Hey, I made a meme, inspired by the troubles besetting Trump’s transition team.
In case you haven’t been following the issue, here are a few just slightly alarming quotes from a Huffington Post piece on the chaos.
Donald Trump’s transition team is nearing a state of stasis, causing concern among both Democrats and Republicans in Washington that his White House will be woefully ill-prepared once he is inaugurated. …
The disarray has left agencies virtually frozen, unable to communicate with the people tasked with replacing them and their staff. Trump transition team officials were a no-show at the Pentagon, the Washington Examiner reported. Same goes for the Department of Energy, responsible for keeping the nation’s nuclear weapons safe, where officials had expected members of the Trump transition team on Monday. Ditto for the Department of Transportation. Over at the Justice Department, officials also are still waiting to hear from the Trump team. …
According to several sources close to the Trump transition team and inside the Obama administration, the president elect and his staff have had difficulty finding able-minded Republicans willing to take on critical posts. One Democratic source, who like others would only discuss sensitive talks on condition of anonymity, said transition officials had been informally asking Obama political appointees to recommend Republicans to take over their jobs.
Yeah, that’s kind of what happens when you elect a dude who has no freaking idea what he’s doing to the highest office in the land.
I can only hope Trump’s incompetence won’t negatively harm the country. Maybe, hopefully, it’ll just prevent him from accomplishing his campaign goals of wasting a ton of infrastructure money on the border wall, which isn’t an effective way to prevent the trafficking of drugs and people, anyway.
But wowee – he hasn’t taken office yet and already things are looking bad.
He bragged that he could fix things. Let him prove it.
“I have no idea what I’m doing” is the unspoken slogan underlying every word out of Trump’s mouth. Looking at his cabinet appointments, I’m getting the distinct feeling they weren’t based on any review of personal merit, but more on “What Republicans can Donald name off the top of his head that he hasn’t burned all bridges with?”
Honestly, the only bright side to the damage President Moron is going to do to the economy and the state of America is knowing I’ll get to rub it in the face of every idiot alt-right who supported him because the internet celebrities who do their thinking for them told them to.
Other than that, the next four years are going to awful.
Electoral college, please, look what’s happening, don’t let this go on, don’t let this become the presidency, we’re pass this.
Wait, is that a dog? What self-respecting dog would ever be seen with that head? I think the dog should sue. 😉
The only good thing that has come out of this was Warren and Bernie going on a warpath and taking back the Dem party for progressives everywhere. I’m just sad it had to take an overwhelming defeat of all magnitudes for this to happen.
Trump: the fascist who couldn’t get the trains to run on time.
(Actually, Mussolini was apparently pretty shit at making the trains run on time too, despite the popular mythology to the contrary.)
I think the fact that the Trump campaign appears to have *not realized* that they would be/are now responsible for hiring white house staff and filling federal appointments is just… incredible. It’s about the only thing I can laugh at. You can’t just not take calls from the CIA, DOD, DOJ, State Department etc.
The federal government is not a business, it doesn’t function like a business, elections are not hostile takeovers where you still inherit the staff of your predecessors. The whole world is still going to be worse off after him than we were before, but christ on sale, this is bitterly hilarious.
*This* is why the idea that we should reject career politicians is adorably stupid.
This couldn’t be more true. :/ [From the Telegraph, a collection of Trump quotes.]
I truly wonder if he could possibly make it through all 4 years.
@David Futrelle
Fascists are uniformly terrible when it comes to any kind of infrastructure.
Oh, please! Did you guys see the look on his face when he was finding out he’d won the election? Did you see the look of sheer terror on his face during his convo with Obama? He is terrified! He has not one d**n clue what to do next. Didn’t research the job, do any reading, nothing.
Obamas meeting with him went on so long because Obama essentially had to give him a crash course in how the Executive branch works.
I really think he didn’t expect to actually win this. Certainly he wanted to win, as a massive ego boost, but he had no plans in place, made no preparations, in case he won. I think he thought all he had to do was make some speeches, lose, and then keep making speeches. Its possible he underestimated the lure of his message and the desperation and stupidity of the American people.
