# The Trump Administration: A Clusterfuck in the Making **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [December 7, 2016, 12:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-administration-a-clusterfuck-in-the-making/774070 "2016-12-07T00:25:42Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2115
**Author:** ![Turek](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/turek/32/18782_2.png) [@Turek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Turek)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2020, 7:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-administration-a-clusterfuck-in-the-making/774070/42286 "2020-04-06T19:32:46Z")
> [@asahi](#): > > Yeah, go ahead, plonk away. > > People here are wishing things would change. Actually most of us are just wishing you’d shut the fuck up, because your constant bleating has grown extremely tiresome. Can’t go 3 posts in a thread without one of your “We’re all screwed! You’ll see!!1!!” screeds. ---
**Author:** ![asahi](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/asahi/32/8693_2.png) [@asahi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/asahi)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2020, 7:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-administration-a-clusterfuck-in-the-making/774070/42287 "2020-04-06T19:38:18Z")
> [@Turek](#): > > Actually most of us are just wishing you’d shut the fuck up, because your constant bleating has grown extremely tiresome. Can’t go 3 posts in a thread without one of your “We’re all screwed! You’ll see!!1!!” screeds. Oh, wow, I get it: People reading “The Trump Administration: A Clusterfuck in the Making” are looking for something uplifting and inspirational. :rolleyes: Whatever you say, dumbass. ---
**Author:** ![dasmoocher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/dbc845/32.png) [@dasmoocher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dasmoocher)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2020, 8:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-administration-a-clusterfuck-in-the-making/774070/42288 "2020-04-06T20:15:21Z")
This article has a nice timeline of Trump and his administration’s fuck-ups: [Trump’s Lost Months Are Killing Us. Here’s How to Make Them Politically Fatal for Him.](https://www.thedailybeast.com/trumps-lost-months-are-killing-us-heres-how-to-make-them-politically-fatal-for-him) > [@](#): > > Why did Trump wait from early February (when shortages of equipment were first identified) until April 2 to use the DPA to provide supplies to medical personnel? The ideological objections of the Chamber of Commerce and other corporate interests played a role. But the larger reason looks political: Nationalizing supply chains _means assuming responsibility, which Trump dreads._ It’s easier to falsely accuse fatigued doctors of hoarding, snatch precious ventilators from blue state governors, and otherwise inject petty politics into matters of life and death. > > When Trump later attacks “that woman” (Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer, a Democrat), and says that he has told Vice President Pence not to call back any governor who is “not appreciative,” he is placing his ego above the lives of the people of Michigan and other states with Democratic governors. [my italics] Yep, it’s the fault of anyone but “I take no responsibility” Trump, but he’s doing a 10 out of 10 “great job” on fighting the virus. After this is over, you know there will be several analyses that will estimate how many additional Americans died that might not have had this clusterfuck had been competent (say, like following the pandemic response “playbook” they were handed during the transition, not disbanding the NSC pandemic team, not playing politics by lying about the “hoax” virus, being an actual President instead of just wanting to play one on TV and at rallies, not living in an egotistical fantasy world, etc… ---
**Author:** ![Skywatcher](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skywatcher/32/254_2.png) [@Skywatcher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skywatcher)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2020, 8:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-administration-a-clusterfuck-in-the-making/774070/42289 "2020-04-06T20:33:36Z")
Der Bungle in 2013: “Leadership: Whatever happens, you’re responsible. If it doesn’t happen, you’re responsible.” Der Bungle today: I’m not responsible for anything. Unless something good happened then I’m responsible, whether or not I actually had anything to do with it. ---
**Author:** ![Euphonious\_Polemic](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/euphonious_polemic/32/3002_2.png) [@Euphonious\_Polemic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Euphonious_Polemic)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2020, 8:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-administration-a-clusterfuck-in-the-making/774070/42290 "2020-04-06T20:54:13Z")
> [@bobot](#): > > Be mindful that to understand a Trump supporter’s “thought process”, for lack of a better term, you must abandon logic and memory. What the Lying con man says right now overrides what he said yesterday, and obliviates what preceeded it. Orwell was a prophet Doublethink - “The power of holding two contradictory beliefs in one’s mind simultaneously, and accepting both of them… To tell deliberate lies while genuinely believing in them, to forget any fact that has become inconvenient, and then, when it becomes necessary again, to draw it back from oblivion for just as long as it is needed, to deny the existence of objective reality and all the while to take account of the reality which one denies—all this is indispensably necessary.” ---
