Hey, do you want to guess what this picture is?
Yeah, that’s the former governor of Texas, Rick Perry. It’s actually a mugshot taken of him when he was arrested in 2014 for “abuse of official capacity and coercion of a public servant.”
He’s probably more famous for this, though.
That’s a picture of Rick Perry forgetting which cabinet departments of the federal government he wanted to eliminate during a presidential debate in 2011. Here’s how ABC News headlined it at the time:
And here is the announcement that Donald Trump has selected Rick Perry to head the Department of Energy.
I could editorialize on this, but what would be the point? Pictures and headline screenshots are worth a thousand words, right?
Instead, let’s just go to the transcript from that debate:
RICK PERRY: But the fact of the matter is we better have a plan in place that Americans can get their hands around. And that’s a reason my flat tax is the only one of all of the folks — these good folks on the stage — it balances the budget in 2020. It does the things to the regulatory climate that has to happen. And I will tell you, it’s three agencies of government when I get there that are gone. Commerce, Education, and the unh … unh what’s the third one there? Let’s see.
RON PAUL: You need five.
PERRY: Oh, five, OK. So Commerce, Education, and the.. unh unh unh
MITT ROMNEY: EPA?
PERRY: EPA, there you go.
JOHN HARWOOD: Seriously, is the EPA the one you were talking about?
PERRY: No, sir, no, sir. We were talking about the unh agencies of government — the EPA needs to be rebuilt. There’s no doubt about that.
HARWOOD: But you can’t — but you can’t name the third one?
PERRY: The third agency of government I would — I would do away with, Education, unh the unh …
ROMNEY: Commerce.
PERRY: Commerce and, let’s see. I can’t. The third. I’m sorry … Oops.
About fifteen minutes after that exchange, Perry remembered what his handlers had told him to say. “It was the Department of Energy that I was reaching for before,” he said.
Do you remember when Mel Carnahan died in a plane crash while he was running for Senate against John Ashcroft but he won the election anyway?
I can’t decide if this idea of Rick Perry running the Department of Energy makes him more like Mel Carnahan or more like John Ashcroft, whose reward for losing was getting to run the Department of Justice.
And Ashcroft covered himself (and more) in glory.
WASHINGTON (AP) — No longer will the attorney general be photographed in front of two partially nude statues in the Great Hall of the Department of Justice.
The department spent $8,000 on blue drapes that hide the two giant, aluminum art deco statues, said spokesman Shane Hix.
So, Rick Perry should work out just fine.
Rick Perry: Captain on the Ship of Fools.
Yay.
He’s the Cabin Boy. He’s the guy Trump sends for the burgers and fries now that Christie is out of the picture.
.
Trump kicked out Christie bc he kept scarfing down all the burgers, fries and taco bowls from “the Hispanics” before he could deliver them to Trump.
Does Perry even know how to order burgers and fries?? Much less them carry them back to his new Overlord?
Well, he probably has as much ability to run the department as Carnahan.
I guess that means we get rid of nuclear weapons production, right?
Oh, privatize it. And allow them to sell in global markets.
How can Perry hobble renewables with regulations if he doesn’t have a Department of Energy?
But the big question: Will Perry get new glasses frames for the occasion?
Let’s see. Which of the campaign rivals has Trump set up in the cabinet?
Ben Carson, Housing and Urban Development
Rick Perry, Energy
I believe their charge was the same one that Richard Nixon had for Howard Phillips as head of the Office of Economic Opportunity: end this agency.
Let’s see how eager they are to work themselves out of a job and go on to a cushier job. There are cushier prospects for these two, aren’t there?
But the EPA was established during Nixon’s tenure.
But Nixon was determined to end LBJ’s great contribution; it didn’t finally happen until Ronald Reagan’s Presidency.
The War on Poverty community action agencies still limp on cobbling together what funds they can for elderly nutrition, HeadStart, and housing programs. Essentially now stultified NGOs instead of what the reformers in the Johnson administration envisioned.
I’m not sure what Nixon’s signing of the legislation for the EPA has to do with my point–that this is not the first time a President has seriously tried to shut down an agency. And that looking at the history of Howard Phillips’s half-successful attempt might be worthwhile.
RE:
Good to know it’s not just me.
My point was that he increased the number of federal agencies by one and didn’t succeed in reducing the number.
Johnson’s War on Poverty agencies weren’t properly funded during his tenure either. Government funded NGOs should never have been more than, if any, a tiny component of the overall model.
