Trump is creating mayhem before he’s formally sworn-in as the 47th POTUS. He’s already at loggerheads with Republican senators over some of his bizarre choices of people to run his administration. For health, Trump has appointed Robert F Kennedy Jr. To describe RfK as a nutter is a serious understatement and probably an insult to nutters. He thinks vaccines don’t work and has plans to stop research into new drugs for eight years. And that’s just the tip of the iceberg, an article on a political website claims he’s even crazier than you might think. He only has the job because he agreed to stand down as a candidate in the presidential election and endorse Trump. He never stood a chance of actually winning but it's thought, being from a Democrat dynasty, he would damage Harris’ campaign by drawing a few of her supporters.
Another amazing choice is Matt Gaetz, a senator from Florida who is under investigation by a Senate committee for statutory rape and trafficking of a minor He could become the new Attorney General, the country’s most senior law officer! Trump's Director of National Intelligence is Tulsi Gabbard (why do so many Americans have names that look like anagrams?) who is said to have strong links with Russia and spends most of her time repeating Kremlin propaganda. She blames NATO for the war in Ukraine and seems Putin's choice rather than Trump's.
There are reports that less half of the Republicans in the Senate are going to support these three appointments in confirmation hearings, which is why Trump wants to adjourn Congress and avoid any scrutiny using a process known as recess appointments. Senators are vehemently opposed to this as well.
His entire cabinet, with a couple of exceptions, looks like a snub to reality and to the Republican Party.
Amidst all of this and with his many legal issues still outstanding, Trump has decided to launch a $10 billion dollar lawsuit against the broadcaster CBS, for allegedly editing the tape of an interview with Kamala Harris on their 60 Minutes show during the campaign, to 'make her look more intelligent'. This is an incredible lack of self-awareness from a man for whom the word 'sanewashing' was invented. Fox News and others regularly cut his more insane rants.
Elon Musk, who has spent millions of dollars to help Trump get elected, is joint head of a newly created Dept of Government Efficiency, charged with cutting $2 trillion out of the US government's annual spending plans. Bear in mind that the total budget is only about $6.5 trillion.
According to the FT: "Ethics experts note that Musk will now potentially have the ability to strip out regulations that affect his own companies, as well as protect his entities’ billions of dollars’ worth of government contracts. His critics fear that he will use the position to go after the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), which has been a thorn in Tesla’s side, and the Federal Trade Commission, which frustrated his takeover of Twitter in 2022."
Some Democrat senators have also called for an investigation into Musk's contacts with Vladimir Putin since Musk has billions of dollars worth of US defence contracts through his SpaceX business. It all smacks of foreign interference and conflicts of interest on the part of South African-born Musk.
However, perhaps the most worrying story is one in The Washington Post setting out how Musk and Republicans used social media in swing states to influence potential Harris voters using what Wapo calls a "false flag operation."
"Muslims in Michigan began seeing pro-Israel ads this fall praising Vice President Kamala Harris for marrying a Jewish man and backing the Jewish state. Jews in Pennsylvania, meanwhile, saw ads from the same group with the opposite message: Harris wanted to stop US arms shipments to Israel.
"Another group promoted “Kamala’s bold progressive agenda” to conservative-leaning Donald Trump voters, while a third filled the phones of young liberals with videos about how Harris had abandoned the progressive dream. Black voters in North Carolina were told Democrats wanted to take away their menthol cigarettes, while working-class White men in the Midwest were warned that Harris would support quotas for minorities and deny them Zyn nicotine pouches.
"What voters had no way of knowing at the time was that all of the ads were part of a single, $45 million effort created by political advisers to Tesla founder Elon Musk who had previously worked on the presidential campaign of Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R), according to a presentation about the group’s efforts obtained by The Washington Post."
These messages were micro-targeted in the battleground states, often with ads that "appeared to be something they were not — a tactic the organizers sometimes referred to internally as 'false positives'.”
The whole scam was developed by Building America’s Future, a conservative political nonprofit organisation with a plan to "push her numbers down” according to one anonymous Trump campaign adviser.
This all smacks of the 2016 Brexit campaign where gullible voters were bombarded with ads that contained totally false claims. There is now talk of the Democrats having to wise-up about how Trump's victory was engineered. It would be a disaster for democracy if this tactic started to be used more widely and by both sides.
Discovering the truth is hard enough without official campaigns deliberately spreading false claims about their political opponents. There should be limits on what's permitted. You can see why the Republicans want to close the federal Dept of Education and scrap regulations. Far better for them to have an electorate that is ill-informed and at the mercy of billionaires like Trump and Musk.
Democracy has always been a tool used by demagogues everywhere but social media has opened up a whole new world of spin and manipulation. We ought to be very concerned. What happens in America soon appears over here, let's face it.