**Author:** ![Euphonious\_Polemic](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/euphonious_polemic/32/3002_2.png) [@Euphonious\_Polemic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Euphonious_Polemic)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2020, 8:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-administration-a-clusterfuck-in-the-making/774070/42291 "2020-04-06T20:57:30Z")
> [@dasmoocher](#): > > After this is over, you know there will be several analyses that will estimate how many additional Americans died that might not have had this clusterfuck had been competent (say, like following the pandemic response “playbook” they were handed during the transition, not disbanding the NSC pandemic team, not playing politics by lying about the “hoax” virus, being an actual President instead of just wanting to play one on TV and at rallies, not living in an egotistical fantasy world, etc… Doublethink. Fox News and the rest of the Trump acolytes have already begun constructing a new reality. One in which Trump acted first; Got all the supplies needed even before the states asked for them; and reversed the destructive policies of the terrible Democrats who denied that the virus was a problem. Of course it is 180 degrees removed from ACTUAL reality. But doublethink will enable millions upon millions of Americans to believe it, and swear on their bibles that it is true. ---
**Author:** ![Euphonious\_Polemic](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/euphonious_polemic/32/3002_2.png) [@Euphonious\_Polemic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Euphonious_Polemic)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2020, 8:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-administration-a-clusterfuck-in-the-making/774070/42292 "2020-04-06T20:58:50Z")
> [@Turek](#): > > Actually most of us are just wishing you’d shut the fuck up, because your constant bleating has grown extremely tiresome. Can’t go 3 posts in a thread without one of your “We’re all screwed! You’ll see!!1!!” screeds. Translation: “Stop rubbing our faces in the shit that we deliberately smeared on the floor! It’s unpleasant and you are mean!” ---
**Author:** ![Euphonious\_Polemic](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/euphonious_polemic/32/3002_2.png) [@Euphonious\_Polemic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Euphonious_Polemic)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2020, 9:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-administration-a-clusterfuck-in-the-making/774070/42293 "2020-04-06T21:00:39Z")
> [@Jack\_Batty](#): > > If anyone is interested in hearing Acting Sec of Navy Modley’s address to the USS Teddy Roosevelt’s crew, it’s on SoundCloud, [here](https://soundcloud.com/paul-szoldra/acting-secnav-modley-criticizing-capt-crozier-to-sailors-onboard-uss-theodore-roosevelt). It’s quite a thing. Especially the peppering of "what the fuck"s heard from the crew while listening. He goes after Crozier, he goes after China, he goes after the media. I’m left, once more, thinking what the reaction would have been if Obama had had an acting Sec of Navy who had pulled this kind of shit. In a just world, the crew of the USS Teddy Roosevelt would have dragged this asshole off the podium and had him swinging from the yardarm for the crows to peck at. ---
**Author:** ![dasmoocher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/dbc845/32.png) [@dasmoocher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dasmoocher)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2020, 9:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-administration-a-clusterfuck-in-the-making/774070/42294 "2020-04-06T21:07:34Z")
> [@dasmoocher](#): > > Looks like it’s Rudy: And Dr. Oz apparently. I just saw this: [Trump Eyes Accused ‘Quack’ Dr. Oz for Coronavirus Advice](https://www.thedailybeast.com/trump-eyes-accused-quack-dr-oz-for-coronavirus-and-hydroxychloroquine-advice) \*The president can’t stop talking about an unproven COVID-19 treatment—the same one the oft-criticized TV doctor keeps pushing and pushing. \* > [@](#): > > As the global pandemic and a staggering economic crisis swells, Dr. Mehmet Oz, the controversial celebrity doctor, has been advising senior Trump administration officials on coronavirus-related matters. Oz has even caught President Donald Trump’s attention with the celebrity doctor’s numerous appearances on the president’s favorite TV channel, The Daily Beast has learned. > > In the past couple of weeks, Trump began hearing more and more about—and watching Oz, now a Fox News regular, discuss—hydroxychloroquine, an anti-malaria drug that Trump aggressively touted as a coronavirus treatment, much to the dismay of various medical experts and scientists. Over these two weeks, the president had specifically made a point of telling aides that he was interested in what Oz had to say and that he wished to speak to the much-maligned television personality, according to two people familiar with the president’s requests. It is unclear if Trump has spoken on the phone with Oz lately, as he told aides that he wished to do so. > > But Trump has told officials that it would be “a good idea” if they talked to Oz, one of the sources added. … Yes, maybe Oz can educate Fauci on infectious disease treatments. I mean, what does Fauci know? He’s only been doing this since before HIV was even identified. And because there’s a Trump tweet for everything: > [@](#): > > Originally tweeted by \*\*@realDonaldTrump > \*\* > Remember this, the worst doctors (by far) are celebrity doctors. If you see their names, or read about them in the newspapers, stay away! > > 5:48 PM - Aug 31, 2014 ---