Oh yes, the other point–Trump only tasked his political rivals with shutting down agencies, not actually doing anything. Think of that historical capstone in the history books.
“I was a recognized neurosurgeon, and then I shut down the US housing and urban planning programs.”
“I was a three times governor of Texas, and then I shut down the US Department of Energy.”
Almost as bad as becoming a Fox pundit.
Both houses of Congress were Democratic.
True, but Nixon wasn’t all that interested in domestic policy and like IKE chose not to go to war with Democrats on those issues. Very different from Reagan.
Here is the relevant section of the debate with the Jeopardy theme added.
As I wrote back then, “Sorry, Governor, the correct answer was ‘What is the Department of Energy?'”
Isn’t this the GOP promise since 1980? Dismantle all federal agencies and departments that they don’t like. Dept of Ed — the DeVos lady will take care of that. Housing — Dr. Ben will offer prayers as his flunkies wield chainsaws. So much “waste, fraud, corruption, and abuse” to slay in so little time, but the Trumpster isn’t going to waste that time. About 2024 Americans will wake up to see everything their good intentions lost them as they huddle and struggle to find work and pay for heat and gas in a $300/barrel oil world.
I agree with that. They will indeed take down whole departments or gut them. And they will point to waste and savings. Heaven help us in eight years,
Good Grief. The Hill – Bill Gates compares Trump to JFK
Billionaires sticking with billionaires would be honest, but not particularly admirable. Or simply saying, “It’s all business to me” would be the same. But this from Gate (Melinda was a big-time Hillary supporter) discloses his historical ignorance and that he didn’t watch/observe the 2016 election. IOW — poor excuse for an American citizen.
Can you hear me slapping my forehead? The world gets dumber and crazier by the day.
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Bill Gates has always been an asshole. Many people think he’s this great philanthropist. Gates does absolutely nothing unless there’s some benefit in it for himself, but he’s been great at crafting this public persona of the great philanthropist do-gooder. He’s not.
No time to provide links, but my opinion of Bill Gates, much like my opinion of St. Steven of the no Jobs for you, is very very low.
One hint is that Gates is in collusion big time with Monsanto over allegedly “feeding” the third world. Go figure.
This is utterly unsurprising that he’d say this about Trump. No doubt he’s already figured out a way to get in on the public trough grift. And no doubt Trump’ll be happy to cut him in, if Trump sees some benefit for himself.
Ptoui!
Not their failings and shortcomings but OURS. Wrt both, progressive taxation is how a society controls individual greed. Wrt Gates, we know what to do about monopoly power. Regulate the hell out of it or bust it up depending on the specific form of the monopoly. Joba was just really good at creating a cult of cool that appeals to boys/men that are fine paying a premium for the “cool.” Not the worst products/services purveyor to this demographic and lightens their wallets enough so that they purchase less of the worst.
We are afraid of progressive taxation even though the top tenth of one percent control half the wealth. And they keep adding to it. We would rather invent ways to tax Wall STreet and leave it at that. Trump is now about to allow all that corporate money overseas that is untaxed to be brought home free or low taxes. And he is going to lower taxes on business and personal. But Sanders was a socialist, you know, for suggesting we tax the bastards more.
Gates’s dad was an attorney. What Gates innovated at Microsoft was license agreements that monetized software at high rates by charging for updates and then forcing customer to purchase those updates in order to continue to operate their systems.
A very interesting kind of monopoly.
From what I know of Gates Sr is that he’s an authentic mid-20th liberal. Jr. fell far from that tree.
But you’re shortchanging Jr. Without his first two innovations, he would have had nothing on which to construct a monopoly. First he and Allen developed BASIC for a microcomputer and that became Microsoft. Then he lucked out in getting a front row seat on IBM’s PC efforts. He learned that they needed an operating system; so, he “bought” one that was better than CP/M and sold a specific package of it to IBM. As IBM wasn’t all that interested in the PC market (not the right cache for them) and Gates had no interest hardware, he saw a better future in the operating system he’d acquired and developing additional programs that could be packaged or integrated with it. It was the packaging that whipped out the existing software companies such as word processing and spreadsheets. For users it was like getting those applications for free. Even if for some time Word was an inferior word processing app.
What is the earliest known case of Alzheimer’s?
Earliest known onset between the ages of 30-40. Gates is well past that age. But Alzheimer’s presents very differently from that of an inflated SOB ego.
http://imgur.com/a/20T2N
With Bill Gates in the ring, the madness agenda is becoming clearer: Population Control. That is a known Gates’ fixation, particularly in the 3rd world countries.