It is one of the few things that make me laugh about Trump – seeing how obviously he doesn’t actually want to do this or have any idea how. Its also the one thing that makes him not quite a true fascist – he doesn’t have a grand vision to carry out, not really.
On the other hand, it utterly sickens me that he won. He is one of the worst people in the country and he will be written into history as god damn President. Who thought that Idiocracy was a dystopia? We wish we were that lucky.
Of course the problem is he will just farm out the “work” to his henchmen who will have no compunction to carry out all their wildest dreams. Mike Pence and Steve Bannon – they have a vision and it is terrifying. Trump will let them do it. I actually wish competent Republicans/Libertarians would step in just to keep the fucking lights on. I can’t imagine him lasting long (resign or impeached, depending on who gets tired of who first) and then we have… president Pence.
….The United States Of America, everybody.
Ikeke35 – exactly my thoughts. It’s the shock of the dog that finally caught the car. “NOW what do I do?!” The photos of him with Obama, his facial expressions and body language all screaming “I have no idea what I’m doing, HAAALP.” His bafflement at learning that he has to hire an entire staff and learn what they’re supposed to do is palpable.
This isn’t Student Body President, and I can’t find it in myself to feel sorry for him.
How do we combine this with one of those Joe Biden memes that are going around?
Hopefully he’ll be too incompetent to attempt a fascist takeover.
*reads*
*puts head in hands*
OhDearGod . . . as if we don’t look like a bunch of morons in the first place for electing him, now he’s showing everyone exactly how far in over his head he is.
I tried to sleep, but then the sheer sense of foreboding woke me up. Let’s count the ways!
1) So he has hired Frank Gaffney. This Frank Gaffney. http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2016/03/cruz-names-anti-muslim-paranoic-as-top-adviser.html
2) Nothing about this upcoming administration is normal: http://joshuafoust.com/this-is-not-normal/
3) We have — AGAIN — slid into a new variant of Bizarro World. Anderson Cooper is trying to normalize Trump and Glenn fucking Beck is screaming alarms. https://twitter.com/sarahkendzior/status/798725839718387713 (Could somebody please tell me which reality this is, okay, I’d like to keep a catalog.)
4) Donald Trump just tweeted “Very organized process taking place as I decide on Cabinet and many other positions. I am the only one who knows who the finalists are!” — which means he’s treating this like some sort of beauty pageant or contest. Because of course he is.
5) Today in transition process — Trump ditches press pool for steaks. https://twitter.com/awprokop/status/798708532493381633
6) Registration for people from Muslim countries planning begins. http://www.thedailybeast.com/cheats/2016/11/15/trump-adviser-wants-muslim-registry.html
So… are we totally fucked yet?
@David Futrelle
Hello my good feminist fellow,
I’m sure you must, by now, be familiar with the Change.org petition, started by Elijah Berg, imploring the Electoral College to become “faithless electors” and cast there ballots for Hillary on Dec.?
Have you signed it by chance? And do you feel it has any hope of working?
Seconding @Jack on the electoral college and spreading this around:
http://www.nbcnews.com/storyline/2016-election-day/sen-boxer-calls-abolishing-electoral-college-n684386
^Ain’t gonna work (that’s what 2018 is for), but it’s nice to see a Democrat actually doing something. Too bad she’s leaving…
In some alternate universe there’s a sitcom running that revolves around a loudmouth business tycoon and reality TV star named Donald Trump, and how utterly he screws up the United States in every episode. TV viewers in that universe’s US either love the show because of how over the top it is, or hate it because it is just so unrealistic. “Come on, how can you watch that crap? That could never happen in real life.”
Oh, god, Glenn Beck?
Is this a weird fever dream I’m having? Am I dying and my brain is slowly shutting down and having shit make no sense?
I’m scared. I’m scared that I suddenly have some bit of respect for Glenn Beck because he said even he wouldn’t give white nationalist a platform.
HE’S NOT PRESIDENT YET GODDAMNIT WE CAN PULL OUT OF THIS NOSE DIVE LET ME LIVE.
Hang on, what? Glenn Beck? When did that happen?
Has Beck become reasonable all of a sudden, or is this one of those stopped-clock things?