(Nielsen) Why would …

… an able person with a bright future like Kirstjen Nielsen – previously utilized in different ways by Administrations of both parties — so transparently dissemble for President Trump in a manner that has virtually assured that due to a single Congressional session, her career is dead ended – that no serious President of either party will ever again appoint her to a significant post?  Today, the Morning Joe talking heads criticized Ms. Nielsen sharply for acting in what they consider her misplaced loyalty to Mr. Trump.  However, at one point while she was serving as Deputy White House Chief of Staff, the President’s close supporter, Roger Stone, was quoted describing her as “… a neocon who likely did not vote for Donald Trump and certainly does not support his non-interventionist worldview.”  That hardly sounds like a diehard Trump loyalist.

A musing:  that Ms. Nielsen did testify as she did out of loyalty – but to Mr. Kelly, not to the President.  She was apparently a surprising choice for DHS to some; one wonders whether Mr. Kelly got her the role to get her out of the White House (where she was reportedly not popular with some of the President’s intimates) and into the (presumably) politically safer environs of DHS by in part persuading a paranoid President that she would be safe and loyal.  If so, Ms. Nielsen may have acted as she did yesterday not to protect the President’s standing with the nation, but Mr. Kelly’s standing with the President.

A second musing:  if the first musing is correct and Mr. Kelly is the man he is reputed to be, he is wildly angry at Ms. Nielsen for sacrificing her career for him …

Counterproductive Protestations …

The President’s recent tweet that he is a “very stable genius” is reminiscent of Gov. Bush’s claim during the Republican Presidential debates, “And I do have the strength [to be President],” and – for those with longer memories – of Adlai Stevenson III’s declaration in 1982, “I am not a wimp.”  If one has to make this kind of protestation, one has already lost the battle …

Pence’s Positioning …

Although I disagree with the Vice President on most domestic issues (although we’re probably fairly aligned on most foreign policy issues), I believe him to be an intelligent and honorable man.  I’m therefore intrigued by the manner in which he’s currently positioning himself with his fawning behavior toward the President (I’m avoiding “obsequious,” the latest buzz word), given these premises:    

1.      Mr. Flynn’s guilty plea dramatically altered the severity and immediacy of the impact of the Mueller investigation upon Mr. Trump’s presidency.  By far the most reasonable assumption as to why the Mueller team would let Mr. Flynn plead guilty to such a minor charge is his willingness to provide evidence against Messrs. Trump, Trump, Jr., and/or Kushner.  The potential for substantial charges implicating the President – with consequent impeachment proceedings — would seem to be a significant possibility.  Mr. Pence and his advisors have to recognize that his chances of ascending to the presidency are higher than any Vice President’s since … Gerald Ford’s.

2.      Mr. Pence certainly appreciates that like all Vice Presidents, his primary duty is to ready himself to be President in a manner that enables him to effectively serve the American people who elected him.  While generally the best way for a VP to fulfill that goal is to adhere closely to the President, in light of current circumstances, it would seem that whether to adhere to or quietly separate from Mr. Trump is a strategic conundrum for Mr. Pence.  Given the toxic partisanship that exists today, if Mr. Trump is impeached, the country’s emotional upheaval, exacerbated by what can confidently be assumed will be Mr. Trump’s own response, will be our worst internal maelstrom since the Civil War.  Presumably, Mr. Pence sees that if such circumstances arise, it will be incumbent upon him to strongly uphold our rule of law while presenting stability to the world and maintaining a core credibility – that which supersedes a position on any given issue – with those on the right and the left.

3.      In the Vice President’s position, my reaction would have been to start quietly separating myself from the President in order to establish credibility beyond Mr. Trump’s rabid base, by supporting the Administration initiatives I believed in, while sidestepping the President’s piques and avoiding the displays of sycophancy that marred the signing of the tax bill.  Mr. Pence and his team appear to have concluded that the best way at this juncture for him to maintain that core credibility across the political divide is by clinging to Mr. Trump.  This approach presumably lessens the possibility that Mr. Pence will be blamed for the impeachment by Mr. Trump or his rabid base, and increases the likelihood that he can maintain their support as he assumes the presidency.  Since he already has the support of mainstream Republicans, he must be calculating that he can wait until he takes office to obtain at least the grudging support from the left by then making aggressive healing overtures. 

If this is his strategy, it rests on two assumptions:  that Fox News and the conservative media will report in a way that causes Trumpers to look favorably on him (not a bad bet); and that Mr. Trump himself doesn’t dump on him, or claim he undermined Mr. Trump’s presidency (not as good a bet).  If Mr. Trump would aggressively lash out at Mr. Pence – provided that conservative media was willing to serve as Mr. Trump’s megaphone — all of Mr. Pence’s current fawning behavior toward the President would have been for naught; he will assume the presidency without the support of the Trumpers while having done nothing to garner credit and good will from the left for being his own man.

