Anything and everything Trump does will be for his own personal gain or personal gain of his family members. He’s been a billionaire for how long supposedly? And what good has he done with all of that? If he really cared about American jobs, he’d have taken stances that back up that position. He’d be doing what Mike Rowe is doing. He cares only about himself – his money, his name, and his image. That is it. Plain and simple. He cares about this country like I care about some random square inch in the middle of the Atlantic.
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I only know the one regulatory agency where I worked for 20+ years. Over that time, we had several “modernization” acts passed by Congress, which legally mandated drastic cuts in the time needed to regulate a specific item, and put legal barriers into doing it thoroughly and properly. Us federal workers had to follow these laws; there was no way around them.
I’m sure lobbyists have a whole bunch of similar wish lists in bill form, just waiting to be passed with the right combination of Congress and president. Which we will have. In 2017, I bet we have the most vigorous, active, productive Congress in, oh, say, just a figure out of my head, eight years.
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Good catch. I know everyone hates Trump, but we don’t have to make things up. It got old with Obama super fast as well.
I’d go so far as to characterize this posting as “fake news”. The headline clearly suggests something that the actual article doesn’t support.
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It depends how you interpret,
I think, given Gingrich’s prior statements about and relation to Trump as long time advisor/campaign bulldog, that he’s saying Congress should be changing ethics laws to weaken them and allow Trump’s nepotism and conflicts of interest. In the context of the discussion, the person making the statement, and the passage that seems the most reasonable reading to me. If read that way, as statements from someone who supports, has been working with, and is advising Trump, this should be read as prescriptive rather than descriptive:
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Well, upon reflection I think you and others are correct that Newt said “could” rather than explicitly saying “should”. But I do think those saying Newt is offering a warning are reading their wishes into his statements. I think nemomen is correct in noting the larger context of Newt’s support for Trump, and that in that context he is supporting Trump’s power to pardon his way out of law breaking. Note that the violator of the anti-nepotism law would be Trump for hiring them, not just the people he hires:
“A public official may not appoint, employ, promote, advance, or advocate for appointment, employment, promotion, or advancement, in or to a civilian position in the agency in which he is serving or over which he exercises jurisdiction or control any individual who is a relative of the public official.”
Newt is implying that Trump can pardon himself. Any bets on whether he thought and Dems had that power or “could” ethically use it to do so?
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Yes, I think that Newt is saying that the current law shouldn’t apply to Trump, because billionaire. He characterizes Trump as “the third great effort to break free from Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal” after Ronald Reagan and his own “Contract on for America.” Newt’s November editorial:
[quote]"At its core this movement is about the American people reasserting control over an arrogant and corrupt political establishment that is both failing and failing to be held accountable.
The Trump surge has the potential to profoundly shift government and society from the New Deal-era big government, bureaucratic, redistributive model to an America based once again on decentralized power, work, optimism, and the effort of individuals, communities, and small groups."[/quote]
Pesky rules like anti-nepotism laws are paradoxically part of the establishment that Newt wants cleaned out. Newt does not acknowledge them as preventing corruption because corruption in his mind is anything that gets in the way of his goal.
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Nobody has to defend the Constitution and enforce existing law, the GOP isn’t about to when it comes to their officials.
Laws only exist so long as officials exist to uphold them, and the GOP has no principles. Corruption only exists outside of their bubble.
Then why did he say that Trump “could” do that if he wished?
You’re defending weasel words, here.
Exactly. “He could do this, and as an advisor I’m just going to shrug and let it happen.”
No, he and the rest want to Let Trump Be Trump. They’re not even miming dissent, they cry tears of joy at the beauty of his grifts and only hope to receive some of the boons.
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True. However, I don’t think Mr. Trump would consider that a president. Does he even know who Jerry Ford is?
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By no means am I defending Gingrich here; most certainly, his statements are super weasely. He’s definitely saying “these are all things Trump could do.” My point was that in context, it sounded more like a warning that a recommendation, but you’re right in that he could weasel it towards the latter. Newt’s relationship with Trump is weird; it’s hard to tell from day to day if he’s advising Trump or warning people about the awful things the man can do.
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That’s a nice executive branch you have there, be a shame if anything happened to it…
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When has Newt ever in his life been a person concerned with right-action over opportunism? His “family” and professional life both.
Him bragging that his employer can and will do whatever is within his grasp (devoid of consequence) is par for the course, and matches his personal values.
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I’m as appalled as anyone at the institutional dishonesty of the GOP, but it doesn’t help for your headline to mischaracterize what Gingrich said. He did not say the Trump “should,” but rather, “could,” pardon his aides. The difference is material and it undermines your credibility.
I read an article today in which a conservative said that liberals were creating the “post-truth society.” This was obvious and blatant projection, but to call it out requires some moral authority that requires notable liberals to take scrupulous care with the facts.
