This week I have a special long edition of Dave Answers Random Questions on Quora.com. I got into a tiff with some dude trying to own me regarding how accomplished Donald Trump has been as president. I'm not sure if said dude is the guy who asked the initial question or if he's just a Trump superfan that couldn't stand the effrontery of my original answer and had to set the record straight. Needless to say I don't think he succeeded, but you can decide for yourself below the fold.
Me: Is that what you think is happening? I’ve seen Donald
Trump mostly hiring lickspittles who have been loyal, not people Leo McGarry
would describe as “smart people who disagree with him.”
Trump also hires people who talk a good game on cable news,
such as Larry Kudlow. He fires them not because he enjoys firing people- if he
did enjoy firing people he would do it to their faces and not over Twitter as
he did with Gary Cohn. He fires them because they are no longer useful to him,
either because he thinks they leaked sensitive information or because they
embarrassed the administration somehow.
The only people Trump hires that appear to occasionally
disagree with him and that Trump keeps around are the military generals that
are serving in his administration. Trump is a bully and a coward, and I think
he gets a kick out of giving orders to 3-and-4 star generals.
JP: Name calling
Trump (“a bully and a coward”) does little to further your argument and
actually weakens it without actual facts to support it. Trump is a businessman.
When he was first elected, he took the advice of people who were in Washington,
and hired those who were suggested to him. As with any businessman, he only
kept those first hires as long as they promoted his agenda, after all, that is
what he was elected for. So now he is firing those who are not pursuing his
agenda as aggressively as he wants. When you look at all that he has
accomplished in just his first year in office, it is apparent that he expects
the same level of accomplishment from those around him. As for your comment
about Trump getting a kick out of ordering generals around, it would be much,
much harder to replace a military general than a bureaucrat, and the military
are sworn to support the Commander in Chief.
Me: I think my calling Donald Trump a bully and a coward is
completely called for in a discussing of things he “gets a kick out of.” If we
are going to discuss his likes and dislikes then his character is certainly up
for debate. There is a clear pattern of Trump attacking those that are weaker
than him, demanding total loyalty from his underlings, and firing said
underlings when they embarrass him and not even having the courage to dismiss
them himself. It matters not whether his advisers still agree with his administration
or not- certainly Steve Bannon and Trump still largely agree with each other,
but Bannon was fired anyway. If you want proof of this pattern you don’t have
to look very hard.
Also the idea that Trump expects “the same level of
accomplishment” from those that surround him is, to put it mildly, laughable.
Of Trump’s major accomplishments since taking office, 1 of them one a slimy
power-grab by Mitch McConnell (Neil Gorsuch) and another was entirely the work
of Congress (the tax bill). The other major policy shifts Trump is responsible
for you’d have to be somewhat callous to call accomplishments, such as rolling
back banking regulations, withdrawing from the Paris Climate Accords, and the
empowerment of ICE to deport any and all illegal residents without regard for
their situation.
Perhaps Trump’s biggest success is how he has converted the
office of the president into his own personal piggy bank. For instance whenever
he visits one of his own resorts, which is pretty much every weekend, the
Secret Service winds up renting rooms and golf carts from said resort, meaning
tax payer dollars are directly going to Trump himself. If that’s the level of
excellence expected of the members of his administration I don’t see why any of
them would be fired, since most of them are merely copying Trump’s model.
JP: I really laughed
when you pointed out his spending weekends at his resort and getting paid for
the rooms that his staff occupy. I really lets me know that you are not, and
probably never have been self-employed. I am guessing that you work as a
bureaucrat for a level of government or a large corporation. You do know that
Trump is not taking any salary for his presidency, right? And if you understood
anything about how much he might be making from any room rental to his staff,
you would laugh at your own comment, as I am laughing as I write this. The
amount of money that he might make after business expenses for such room
rentals is far less than what he has given up in presidential salary. Trump is
a billionaire. You need to think about how much money that is and how
insignificant these numbers are to him. Also, when he occupies this resort, it
is not open to the public, so he is sacrificing any actual revenue that he
would make if he went and stayed in some government building.