If this anthropological conjecture is ridiculously right, I can’t be pleased. But really, what else would be a better reason for billionaires to stick together? Why should the concern on environmental limitations be a public matter? The (geo)political trajectory since the report of Club of Rome makes more sense with this factor. Progressive policies are too good for the people, folks! Liveable planet uber alles – some people have to go as pests, alas. The anti-environmental appearances are becoming so emphatically contrarian, won’t they raise a suspicion? The abrupt calamity will be masked for History by conflicting stories of how the US elected the Trump dynasty, etc. Liberals can expect more practical jokes on themselves. Sorry to bring this up before sleep…
Well, at least Gates practices what he preaches unlike many other millionaires/billionaires.
All peoples want the creature comforts that almost all Americans have become accustomed to to some degree. The problem is that the planet can’t really support that for a world population that has grown from one billion to over seven billion in a mere two hundred years and is projected to increase by another two billion in the next twenty-five years. “Creature comforts” include lower infant and disease mortality and longer lives. The rational compensation for those goodies is decreased fertility.
It’s big government you know and the public may just think it is a good idea to shut down the energy department and maybe HUD, Education and Obamacare. Look at all the savings from cutting the beureaucratic waste and cost he will say. And then we can cut taxes to the bone as well. Obamacare itself has those special taxes on investment income. Sounded like a good way to help finance health care at the time. But the truth is you simply cannot pick your favorite special source like Wall Street to tax and pretend no one will notice. I know that’s a paid political message. But we are now about to be on the receiving end. Taxes need to be restricted to progressive taxes as needed. Anything else runs into the danger of picking on some interest group. I’m just venting now. There is too much shit going down.
The appointment of Rick Perry rids Teddy Cruz of a serious opponent for his 2018 Senate run. Cruz got on board the Trump train and was helpful corralling votes of fundamentalists, who had reservations about Trump. Rick Perry beat Cruz in early polling by 9 points.
“The discussion about Cruz’s 2018 prospects comes as his popularity at home continues to take a hit following his unsuccessful presidential campaign. Thirty-nine percent of likely voters told PPP they approve of the job Cruz is doing, while 48 percent said they do not and 13 percent were unsure.”
https:/www.texastribune.org/2016/08/17/poll
Going to have to disagree as Cruz was never on-board with Trump and Trump had already corralled enough of the fundie vote on his own that he didn’t need Cruz to get the remainder. Although Dr. Ben cozying up to Trump did help, but Trump began setting up the alliance early on in the debate where Dr. Ben was left standing in the hallway entrance to the stage.
Perry’s poll numbers to challenge Cruz are excellent and he’s be a much more reliable and accommodating Senator for Trump than Cruz will ever be. So, perhaps this appointment is viewed as a way to raise Perry’s stature and keep his name in the news until next year when he can challenge Cruz. While it’s tempting to think that Trump made a deal with Cruz, such a secret backroom deal that nobody on the outside got even a whiff of is out of character for Trump. Plus Trump didn’t get to where he is by placing his trust in weasels like Cruz. Also interesting to note that Kellyanne Conway, who began this election cycle in Cruz’s corner, will not be a part of Trump’s administration. Trump had to take what he could get during the campaign and Conway did the job as well as she could, but he’s in the big leagues now and there’s better talent available for him.
Have to admit Trump has demonstrated A sense of humour with this appointment. It’s a way of reminding Perry every day of his working like what a fool he’s been. Too bad for everyone else who depends on having a functioning department.
The humor/irony does not seem to have been lost on the media, either, as every report I’ve heard about the Perry nomination has included replaying that debate “oops” moment. Think I’ve heard the nomination explicitly labeled “ironic”, too.
Trump nominates the guy he ridiculed mercilessly (though if that were disqualifying, the candidate pool would be minuscule) to head the agency that guy pledged to eliminate, but couldn’t remember which it was.
A joke.
A sick joke.
But a joke.
After knowing these additional facts, your theory makes more sense. Cruz is a thorn in the Republican establishment’s side.
Did you intend your comment as a response to mine? If so, recognize that I’m only making a conjecture based on what is publicly known or knowable. Entirely possible that Trump may have succeeded in putting a straight-jacket on Cruz which the GOP was unable to do with either of these rogues. And Cruz may have calculated that the odds for him to succeed Trump are better if he does time as Trump’s flunkie than building his own support base.
OTOH, there is no solid foundation under Trump or the teabaggers. It could implode in the blink of an eye.