An Explanation on Why Things Have Changed, and Why Gaetz and Hegseth Can Even Be Considered for Cabinet Posts
From Bret Stephens, NY Times Opinion: It’s been a little more than three decades since Daniel Patrick Moynihan published his famous essay on “Defining Deviancy Down.” Every society, the senator-scholar from New York argued, could afford to penalize only a certain amount of behavior it deemed “deviant.” As the stock of such behavior increased — whether in the form of out-of-wedlock births, or mentally ill people living outdoors, or violence in urban streets — society would most easily adapt not by cracking down, but instead by normalizing what used to be considered unacceptable, immoral or outrageous.
Perspectives would shift. Standards would fall. And people would get used to it. If Moynihan were writing his essay today, he might have added a section about politics. In 1980, when Ronald Reagan won the presidency, it was still considered something of a political liability that he had been divorced 32 years earlier. In 1987, one of Reagan’s nominees for the Supreme Court, Douglas Ginsburg, had to withdraw his name after NPR’s Nina Totenberg revealed that, years earlier, the judge had smoked pot. A few years later, two of Bill Clinton’s early candidates for attorney general, Zoë Baird and Kimba Wood, were felled by revelations of hiring illegal immigrants as nannies (and, in Baird’s case, of not paying Social Security taxes).
How quaint.
On Monday, a lawyer for two women told several news outlets that former Representative Matt Gaetz used Venmo to pay for sex with multiple women, one of whom says she saw him having sex with a 17-year-old girl at a drug-fueled house party in 2017. Donald Trump is doubling down on Gaetz’s nomination as attorney general.
Gaetz’s virtue, in Trump’s eyes, is his unsuitability. He is the proverbial tip of the spear in a larger effort to define deviancy down. If someone accused of statutory rape can be attorney general, anything else is possible — not just Tulsi Gabbard as director of national intelligence or Robert F. Kennedy Jr. as health and human services secretary, but anything.
There’s a guiding logic here… It’s to perpetuate the spirit of cynicism, which is the core of Trumpism. If truth has no currency, you cannot use it. If power is the only coin of the realm, you’d better be on the side of it. If the government is run by cads and lackeys, you’ll need to make your peace with them.
Trump is “defining deviancy down”. Sexual assault is now acceptable in our politicians. Trump proves it with his election and his nominations for members of his cabinet.
Then there is this from Ezra Klein. Think back two months. Imagine it’s September. You’re reading the Substack of some resistance-era liberal. They’re ranting about the dangers of the Orange Man coming back. “Imagine what a second term is going to be like,” they write. “You’re going to have Robert F. Kennedy Jr. for Health and Human Services secretary. Tulsi Gabbard is going to lead the intelligence services. Matt Gaetz is going to be the attorney general. Maybe Donald Trump is going to make a ‘Fox & Friends’ host secretary of defense.”
I think most people reading that would have said: Oh, come on! Donald Trump might be a menace. He is a menace. But that’s a parody of what a Trump-hating liberal imagines a Trump administration is going to be. Let’s be real about this.
It is this remarkable transference Trump is able to effectuate. He makes his opponents look like rabid antagonists by making them respond to a reality that leaves no room for neutrality, no room for a wait-and-see open-mindedness. He creates a wild reality — and then you sound wild simply describing it.
For me, the Rubicon here was Gaetz.
What we’re seeing here is that in the areas of government where Trump cares most about full control — the military, the intelligence services, the Department of Justice — he is trying to do what he could not do last time: He is trying to put true lackeys and loyalists in charge. People who have no loyalty aside from their loyalty to him. No patron aside from him. No viable path in politics or public service aside from him. And these are the parts of the government that can be weaponized most dangerously. And even if Matt Gaetz is rejected or withdrawn, as he very well may be, the intention is there.
Follow-up on the Insanity of College Sports
I wrote earlier this week about how college sports are becoming insane with the offering of incoming freshman more in NIL money than the president of the university makes. This is from an article in the Detroit News about the U of M football teams’ head coach Sherrone Moore.
In the ever-changing college football landscape, a head coach’s job also continues to evolve because of NIL and, soon enough, revenue sharing.