You are the one who
started discussing what Trump likes and dislikes, not me.
As a businessman, (I
have had up to 50 employees) it is nothing personal when I fire someone. It is
all business. Business people understand that. When you are in business it is
not a social club, we are here to make money. In Trump's case, he is in the
presidency to complete the agenda he was hired to do. It is obvious that you
have been watching the mainstream media outlets' spin on Trump, and your short
list of his accomplishments is because those are the ones that mainstream media
is grudgingly forced to admit to, as it seems that you are grudgingly admitting
to. But there are more than a few accomplishments that he has to his credit
that the mainstream media are absolutely ignoring. I could give you a long,
long list, but I suggest that you just do a little research. Google his list of
accomplishments. It's immense. But just a few that have been largely ignored
because they do not meet with the left's narrative, are the lowest unemployment
rate for both Hispanics and blacks, EVER!!!! The lowest unemployment rate for
women, in 17 years. The highest labor participation rate in 15 years. America
becoming energy self-sufficient, so it doesn't have to rely on oil from
countries where the oil profits go towards repressing their people. For the
first time in over 50 years, there is hope for, not just a cease-fire, but
total peace on the Korean peninsula. ISIS is squashed.
Oh boy, I could go on
and on, but it is not up to me to educate you. You need to step away from the
fake news media of CNN, ABC, MSNBC, and others, to find out what the truth is
about what is going on in D.C. More people have been sacked than just the ones
that the media are talking about. Trump is running the government like it
should be run, like a business, with no freeloaders on the tax payers dime.
Also, Trump has been taking a personal role in negotiating both contracts and
trade agreements. When he cancelled the U.S.'s participation in the Pacific Rim
agreement, I just could not even believe that everyone in the country wasn't
cheering. Did you happen to look at that deal? It was the worst deal for the
U.S. in history. It would have meant giving hundreds of billions of dollars to
other countries for nothing. And when Trump personally negotiated the costs of
the new Airforce One, down by $100 million, it showed just what this president
is made of. Can you imagine any other president in recent history doing that?
Do your research and
open your mind, and stop spouting the anti-Trump rhetoric that you hear on the
fake news outlets.
Look at his
accomplishment in detail, not just what the fake news tells you, and then weigh
that against the BS that counts for nothing, because someone got their feelings
hurt by Trump's tweets. That sht means nothing
Me: No, I am not a bureaucrat. If you check my profile
you’ll see I’m an engineer. I work for a private company. Since you mentioned
it I’ve never been self-employed, as if that would change my opinion of how
Trump has run his administration.
I suppose it’s nice that Trump is donating his annual
salary. Not that it matters because as you point out the man is a billionaire.
A $400,000 annual salary should be rounding error to such a man. Is it old hat
to point out Trump has never made his tax returns public? Maybe, but it makes
it hard to know how much money he has or makes.
The question I answered refers to whether Trump “gets a
kick” out of firing subordinates he disagrees with, as in does he enjoy firing
people he supposedly hates. In that case I assume his personality, his likes
and dislikes, are part of the discussion.
When Trump is at his resort, it’s not open to the public, so
he’s losing money. Except the resort is never open to the public, because it’s
a private resort which has $200,000 membership fees. So regardless if there’s
no one else there except for Trump and his secret service contingency the
resort is making Trump money.
I did google a list of Donald Trump’s accomplishments as
president. I do not feel like I gave him the short end of the stick. Even news
sites that are generally friendly to him have a short list that mostly include
generic items such as “rolling back regulations” or ending policies of the
Obama administration as if that’s a major accomplishment. As per some of the
specific “accomplishments” you call out:
·
“lowest unemployment rate for both Hispanics and
blacks, EVER!!!!” Caps lock and 4 total exclamation points. Must be impressive.
Only not really, because unemployment rates for blacks and Hispanics have been
on a downward trend for years. In this case Trump gets credit for carrying on
or not fucking up the policies laid down by the administration that started the
trend, the one that came before him. Who was that again?
