By Amrit Brown
The world’s richest person, a Fox News anchor and a warmonger walk into a bar. Wait, no, they walk into the White House. They could be the head of the new Department of Government Efficiency, the Defense Secretary and the ambassador to Israel. And this isn’t a joke. They are three of the choices that Donald Trump has already made just three weeks after his election to a second term as president of the United States.
Regardless of your opinion of Donald Trump, his choices for major roles in his next administration are alarming. Government as entertainment is not responsible, especially during global crises.
The world’s richest person, Elon Musk, is a loose cannon. In the past year, he has lost billions on “X” and said that he wants to prosecute critics whose speech he dislikes. He is now charged, along with Vivek Ramaswamy, with cutting government waste.
The Fox News anchor is Pete Hegseth. He is a veteran but has never held a position in the United States government. Hegseth has challenged the role of women in combat, believing units with both men and women lead to more casualties. In 2019, he called for President Trump to pardon service members accused of war crimes, and was partially successful. He will be our Defense Secretary in the middle of a series of global conflicts.
The warmonger is Mike Huckabee. He once said, “There’s really no such thing as a Palestinian.” He also thinks that a Palestinian state should be created somewhere else in the region. That would mean another removal of Palestinians, as in 1948, or decreeing that a state such as Jordan is Palestine, a racist realignment of the area. Huckabee does not support a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas, thus assisting in the ongoing Israeli assault. Naturally, Huckabee will be the United States’ next ambassador to Israel.
So, why? Clearly, these are not the most qualified candidates. They are not “the best,” not even close. They do, however, share an important trait: unwavering loyalty to Donald Trump. Loyalty isn’t always a bad thing. It can be crucial to a strong administration. This isn’t the case with Trump though. The loyalty to him is fabricated. Those loyal to him hope that they will be rewarded with political power. In many cases, they don’t deserve it. Certainly, these three don’t.
The United States is becoming a kakistocracy. After these next four years, you’ll be well versed in scatology as Trump trashes political practices and puts forward poorly qualified candidates who bring little to the positions they fill.
With unqualified non-elected officials potentially running rampant by Jan. 21, the question becomes who’s to blame outside of the party of the elected president? One answer is clear. The Democratic Party failed to appeal competently to voters that they typically win by large margins. Black Americans voted for a Republican candidate at a rate unprecedented this century. Despite the racist and misogynistic statements of Donald Trump’s past, Kamala Harris only won 53% of female votes, 52% of Asian votes and 52% of Hispanic or Latino voters.
The failure is indicative of a party that has lost direction and is now seen as a war party. No longer are they the party of inclusion or the party of the working person. Over the next four years, I ask every elected official of the Democratic Party not to blame the voters. Blame themselves. Blame themselves for not connecting with voters living paycheck to paycheck, turning off key constituencies, refusing to take inflation seriously and funding Israel’s wars. Identify the failures, including a process that disenfranchised Democratic primary voters, of this election cycle and rectify them. Because in four years, even though Donald Trump cannot constitutionally run for president again, the next option may not be any better and the damage may be irreversible.
We all have different lived experiences. You may be thrilled by the election outcome. Others are terrified that Trump’s rhetoric makes them less safe and jeopardizes their rights. When we come back in 2076 to mark 50 years since graduation, we will be better able to tell the long-term environmental, social and political effects of this president and the non-elected officials that he put in place.
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