Time will tell whether he needed a strategy for healing the nation’s current divisions … and if he did, whether he picked the right one …

South Korea approves LG plant in China

Richard Haass comments in A World in Disarray that when viewing the world through the prism of regionality, “Many of the most important economic, military, and diplomatic interactions take place at this level for the simple reason that proximity counts.”  I was reminded of his comment by an article in today’s Wall Street Journal that indicates that the South Korean government is allowing one of its largest companies, LG, to build a OLED production facility in China, which the Journal states will be “the first-ever [sic] transfer of the sophisticated display technology outside the country.”  The Chinese produce OLED technology, but currently lack South Korea’s sophistication.

Although the Journal further reports that the South Korean government has cautioned LG to increase its security to protect the technology, presumably all realize how futile those efforts will be for a factory placed in China.  In an admirably understated fashion, the article indicates that South Korea and China have warming diplomatic and economic relations, driven in part by a desire to have a coordinated policy regarding North Korea.

Referring back to a recent post, I would suggest that this South Korean decision is simply a manifestation of that government’s assessment of global realities.  It is at the epicenter of the quake that could result from the acrimonious exchanges of two mercurial leaders; it may well feel uneasy (understandably) about the United States’ willingness to defend it; it has very likely determined (rationally) that China can do more than the United States to protect it against North Korean aggression; and it has apparently decided (certainly uneasily) that in the current bellicose atmosphere, there is less risk from China ultimately attempting to exploit their closer ties to sap its economic and political freedoms than there is that North Korea will take cataclysmic action affecting the lives of its citizens.

While – since proximity counts, and China is the dominant Asian power – South Korea may in coming years have begun to establish closer ties with China in any event, it’s hard not to conclude that these sorts of diplomatic shifts will occur at an accelerating rate due to the visceral perception that the U.S., despite its occasional protestations to the contrary, is in the process of disengaging from many of its traditional alliances.

Letter to WSJ Editor, re: “Tax Reform: States”

I just emailed the following Letter to the Editor to the Wall Street Journal in response to its cited editorial:

As a 40-year Wisconsin and taxpayer who has never been a member of a union, I was offended by the presumptuousness of your editorial, “Tax Reform Take 2:  The States” (Dec. 21), in which you dismiss certain high tax states as “liberal political cultures heavily influenced by public unions,” suggest that Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker “should propose an across-the-board tax rate cut,” and conclude by urging high-tax-rate states to cut their rates in order to be “more taxpayer friendly.”

You should mind your own business.   Wisconsin has traditionally placed greater emphasis than some other states in areas such as educational excellence, quality state services, a solid support network for the disadvantaged, and safeguarding our natural resources.  Efficiency is vital, but – as with most things in life – you get what you pay for.  It is not Wisconsin’s place to question other states’ services and taxing approaches; it is not your place to question how we in Wisconsin – or citizens of other states that tax at relatively higher rates – choose to conduct ours.  The majority of people in these states would not consider the degradation of the quality and availability of their state services likely to result from a reduction in their states’ income tax revenues to be “taxpayer friendly”; these states balance their services/taxing approaches as they do because the majority of their citizens believe in them.  High-earner residents have always been able to leave these states if they wished; it’s pure speculation that they will now.  Our federal system is designed to enable the citizens of different states, across a wide swath of issues, to express their cultures and values in their own ways.  Does the Journal only stand for federalism when it doesn’t like an approach that the federal government is taking on an issue?

 

An Unfortunately Lasting Trump Legacy

I have heard some of our people who are troubled by President Trump’s actions in his first year in office console themselves by saying, “This too shall pass.”  In the domestic sphere, they may be right.  In the foreign sphere, I’d suggest that the President’s behavior in this single year has in the most important respect left an impression on foreign leaders that won’t be undone for generations, if at all:  a faith in the constancy of America.  Although specific Trump foreign policy approaches may (almost certainly will) be reversed – his laissez affaire approach toward Russian aggression, his economic disengagement in Asia, his withdrawal from the Climate Accord – it seems highly doubtful that any foreign leader with any sense will in the foreseeable future base his/her nation’s well-being on any long-term commitment from the United States (I know I wouldn’t).  Mr. Trump’s election and behavior have made clear that no matter how sincere a given President might be in providing assurances on a given policy, the American people are capable of electing a successor who completely undoes previously agreed-upon commitments.  This loss of confidence may have the silver lining of getting those nations generally aligned with us to become more self-reliant; with shrinking funds, our ability to cast a defense net over our allies would be unraveling over the next decade in any event.  That said, this loss of confidence could in the coming years and decades cause our Asian allies, out of a sense of self-preservation, to seek closer ties to China than we will like, and perhaps similarly cause our European allies to be less willing to assist us in confronting inappropriate Russian behavior (due to their need for its oil) than we would hope.     

