We've only just begun
“There is nothing wrong with your television set. Do not attempt to adjust the picture. We are controlling transmission. If we wish to make it louder, we will bring up the volume. If we wish to make it softer, we will tune it to a whisper. We will control the horizontal. We will control the vertical.”
Donald Trump must have been a fan of “The Outer Limits,” which ran on TV in the early 1960s. He certainly is trying to govern that way.
In the 10 days since he didn’t place his hand on the bible to swear he would “preserve, protect and defend the Constitution” he has been everywhere: pardoning convicted insurrectionists, ordering the use of Guantanamo Bay as a detention center for his immigrant roundup, and causing chaos at the state and local level as he challenges Congress’ right to control appropriations.
Heck, he’s even made himself a National Transportation Safety Board investigator, weighing in on the cause of a collision between a passenger airliner and a military helicopter at Washington National Airport.
The chaos caused by the on-again, off-again freeze of all federal grants and loans is a reflection of his governing “style.”
Republicans have long been on the warpath against “waste, fraud and abuse” in government spending — the founding “principle” of Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency.
There have certainly been outrages like the $14,000 3-D printed military toilet seat. And gouging by military contractors — like Musk — has been common.
But major scams involving programs like Medicare, Medicaid and food stamps come from medical professionals and insurers. In those cases, the people who receive the services are victims.
Many of them who will be victimized again by what was a so-called “outage” for the portal that allows states to get reimbursed for Medicaid programs that serve poor people and the elderly.
The Trump freeze isn’t even about waste, fraud and abuse. It’s about ideology, spelled out in a poorly written two-page memo that was temporarily blocked by a federal judge.
"To implement these orders, each agency must complete a comprehensive analysis of all of their Federal financial assistance programs to identify programs, projects, and activities that may be implicated by any of the President’s executive orders. In the interim, to the extent permissible under applicable law, Federal agencies must temporarily pause all activities related to obligation or disbursement of all Federal financial assistance, and other relevant agency activities that may be implicated by the executive orders, including, but not limited to, financial assistance for foreign aid, nongovernmental organizations, DEI, woke gender ideology, and the green new deal."
That memo has since been rescinded, forcing White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt to muddy the waters even further:
“The Executive Orders issued by the President on funding reviews remain in full force and effect and will be rigorously implemented by all agencies and departments,” Leavitt said, blaming the confusion on the courts and news outlets, not the administration. “This action should effectively end the court case and allow the government to focus on enforcing the President’s orders on controlling federal spending.”
In the meantime, hospitals, scientific researchers, environmental programs and arts organizations, to name just a few private, not-for-profit organizations are left to scramble and figure out whether their programs meet Trump’s ideological tests.
It’s all part of Trump’s effort to be the Great and Powerful Oz, to make sure that people pay attention to him and the power he allegedly wields.
Which of course raises the question of who has the heart and brain to pull back the curtain.