**Author:** ![dasmoocher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/dbc845/32.png) [@dasmoocher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dasmoocher)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2020, 9:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-administration-a-clusterfuck-in-the-making/774070/42295 "2020-04-06T21:17:24Z")
> [@Jack\_Batty](#): > > If anyone is interested in hearing Acting Sec of Navy Modley’s address to the USS Teddy Roosevelt’s crew, it’s on SoundCloud, [here](https://soundcloud.com/paul-szoldra/acting-secnav-modley-criticizing-capt-crozier-to-sailors-onboard-uss-theodore-roosevelt). It’s quite a thing. Especially the peppering of "what the fuck"s heard from the crew while listening. He goes after Crozier, he goes after China, he goes after the media. I’m left, once more, thinking what the reaction would have been if Obama had had an acting Sec of Navy who had pulled this kind of shit. And of course, there’s the minor irony of the SecNav calling the captain naive or stupid if he didn’t think his email letter would leak and become public and his own speech is out there now. The speech may not have been secret and I haven’t heard it, but the talking heads on TV seem appalled he would give a speech like that and it doesn’t look good for him. ---
**Author:** ![Great\_Antibob](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e47c2d/32.png) [@Great\_Antibob](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Great_Antibob)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2020, 9:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-administration-a-clusterfuck-in-the-making/774070/42296 "2020-04-06T21:18:55Z")
> [@Euphonious\_Polemic](#): > > Translation: > > “Stop rubbing our faces in the shit that we deliberately smeared on the floor! It’s unpleasant and you are mean!” **asahi** ’s notion of a solution is deliberately letting millions of people suffer and/or die so Americans understand how terrible Republicans really are and are never tempted to go that route again. I think your summary of the position lacks just a tiny bit of nuance. ---
**Author:** ![running\_coach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/running_coach/32/15836_2.png) [@running\_coach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/running_coach)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2020, 9:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-administration-a-clusterfuck-in-the-making/774070/42297 "2020-04-06T21:22:48Z")
> [@dasmoocher](#): > > And of course, there’s the minor irony of the SecNav calling the captain naive or stupid if he didn’t think his email letter would leak and become public and his own speech is out there now. The speech may not have been secret and I haven’t heard it, **but the talking heads on TV seem appalled he would give a speech like that and it doesn’t look good for him**. As long as it looks good to Trump… ---
**Author:** ![eschereal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eschereal/32/18939_2.png) [@eschereal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eschereal)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2020, 9:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-administration-a-clusterfuck-in-the-making/774070/42298 "2020-04-06T21:30:21Z")
> [@Euphonious\_Polemic](#): > > In a just world, the crew of the USS Teddy Roosevelt would have dragged this asshole off the podium and had him swinging from the yardarm for the crows to peck at. Good luck with that. The USS TR is in Guam. Do you think this fuckwit went halfway around the world to get yelled at? When you listen to the audio, it is clearly a PA broadcast, and Modley was almost certainly nowhere near the ship. ---
**Author:** ![Monty](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/monty/32/47_2.png) [@Monty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Monty)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2020, 9:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-administration-a-clusterfuck-in-the-making/774070/42299 "2020-04-06T21:32:21Z")
> [@Jack\_Batty](#): > > If anyone is interested in hearing Acting Sec of Navy Modley’s address to the USS Teddy Roosevelt’s crew, it’s on SoundCloud, [here](https://soundcloud.com/paul-szoldra/acting-secnav-modley-criticizing-capt-crozier-to-sailors-onboard-uss-theodore-roosevelt). It’s quite a thing. Especially the peppering of "what the fuck"s heard from the crew while listening. He goes after Crozier, he goes after China, he goes after the media. I’m left, once more, thinking what the reaction would have been if Obama had had an acting Sec of Navy who had pulled this kind of shit. My memory very well might not be the best, but I do not recall President Obama stacking his cabinet with acting secretaries. Did he even have one acting secretary during his tenure? ---