Jeff Sessions: A Pivot Point

Am struck this morning by the exquisite and peculiar pivot point that Attorney General Sessions has become – certainly quite unhappily, from his perspective – in the Trump saga.

Although the Democrats and some Republicans have cuffed him around for forgetting about both his own Russian contacts and Mr. Papadopoulos’ reference to Mr. Papadopoulos’ Russian ties, no one has really gone after the Attorney General with the outright viciousness we have seen in Washington.  Nobody is seriously calling for his resignation or firing.

I would suggest that there are two reasons.  First (and, regrettably, that probably of lesser import to Democrats), the Congress knows him, and the members may well viscerally know – even those, such as Sen. Schumer and Rep. Pelosi, that decry the AG’s views in most areas – that Mr. Sessions would not interact inappropriately with the Russians.

The second reason is obviously that Democrats and those Republicans concerned about Mr. Trump want Mr. Sessions right where he is – with his recusal effectively blocking the President’s ability to fire Mr. Mueller.  Democrats and those Republicans concerned about Mr. Trump don’t want Mr. Sessions; they want a full and fair investigation of Mr. Trump and his associates, and having Mr. Sessions continuing to serve as AG appears an appropriate means to achieve that goal.

I heard liberal talking heads lauding Mr. Sessions this morning for rebuffing Jim Jordan’s drive toward having the AG appoint a Special Counsel to investigate Uranium One.  While I don’t discount a desire by Mr. Sessions to do his job ethically and honorably – to follow the facts — being scrupulously straight is also the AG’s best approach for his own self-preservation.  I don’t think Mr. Sessions needs to be told that his own bumbling and faulty memory have given the Democrats sufficient ammunition against him so that even if he’s not now directly in the political cross-hairs, he’s certainly within range … and that his best course for his own survival is to play it scrupulously straight, lest he get swallowed by the Trump maelstrom …

Personal Fallout from the Trump Campaign and Presidency

I’ve heard it suggested that Donald Trump never expected nor truly wished to be president – that he ran as a huge marketing ploy for his businesses and brand.

Particularly if that is so, one can imagine that a number of avid supporters of the President that may well be thinking privately – albeit for different reasons – that they would be in much happier places in their lives today had he never run for office.  Without any deep reflection, I’d offer at least:  Mrs. Trump; Donald Trump, Jr.; Jared Kushner; Ivanka Trump; Reince Priebus; Sean Spicer; Michael Flynn; Michael Flynn, Jr.; Paul Manafort; Rick Gates; George Papadopoulos; Jeff Sessions; Tom Price; Wilbur Ross; Rex Tillerson; Bob Corker; and – perhaps – the President himself.

Only a few Trump supporters come readily to mind that (at least as of today) are now seemingly in better places in their careers – again, for different reasons — due Mr. Trump’s candidacy and presidency, than they would be otherwise:  Steve Bannon; Nikki Haley (admittedly not necessarily an “avid” supporter of Mr. Trump’s candidacy); and – perhaps – Mike Pence.

North Korea November 5, 2017

This is an update of something I wrote before beginning this site:

As President Trump begins his trip to Asia, I don’t discount the possibility that the President has made headway with regard to North Korea.  (I note that Thae Yong-Ho, a North Korean diplomat defector, indicated on the PBS Newshour this past week that he did believe that the President’s rhetoric had had some deterrent effect on Kim Jong Un).   North Korea will obviously be the primary topic when Presidents Trump and Xi meet; although Mr. Xi’s current position is very strong while Mr. Trump’s position is clearly politically challenged, if Mr. Trump has and continues to privately indicate to President Xi that “If you don’t do something about this, I will,” I’d take that comment seriously if I were Mr. Xi given Mr. Trump’s unpredictability.  However — particularly given Mr. Thae’s view that any attack by the U.S. on North Korea would result in a full-scale war on the peninsula — it seems that the only true solution to the North Korean problem is regime change from the inside.  We don’t have people on the inside that, with appropriate support, can bring about regime change, but I’d guess that the Chinese do; a Chinese puppet atop North Korea would undoubtedly be preferable to us as well as to the Chinese.  However, an effort like this, if it is indeed being undertaken, will undoubtedly take months, and it seems likely that Mr. Xi was unwilling to do anything that might upset the status quo until his power was reaffirmed and enhanced at the recent Chinese Communist National Congress.  Mr. Kim clearly has superlative antennae for survival, and certainly has to be attuned to the possibility of a Chinese move against him; it would seem that the Chinese will not want to move so quickly as to look like they’ve consorted with the Americans against an ally.