Cleaning House

[matt819]

The testimony being given could result in impeachment. Who know?

And then the Senate is likely to do. . . what? Nothing, is my bet.

But let's assume, regardless, that a Democrat is elected next year. The alternative, frankly, is far too horrifying and depressing to contemplate.

How do we - that's a collective Democratic We - undo the damage.

I have previously expressed the hope that "someone" is compiling a game plan for this purpose, whether a particular campaign or a liberal "think tank" or whatever.

Some questions.

How do you purge the government of non-judicial appointees? Schedule C appointees serve at the pleasure of the president, so these lickspittles should be easy to remove. I understand that there are well over 1,000 of these. But what about other, what shall we call them, infiltrators? I don't know what these would be called - other appointee, maybe? Or RWers hired as federal employees during the past few years, despite freezes on federal hiring - they would be damn near impossible to remove. Can they be shunted away from anything important?

And then there's the reconstruction of federal agencies. What do we do about the movement of USDA scientists from DC to the midwest. How do you recover the EPA scientists? How to you rehabilitate the social safety net programs? And at what cost, given the ballooning federal debt? At the cabinet secretary level, I would hope that the new president has a binder full of real professionals who have real plans to restore dignity and integrity to the federal government, especially at State, Commerce, and the Intelligence Community. IMHO, every single trump appointee has to go. Terminated on day 1, no letters of resignation, just terminated and escorted out of the building. Same thing at the White House. Every single person appointed by trump has to go.

Border patrol purged of trump appointees. Camps closed, wall funding with illegally authorized money stopped. No dithering. And there has to be a plan for what to do with all prisoners - because that is what they have become. And this process, more than anything else, has to start on day one.

Back to the president - the new president has to have a very deliberate plan to meet with world leaders, starting with our allies. Invitations to everyone, singly, maybe, or in groups. Joint meeting with Canadian PM and Mexican president as quickly as possible. Restate commitments to NATO, rejoin the Paris Agreement on Climate Change.

Then there are the executive orders. Here's a link to the executive orders and other crap from the current regime: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_executive_actions_by_Donald_Trump#2017. I have no idea how you go about undoing these, but undone they must be. Every single EO has to be prioritized and undone. Keystone, logging and mining, national parks, air and water, etc. And all of this followed by the introduction of bills in Congress to enshrine as many of these changes as possible so that future presidents can't undo them. Yes, I realize that this means that Dems have to take the WH and both chambers of congress. Go big or go home? (Funny aside. I read on an introverts page someone that the introverts response to this is, no problem, I'm heading home.)

Then there are the 60 million deplorables who need to be deprogrammed. See the book coming out by cult expert Steven Hassan. But it's one thing to deprogram the odd Moonie or Jonestown survivor (yes, I'm dating myself) or, more recently, the folks from Nexium. But 60 million? Many of whom are extreme RWers bordering on domestic terrorists, in thought if not in action. I may be exaggerating, but you get the idea. Because I still think the republican candidate, whoever it may be, will get somewhere near that number of votes. Those people cannot bring themselves to vote D even though their lives depend on it, to say nothing of a woman or a person of color or a gay person or anyone named Biden or Clinton.

And on and on and on.

My guess is that Warren is actively working on this. Maybe Biden as well, though I'm afraid that he might be willing to compromise from the get go. BTW, I don't buy the "let's look forward" approach that Obama adopted. I think the investigations need to continue under a Democratic president. Americans - and the world - need to know that there is a price to pay when trying to undo at 250-year-old democracy.

Enough for now. Gotta get back to work.

[world wide wally]

1. I think Biden hates Trump more than anybody seeing how he worked alongside of Obama

only to see Trump undo everything they did with such animosity.

[matt819]

2. Okay

And he posted on Instagram that he has no plan to pardon an impeached trump.

But remember, Biden served for decades in Congress and grew up, so to speak, in an environment where compromise was normal, as it should be in a democracy. Where you have to work with people whose principles you might otherwise revile. Some of these deplorables might have been friends, in a fashion, as people who work closely together might become friends, as long as, out of the office, you didn't talk work. That kind of thing.

President Obama took no action to "investigate" Bush and his administration's false claims that led us into war in Iraq and Afghanistan, and to hold them all accountable in some way. Look, I don't know what this sort of accountability would look like. Maybe it will be legalistic and people will end up in jail (my preference, tbh). Maybe it will be along the lines of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission in South Africa after Mandela was elected in 1994.

This isn't necessarily have to be something addressed during the campaign. I just think it needs to be somewhere on the table.