**Author:** ![asahi](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/asahi/32/8693_2.png) [@asahi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/asahi)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2020, 9:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-administration-a-clusterfuck-in-the-making/774070/42300 "2020-04-06T21:38:06Z")
> [@Great\_Antibob](#): > > **asahi** ’s notion of a solution is deliberately letting millions of people suffer and/or die so Americans understand how terrible Republicans really are and are never tempted to go that route again. > > I think your summary of the position lacks just a tiny bit of nuance. That’s not really what I said, though; I literally said that I wanted this to be a disaster and that I wanted the healthcare system and the economy collapse (at a time when this appears to be actually happening, mind you). I later tried to nuance that in my exchange with Monty, in which I basically clarified by saying that I want this to be bad enough so that people actually fucking learn something from it. Understand something: it’s already bad, already a disaster. The question is whether it’s bad enough for us to learn any lessons. Are enough of the right people - the persuadable, reachable type - going to go from simply shrugging their shoulders and accepting Trump because "Woo! Hoo! we have more jobs and Amazon now pays $15 an hour…to actually having a Eureka moment and waking the fuck up about how bad conservative politics is and how it’s ruining our society. Ideally, nobody would die; we would just be a curious enough lot to find enlightenment on our own. But I’ve watched over and over again as this country gets suckered by right wing lies and I don’t just blame the right wing propagandists - lying is what they do. I blame voters who either like the lies they’re being told or who are just otherwise indifferent. I want it to be bad enough to the point where we can actually benefit from this. There’s nothing really pathological about it. ---
**Author:** ![Jack\_Batty](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jack_batty/32/3201_2.png) [@Jack\_Batty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jack_Batty)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2020, 9:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-administration-a-clusterfuck-in-the-making/774070/42301 "2020-04-06T21:38:20Z")
> [@Monty](#): > > My memory very well might not be the best, but I do not recall President Obama stacking his cabinet with acting secretaries. Did he even have one acting secretary during his tenure? That’s like a meta-point in this shit show. ---
**Author:** ![dasmoocher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/dbc845/32.png) [@dasmoocher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dasmoocher)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2020, 9:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-administration-a-clusterfuck-in-the-making/774070/42302 "2020-04-06T21:43:28Z")
> [@running\_coach](#): > > As long as it looks good to Trump… True. It’s always an audience of one, isn’t it? I think Jim Mattis and Nikki Haley are the only ones I can think of that have left the administration with their reputations still intact. Trump himself is like a virus, infecting all that work for him, even the previously well-respected ones, like, say, John Kelly, and the GOP itself. ---
**Author:** ![asahi](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/asahi/32/8693_2.png) [@asahi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/asahi)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2020, 9:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-administration-a-clusterfuck-in-the-making/774070/42303 "2020-04-06T21:47:19Z")
dp ---
**Author:** ![eschereal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eschereal/32/18939_2.png) [@eschereal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eschereal)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2020, 9:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-administration-a-clusterfuck-in-the-making/774070/42304 "2020-04-06T21:54:27Z")
So this Swiss company, Novartis, was [paying Michael Cohen for access](https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/major-producer-of-hydroxychloroquine-once-paid-michael-cohen-hefty-sum-for-access-to-trump/ar-BB12eeHz) to ShitGibbon, on the order of $100K/mo in late '16/early '17. So what? Well, it appears that hydroxychloroquine is one of their major products. Which means, something. ---
**Author:** ![Euphonious\_Polemic](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/euphonious_polemic/32/3002_2.png) [@Euphonious\_Polemic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Euphonious_Polemic)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2020, 9:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-administration-a-clusterfuck-in-the-making/774070/42305 "2020-04-06T21:59:58Z")
> [@dasmoocher](#): > > True. It’s always an audience of one, isn’t it? > > I think Jim Mattis and Nikki Haley are the only ones I can think of that have left the administration with their reputations still intact. Trump himself is like a virus, infecting all that work for him, even the previously well-respected ones, like, say, John Kelly, and the GOP itself. Trump is the King Midas of feces; Everything he touches turns to shit. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-administration-a-clusterfuck-in-the-making/774070.md?page=2114) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-administration-a-clusterfuck-in-the-making/774070.md?page=2116)