·
“The lowest unemployment rate for women, in 17
years.” Again true, but the trend is down from previous years, with 34% fewer
women joining the workforce in Trump’s first year opposed to Obama’s last 2
years. Counting the number of new women in the workforce isn’t enough since the
US population, hence the number of women that exist, is also going up.
·
“The highest labor participation rate in 15
years.” Except once again the trend is going down. More people are joining the
workforce, but the number of people joining in Trump’s first year is lower than
in Obama’s final years. Also at less than 5% there’s a chance we’ve reached
full employment in any case, so the real challenge will be what Trump does when
we reach the actual down slope.
·
“America becoming energy self-sufficient…” based
on what? Trump’s empty commitment to revitalize the coal industry? Promising to
build the Keystone pipeline? His ignorance of the solar and wind energy
sectors?
·
“For the first time in over 50 years, there is
hope for, not just a cease-fire, but total peace on the Korean peninsula.” Is that
why everyone is freaking out that John Bolton is about to be appointed Trump’s
NSA? Because they’re worried he’ll counter all the progress Trump has made with
his diplomatic outreach to North Korea?
·
“Trump is running the government like it should
be run, like a business…” The government is not a business. It should never be
run like one. The simplest description I’ve heard of the federal government is
it’s an insurance program with a military. Those tax payers are putting money
into the government largely to fund Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, and
the military. Running the government like a business that needs to cut out the
freeloaders is not what government is about at all.
·
“And when Trump personally negotiated the costs
of the new Airforce One, down by $100 million, it showed just what this
president is made of. Can you imagine any other president in recent history
doing that?” Yay! The president saved $100 million for a government that sports
an almost 4-trillion-dollar budget! I guess 0.0025% isn’t nothing though. As
for a president who negotiated better deals than saving $100 mil off a $3.9
billion contract, whether you agree with the partnership or not Obama did get
11 other countries to agree to the Trans-Pacific Partnership. You must admit that’s
slightly more impressive than getting one company to cut costs a tiny bit.
·
“Do your research and open your mind…” Oh I’m
open. Every time someone asks a question about Trump’s accomplishments I look
around in case there’s something I’m missing. But my mind is not so open my
brains will fall out. I’m not going to look at an “accomplishment” that’s
following years-long trendlines and declare Trump is responsible. I’m not going
to view a $100 million savings as a great deal for the American people when Trump
signed a tax cut bill that promises to explode the deficit while eventually
raising my taxes.
JP: This will be my
last response to you since you are obviously being intellectually dishonest by
making untrue statements. So let me set the record straight regarding Obama’s
record.
There was no trend
that Trump inherited from Obama that now shows as a plus for Trump. Labor
participation rates under Obama DECREASED by 2.7%. The percentage of unemployed
Blacks was 8.6% when he left office, virtually unchanged from when he took
office. The employment to population ratio was similarly unchanged at 59.7%.
Obama increased the
debt by 116%. You would think that if you are going to spend that much money on
the economy, you would be able to do something positive.
While the
unemployment rate under Obama went from 7.6% to 4.9%, the decrease in the labor
participation rate had a lot to do with that.
Now compare those
real statistics with what Trump has done in little over one year. Also, Trump
being a businessman, saw the potential of repatriating a few TRILLION dollars
that was sitting offshore in multinational corporations’ bank accounts. No one
else even considered that. By simply dropping the rate that these corporations
had to pay to bring that money to America, there is not only a huge tax
windfall for the federal government, that would not have happened under another
president, but all that money is being put to work building factories and
employing people. It took a businessman, running the country like a business,
to see that potential. And yes, running the country like a business works. Food
stamp usage is way down, as is the unemployment rate. These things benefit
people at a social level, even though it is a strategically smart business
move.
I don’t know if you
are just missing the truth because you only watch CNN et.al., or if you are
just lying to try to win an argument. Trump did release his tax return and it
showed the tens of millions that he pays in taxes. But frankly, what the heck
do his personal finances have to do with anything that we have been discussing?
If anything, they show that he is more capable than your average career politician,
of managing a business and making money, which is a plus for Americans.