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But Gingrich said Trump is on solid political ground as he prepares to take the White House while maintaining ownership of his business. In fact, Gingrich argued that Trump’s résumé and financial history were among the reasons why the Republican won the presidential election.
“I think there was a general sense that the president had the ability, that this was going to be a billionaire presidency. I don’t think anyone who voted for him was not aware that he was a very, very successful businessman,” he said.
…
Gingrich also argued that Americans shouldn’t be surprised that there are certain changes that Trump shouldn’t be expected to make, including giving up licensing on his iconic last name or his communications with his adult sons, Eric and Donald Jr., who are slated to take over the business.
“You can’t say the Trump Tower is not the Trump Tower, or the Trump hotel is not the Trump hotel. And you can’t say that the kids who run it aren’t his children,” Gingrich said.
But it was Gingrich’s suggestion that Trump could sidestep potential problems inside his administration — through his constitutional right to issue pardons — that prompted an incredulous reply from the NPR program’s host and two of her guests.
“That level of authority strikes me as rather broad and perhaps ought to be in the hands of Congress rather than within his own hands,” said Rehm, who is set to retire at the end of this week after a more than 30-year run.
“Speaker Gingrich’s statement that wealth trumps the rule of law, basically that’s what he was saying, is jaw-dropping,” added American University government professor James Thurber. “I can’t believe it. He’s a historian. He should also know that we did not want to have a king. A king in this case is somebody with a lot of money who cannot abide by the rule of law."
So many excuses from conservatives.
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Yes, and then he goes on to say that the corruption that we are worried about is a real problem, and we can’t just wash our hands of it.
That is to say, he reported the situation as he sees it, and then he said that the situation is a problem, and that something must be done about it. I don’t agree in every detail on his assessment of the situation, but I don’t disagree with him on the substance of what he’s said. Trump probably can get away with all this stuff, and Trump really can’t easily pull out of his brands or his businesses–it’s not a stock portfolio, and dumping it into a blind trust in its current state would probably be financially disastrous for Trump, so it’s not surprise that he’s refusing to do that, even though it’s really bad that he’s refusing to do that.
So what exactly was it that Newt said that you disagree with here? Do you disagree that the situation is a problem, and we should do something about it? I suspect not. So you agree with him on that. Do you agree that the law he was talking about was put into place by Johnson to address a very specific problem? If so, great, if not, so what? That’s not what matters.
The point is that the headline suggests that Gingrich approves of what Trump is doing, but that’s not what Gingrich said. He said Trump can probably do it, and that it makes sense that he’s doing it. Maybe we don’t like that, but is it incorrect?
Wealth does trump the rule of law. We see it time and time again. If we don’t like it, we have to do something about it, not just not talk about it.
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Newt is being his slipery self. He didn’t say he disapproves, either. Rather, he notes that Trump was elected with people knowing about his conflicts of interests:
Well I think it was – I didn’t walk around and ask them about it, but I think it was pretty clear that he was a billionaire. I mean, he said it all the time, his opponents said it all the time. And I think that there was a general sense that the president, you know, had the ability – that this was going to be a billionaire presidency. I mean, it’s not – I don’t think anybody who voted for him was not aware that he was a very, very successful businessman.
I think Newt implies that knowing Trump’s conflicts of interests means that acting on them is not only ok, but why he was elected in the first place.
Note that Newt is dismissive of the anti-nepotism law as a one off:
The whole anti-nepotism thing is Lyndon Johnson’s reaction to Bobby Kennedy and the fact that Johnson Kennedy, and Kennedy had been attorney general under his brother and that it was a very narrowly focused bill really in reaction to a particular personality thing.
So, yeah, I think Newt is indicating his disdain for the anti-nepotism law and his support of Trump violating it with impunity. Never did Newt say, as far as I noticed, that Trump should not violate it as a matter of ethics.
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Pretty sure “do something about it” should have included “keep Trump as far away from the presidency as possible”, not “campaign for him all day every day and ignore everyone saying how awful this entire situation will be if he’s elected”. Gingrich clearly doesn’t see these as actual problems*, or he wouldn’t have been driving Trump’s bandwagon all year.
*unless you define “problem” as “headache that the incoming president will have to figure out a way around, and by the way here’s the entire rationalization he could use for that purpose” and not “legal and ethical quagmire which the president has no interest in avoiding by doing the right thing”.
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I heard the show. When Gingrich hung up, there was absolute silence for a few seconds. One of the panelists then said something along the lines of, “I don’t believe I just heard that. Gingrich is an historian - he ought to know better.” Jeez, I live in the DC area and drink the tap water. It must be something else that’s got half the country stark raving crazy!
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Nope - fortunately, the founders thought of that move. Article II sec. 2 says the President “shall have Power to grant Reprieves and Pardons for Offenses against the United States, except in Cases of Impeachment.”
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