Michigan head coach Sherrone Moore said recently on a local television interview with WXYZ’s Brad Galli, that 50% of his workday involves NIL. Michigan is coming off a bye and the 5-5 Wolverines face Northwestern on Saturday in the final home game of the season, but a good portion of his Monday weekly news conference focused on where he and the program are with NIL.
Moore explained that most of the time he spends on NIL is more focused on roster management, which is where general manager Sean Magee is significantly involved.
“More so than the NIL, how we’re doing it, who we’re recruiting, so more recruiting than anything else,” Moore said of his daily tasks. “And it’s texting kids. It’s talking to parents. Talking to the brother, the sister, the kid, the teacher, the high school coach, and continue to build those relationships. So the guys, when they get here, I know everything about them, and they know everything about me. And then, when I try to push them to that level that we’re successful, they know I’m doing it out of love and care and in their best interest. That’s really what most of my days are, are filled with.”
Is it any reason old school coaches are leaving in droves. The recruiting, transfer portal, and NIL have changed the job. Working on game strategy is now a secondary responsibility of the head coach.
I am Still Waiting for the Governor and Legislature to Keep Their Campaign Promise.
The Democrats won the governorship and both champers of the house in 2022 with a campaign promise of improving the state government’s transparency. With the Republicans taking control of the state House in January, it is now or never for the Democrats to keep their promise. Here are excerpts from the Detroit News Editorial.
There is, however, a bipartisan idea the Legislature could work on. Lawmakers should finish the job of amending the Freedom of Information Act so that people can request public records from the governor and legislators.
Every state in the country has a public records law, including Michigan. Our law, enacted in 1976, omits the governor’s office and the Legislature. This means government records that would be of great interest to people are beyond our reach. How did former Gov. Rick Snyder respond to the Flint water crisis? How did Whitmer decide her COVID policies? Who are lawmakers meeting with before an important vote? The public can’t get these records unless the elected official voluntarily releases them.
Over the last several years, bills that reform FOIA have passed one legislative chamber, only to stall in the other chamber. The House passed the legislation in 2017, 2019 and 2021. Earlier this year, the Senate took the lead, passing Senate Bills 669 and 670, sponsored by Sen. Jeremy Moss, D-Southfield and Sen. Ed McBroom, R-Vulcan.
If Whitmer and the Legislature want a bipartisan win, they should work together in lame duck. A failure to complete the legislation this year means the process will start over and the bills will have to clear both chambers next year.
I couldn’t agree more. It is embarrassing to be 49 of 50 when it comes to transparency in state government.
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Quotes of the Day: Congressman Max Miller, a Republican from Ohio, had this to say after Gaetz’s nomination was announced. “He’s getting what he wants, regardless, which is: I’m standing here, and we’re all standing here, wasting our time talking about a guy who is literally worse than the gum on the bottom of my shoe.”
On NBC’s “Meet the Press,” former Trump National Security Adviser John Bolton said that Gaetz “must be the worst nomination for a Cabinet position in American history.”
Mike Simpson, a Republican House member from Idaho who thinks the Senate should see the ethics report, suggested Gaetz’s nomination and subsequent resignation constituted an attempt “to prevent that report from going out.” Congressman Simpson, you could be on to something there.
Orchid of the Day: Florida-based cruise company Villa Vie Residences recently announced the launch of its Tour La Vie program, allowing passengers to spend up to four years visiting over 140 countries – all while avoiding the United States.
The Tour La Vie trip offers a variety of extended stays aboard the Villa Vie Odyssey, including a one-year “Escape from Reality” cruise, a two-year “Mid-Term Selection” cruise, a three-Year “Everywhere but Home” option, and the four-year “Skip Forward” trip.
Onion of the Day: President Biden for allowing Ukraine to use U.S. missiles to attack into Russia.
Question of the Day: Is the four-year cruise appealing to you?
Video of the Day: Dan Miller’s Calls of the Game.
Calls of the Game: Detroit has HUGE offensive day in a 52-6 win over Jacksonville | Lions vs Jaguars
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