In one of the books in The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy series the character Zaphod Beeblebrox is elected President of the Galaxy. The description (from Wikipedia):
He was briefly the President of the Galaxy (a role that involves no power whatsoever, and merely requires the incumbent to attract attention so no one wonders who’s really in charge, a role for which Zaphod was perfectly suited).
source
Donald Trump was made for the USA Presidency.
Now, there’s a whole other argument regarding Hillary Clinton as a truly terrible candidate. The mainstream media dearly wanted The Donald to be Hillary’s final opponent, because there was no way that Hillary could lose against Donald effing Trump. That’s worthy of a whole other post. Putting this aside, what else caused Donald Trump to win?
I think it was because Donald Trump knew that his role would involve no power whatsoever, and merely require him to attract attention so no one wonders who’s really in charge. And Donald (or Steve) saw that Twitter was a new form of communication. One so new, so significant, and so free of gatekeeping that they could wield it masterfully before any of the old guard caught on.
I think Donald Trump has been in business long enough to know to surround himself with super competent people. Steve Bannon was that expert in this new field (to Donald) of running a presidential election campaign. Trump listened to him, and the results were great.
Hillary was the weasel government insider, so Steve Bannon and Donald Trump cast Donald as the opposite.
Do government weasels make promises? No. Therefore, Donald would make 100 promises to be carried out in the first 100 days. And immediately after the inauguration, he tried really hard to make those come true. That was while Steve Bannon was still whispering in Donald’s ear.
Do government weasels sell out to corporate interests, and thus become the lackeys of big money? Yes. So Steve and Donald tweeted to high heaven that The Donald is financially independent and beholden to no-one.
Did this particular government weasel happen to be married to the guy who backstabbed all of the Midwest by signing legislation to ship their jobs and careers to Mexico, Canada, and China? Yes. So Steve and Donald tweeted “Let’s Make America Great Again”. Hillary (late in the campaign) had said that by electing Hillary, you’d get Bill, too (she would put him in charge of the economy). So first, Bill outsourced the manufacturing jobs; what was left to outsource? Engineering and tech services? “Make America Great Again” was a good foil to it’s opposite.
Did this particular government weasel call off the rescue team trying to save the Americans in the Benghazi attack? Someone decided that the rescue team should be grounded. That all the weasels involved dodged as many questions as possible was grist for the Trump Campaign mill. Particularly damning was the administration’s blame that the attack was due to a Youtube video. Anyone with a calendar and a brain could identify September 11 as a significant date.
Emailgate was another opportunity for Steve and Donald to highlight the reality that Hillary is a weasel. And they did so.
After Donald Trump was elected and inaugurated, he and Steve Bannon went to work to keep those campaign promises he had made. I remember being in a management meeting where it was announced that the Trump Administration would no longer fund employees who aren’t there. Turns out that some departments have positions to fill, haven’t filled them, but bill for the funding money anyway – and the previous administrations paid it. These unfilled positions became a sort of a slush fund; and some departments had up to 20% of their positions unfilled.
Then there was the new executive order that every new regulation can only be adopted when two other regulations are removed. To me, this is a clever way to trim back some of the cruft that has accumulated over the years. It is neither drastic nor urgent; and, it allows the regulators to figure out on their own how to clean up the worst of the trash still on the books.
One of the themes of the Donald Trump campaign was that Donald was elected to “drain the swamp of corruption” that is Washington, D.C. This was a great message, and one I’m sure Steve and Donald agreed would work well.
And then, someone figured out how to drive a wedge between Steve Bannon and Donald Trump. Steve left. With Steve no longer whispering in Donald’s ear, a power vacuum developed. Who filled it?
The Republicans.
The very alligators Donald was supposed to get rid of.
And the reformation by way of electing an outsider, is dead.
At least Donald is still (somewhat) aware that his role involves almost no power, and merely requires him to wield Twitter to attract attention so no one wonders who’s really in charge; a role for which Zaphod, er, The Donald, is perfectly suited.