one of these things:
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Detract from something good about Republicans
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Deflect from something shitty about Democrats
You may draw your own conclusions from that, gentle reader.
Credit belongs to be_excellent_to_each_other@kbin.social
It’s a really poignant observation. If you’re constantly putting down only one side to try and argue it’s the same as the other side, the two sides are very obviously not the same.
In the end, it comes down to elections. Democrats will follow the rules. Republicans won’t. So if we don’t want the worst case scenario, we have to do our part and let the Democrats do theirs.
I also wanted to touch on this – the very nature of Good versus Evil is that Good is always handicapped. Evil can let bystanders die as collateral. Evil can abandon its allies and those it claims to protect. Good can’t. Good is bound by rules even when it’s being morally questionable. It’s what separates Good from Evil, in usual circumstances.
This isn’t to say that we should sit and twiddle our thumbs if Trump creates concentration camps for “vermin” and his undesirables. At that point, it’s not usual circumstances anymore. Good cannot do Good unless it breaks some of those rules for the bigger picture. We can’t rig elections preemptively, but we sure as hell can rebel against a legally, duly elected president.
I’m not saying this out of idealism, but because of what we want to protect. If we readily abandon the institutions and laws we want to protect, that weakens those even further. The best outcome that will protect and preserve a peaceful democracy just be accomplished through that peaceful democracy. When that isn’t possible, you’re still going to protect it, but if you succeed the democracy will be considerably weakened. Change through violent rebellion just makes it more likely that the change will be overthrown in a new violent rebellion.
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If the party doesn’t take this opportunity to move right and demand votes anyway like they’ve been doing for half a century, I’ll be happy to be wrong.
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Ah yes, the party that keeps people with dementia in office until they die
I don’t have a dog in this fight, but it’s unclear which party you’re talking about.
They’re talking about the California democrat senator Dianne Feinstein who remained a senator until her death at 90yo. She was by no means fit for office for several years leading up to her death.
Not American, so I was confused because there’ve also been stories about McConnell, Biden and Trump having lapses in international media.
Maybe they mean the presidential candidate that keeps forgetting he is (still) not up against Obama
I think they meant the Senator who keeps having mini-strokes during press briefings
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I’m not American. Here’s a list of US politicians who have had ‘senior moment’ gaffes or incidents based on international(!!!) coverage of US politics:
Biden, Trump, Feinstein, and McConnell.
I know US politics is hyper-partisan, but please don’t disingeniously deny they’re too old to govern, based on party preference. A turd is still a turd, even if it’s better than a bag of vomit.
It is not the d’s fault that all of us were taken by surprise that trump would go full hitler and have actual smart people trying to help that happen
This is sarcasm, right?
It is not the d’s fault that all of us were taken by surprise that trump would go full hitler
If this surprised Democrats, they weren’t paying any attention at all. They’re not taking the threat seriously. They’re just going to try to take advantage of the situation. It’s idiotically reckless.
Absolutely nobody on that list should ever be allowed to have the slightest bit of political power.
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They want a king. That’s the order structure that makes sense to their brain.
Harnessing the power of AI to more efficiently install a facist totalitarian state. What an innovative and horrifying use.
And looks like any credentials or experience are going by the wayside again. It was fascinating just how bad all of his appointments were in the first term. Environmental protection agency? Put a coal lobbyist in charge. Department of Education? Grab that religious zealot who wants to abolish all public education. State Department? Get the former boy scouts president and CEO of ExxonMobil in here.
This is frightening though, the idea that Bill Bar and John Bolton sound reasonable in comparison to what he has in mind should be ringing off facist warning bells for any American. I fully expect Attorney General nominee Sidney Powell or someone similar. And for anyone expecting senate confirmations to stop this, it’s possible democrats lose the senate again with Joe Manchin out and a bad map this year with democrats and most of these positions don’t have any senate confirmation. He also routinely avoided issues with senate confirmation in his first administration, by appointing the facist he actually wanted to a “deputy” or “acting” role, and then leaving the actual role unfulfilled with all duties delegated to the deputy. Many of these people he never even bothered officially nominating to the senate.
Why does the thumbnail look like he’s sucking his own hair with a vacuum
Here you go
Now i can’t unsee it
Now you never have to, look at the image above
Well, it certainly does suck
Trump types don’t operate well with actual rules. They won’t survive the on boarding process.
Why assume the fascistic lackeys will be ejected rather than the rules?
Trump wants to get rid of the federal workforce. He wants to go back to the Spoils system where Presidents awarded government positions and ambassadorships as favors and payment. That way there’s nothing stopping from stacking the government and firing any dissenters.
It won’t work. The federal government is HUGE now and it’d take years just to get an accounting of who to replace, even if you only go for supervisors and up. This WILL be a huge problem if attempted because it will decapitate every federal agency from being effective.
He succeeded in firing half of State last time. Crippling the government is the whole point.
Uhh no he didn’t? Lol, source?
Actually the Federal Government is quite small, but the employees were told to do more with less, now you have individuals who are unreplaceable. Entire functions of Government run through the hands of so few due to their complexity.
So when Trump fires all of them the government simply fails to function.
Sort of similar to how it was before, just far larger in scope of damage.
Trump demands so much loyalty. Not too surprising.
We did away with this a long time ago, it used to be called the “spoils” system. As in to the victor go the spoils. The end was bipartisan as it’s a terrible way to run a government unless you want invite incompetence and corruption.
Ending it made sense from the pure cynical pov. If you can’t award favors your opponent can’t either. If you can’t do something you can’t be held responsible for not doing it.
It worries me how this sounds. This is exactly the sort of thing you read and hear in fictional stories where the bad guys and good guys are fighting for control of their government.
I don’t like this one bit.
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This is the best summary I could come up with:
The former president reportedly has long planned to overhaul the government in his image should he win another term, and Axios reported on Monday that his team is busy screening thousands of loyalists in the hopes of installing an army of up to 54,000 MAGA diehards to expand the president’s power.
Axios reported in 2022 that Trump planned to ensure the loyalty not just of his high-profile appointments, should he win in 2024, but of thousands of mid-level staffers working throughout the government.
The campaign is contracting “smart, experienced people, many with very unconventional and elastic views of presidential power and traditional rule of law,” according to Axios, to ensure new hires are fully onboard with the brutal policy proposals Trump has floated.
Trump has also repeatedly indicated that he will weaponize the Justice Department to go after his political enemies, including the people responsible for his four criminal indictments and other legal issues.
The New York Times reported the same day on Trump’s sweeping plans to attack immigrants — including through deportations.
The Axios report on Monday emphasizes that the former president and the conservative forces organizing the effort to screen potential staffers are going to stop at nothing to tear down any governmental roadblocks standing in the way of Trump’s brutal vision for the future of the country.
The original article contains 487 words, the summary contains 220 words. Saved 55%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!
Ah the return of the spoilage system.
Where are they going to get those?
