Trump's new assistant Drug Czar: a 24-year-old campaign volunteer with no experience, in charge of billions to end the opioid epidemic

Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2018/01/15/all-the-best-people.html

So Trump is saying that he is not taking the position seriously and doesn’t care if the coffers are looted from the office.

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Approves.

image

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You see, “forgotten voices” of a Real America™ ravaged by opioids, the president* really cares about you.

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Sounds like he at least has experience with illegal drug manufacturing. Someone with more drug experience, like, say John McAfee, would be better, but I can’t really fault this choice.

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Skaneateles is a frighteningly white rich Republican town where everyone has a yacht and plays polo on the weekends. It’s exactly where I’d imagine this guy coming from.

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At this point I wouldn’t be surprised if a Federal Judgeship gets offered to the kid who shovels sidewalks outside Trump Plaza.

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I believe he already tried that.

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End the epidemic, or turn it up to 11? Amirite, bro? Whooo!

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Yes, the ONDCP has no permanent director, but it does have an acting director, Richard J. Baum. That means that Baum is the acting Drug Czar, not Weyeneth.

Weyeneth is now second-in-command at the ONDCP, because the acting Chief of Staff, Lawrence “Chip” Muir, was dismissed less than a month ago.

There’s a reason why the WaPo headline is “Meet the 24-year-old Trump campaign worker appointed to help lead the government’s drug policy office” and not “Trump’s new Drug Czar: a 24-year-old campaign volunteer with no experience, in charge of billions to end the opioid epidemic.” The latter is misleading.

Such misleading headlines hurt the integrity of the political left, making it difficult to defend against accusations of spreading misinformation (aka “fake news”), and, as someone on the left, I find it very frustrating.

EDIT: Cory fixed this

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Bah, who needs things like facts, integrity, or doing things like actually reading the news before misinterpreting it? Here at BB we like our news fake and scary.

UPDATE: it’s been fixed, so yay!

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If someone offered me a position like that, I’d have the sense to say, “Are you nuts? I’m totally unqualified.”

In conclusion: What’s wrong with people like this?

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Wasn’t Jared fixing opioids? (alongside veterans’ care, government systems and the whole Middle East)

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Drain the swamp.

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Cory Doctorow contributes fake news to Boing Boing? Unheard of!

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Thanks for the correction!

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Thanks for correcting! :slight_smile:

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This is how the GOP always rolls.

After the fall of Saddam Hussein’s government in April 2003, the opportunity to participate in the U.S.-led effort to reconstruct Iraq attracted all manner of Americans – restless professionals, Arabic-speaking academics, development specialists and war-zone adventurers. But before they could go to Baghdad, they had to get past Jim O’Beirne’s office in the Pentagon.

To pass muster with O’Beirne, a political appointee who screens prospective political appointees for Defense Department posts, applicants didn’t need to be experts in the Middle East or in post-conflict reconstruction. What seemed most important was loyalty to the Bush administration.

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Shouldn’t we be a little more concerned about just who these “Trump officials” are specifically, so that once Trump finally departs, they will not quietly become someone else’s officials?

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I one time felt bad about spending too much money on Boba Fetts. I think I should apply to be head of the Treasury.

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