I explained it
recently to a friend of mine this way. I want to hire an accountant. My two
choices are a guy who is competent and who is a socially mobile man who is a good
public speaker and is even a very likable fellow. The other guy is a real
asshole who spits on the ground in front of people, is rude to a level of total
disgust, and he is unfriendly and ugly to boot, but he knows the tax code
inside out, upside down, front to back, and in every single detail. He has his
clients best interest at heart, and he actually has a very big heart. Now which
guy would be the smarter choice to hire? I will go with the asshole every time
and I will be ahead of the person who hires the smooth talker, by a mile.
When people voted for
Trump, they saw past the shallow BS that CNN et.al., were spouting. They saw
someone who actually has not made politics a career, so becoming a politician
was not done to have a job. It was done out of the love he has for his country.
So I suggest that you look past the Stormy Danielles crap that means nothing to
the big picture, and see what a large number of smart Americans see.
Me: “Trump did release his tax return…” No, he didn’t. If we
can’t agree on that I’m not really sure there’s a point in me rebutting
anything else you’ve said. But for what it’s worth…
“Food stamp usage is way down, as is the unemployment rate.”
These are medium-term trends started way before Trump took office. I guess I’ll
give him credit for not fucking things up on this front, but it’s only been a
year. It took Obama’s policies several years to turn these numbers in the right
direction in spite of Republican opposition to his policies.
“I don’t know if you are just missing the truth because you
only watch CNN …” I do not watch CNN. In fact I watch zero cable news channels.
They provide little of value when I can just go on the internet and read
whatever website I want. If you really need to figure out where I got my information
regarding employment statistics, I read a lot of it from the US Department of
Labor Bureau of Labor Statistics.
I really don’t want to go deep into the weeds on a reply on
Quora. If you really care about finding the real information it’s easy with a
simple google search. Donald Trump’s policies are not resulting in a remarkable
uptick in the unemployment rate or the labor participation rate.
“what the heck do his personal finances have to do with
anything that we have been discussing?” You brought up the president donating
his salary, the fact that he was a billionaire, and his potentially losing
money at his Florida resort. I don’t know why since the initial question and my
answer had nothing to do with that.
“Labor participation rates under Obama DECREASED by 2.7%.”
Yes, this is true. Simply quoting the number isn’t enough. There are a number
of reasons why the number is declining, among them the percentage of retirees
spiking as baby boomers retire, people taking advantage of early retirement
because they felt it was the best deal they could get at the time, more
potential workers staying in school longer because companies often require a
bachelor’s degree to qualify… Few of these would be under the president’s
control, so citing Obama’s policies as the reason is unfair. Although it should
be noted that retirees feeling comfortable with retiring early is a good thing.
In any case, even if Obama were to be blamed for the labor participation rate
declining from 2008 to 2014, the rate stabilized in his last two years and is
holding steady through Trump’s first.
“I will go with the asshole every time…” Good luck hiring a
firm full of assholes. In my office client relations are a huge part of
business. If we can’t trust one of our engineers to speak with candor and
respect to the people who want to give us money to do work, then we don’t make
money. And for the US having a giant flaming asshole as our chief diplomat has
been very bad for international relations both with our allies and our enemies.
It’s not just about the amount of money Americans are raking in, it’s also
about not starting a nuclear war, and nobody has confidence that Trump has any
clue on that front.
“a few TRILLION dollars that was sitting offshore in
multinational corporations’ bank accounts.” That money is still sitting there.
Corporations with overseas cash still figure a better deal is coming. Saying
that no one ever thought to allow corporations repatriate foreign cash without
paying taxes is really ignorant. In 2004 Congress passed the American Jobs
Creation Act which included a repatriation holiday where corporations could
bring back their overseas cash at a 5% rate rather than the standard 35% rate.
Only 9% of the cash came back, the corporations that took advantage eventually
cut thousands of jobs rather tha create new ones, and the treasure missed out
on billions of dollars in revenue. Basically a repatriation holiday is a really
shitty idea in theory and practice.
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