A leader can best be judged by those who he puts in positions of power. To that end it is important to note the people who Obama (and even Bush II) put in power around them. These people got things done. They worked for and often represented the common people. Obama rolled with policy wonks who had the greater interests of the nation and the world in mind. Trump works with people he knew or owed favors to from the business world, and that is a recipe for the slow-motion disaster that is seeping through our nation’s psyche like lava from a Hawaiian mountain top.
Today’s self-aggrandizer is Scott Pruitt. This is the man put in charge of the EPA. This is also the man who rejected both theories of global warming and the Paris Accord. Thanks to Pruitt, whose voice rises to the president’s ear, we are slipping off the stage as world leaders in world preservation. We are still Team America: World Police, but in terms of actually trying to fix the world, we are no longer on that page. According to Pruitt, nothing is wrong.
Everything is wrong. Pruitt is already under investigation for all of the stuff he’s done while in office to increase his personal spending budget (and use that budget for outlandish personal means). Most recently he was outed for having security remove several news agencies from a summit, claiming there were not enough seats for them. Notably the agencies removed were the ones offering unfavorable coverage.
We are in the midsts of an insidious administration driven to use any strategy necessary to keep Americans scared and divided in order to keep themselves in power. We are also in an age of the ‘inmates running the asylum’ with Pruitt and his chief deputy (a historically noted coal lobbyist) making policy on protecting the environment while simultaneously profiting from destroying it.
Some Thoughts:
- Generally speaking, any restaurant’s menu is a hustle game. I personally have been hustled many times. I am also learning the hustle–learning what to buy and what to avoid as there are multitudes of similarities in a menu and often the bargain is not where you expect.
- To whit: the dollars separating a street taco and a super taco are not worth the ‘bargain’. Take the street taco and then take yourself to the fixin’s bar.