Refuge In Kakistocracy

H.G. Wells published War of the Worlds in 1897. He depicted humanity being saved from the malevolent and technologically superior Martians not by armed might or ingenuity or the indomitable spirit of man, but by a head cold:

It is not implausible that something useless and annoying, generally an impediment to humanity, could save us. I speak, of course, of human frailty.

Are we not routinely saved from disaster by our most petty and regrettable human qualities, which seem to serve no purpose? How would World War II have turned out if Hitler were not a monomaniac who invaded Russia? Would the Germans have been able to plunge far into the Russian heartland — thus tying up vast quantities of men and materiel on the Eastern Front — if Stalin hadn’t been an egotist refusing to believe that Hitler would betray him? Would Nixon have fallen if he were not paranoid and resentful? Are not Bond villains routinely thwarted by their tendency to boast about their sinister schemes? Am I not routinely distracted from picking stupid online fights by sloth, gluttony, and occasionally lust?

So: in a month with few bright spots, here is a glimmer of hope: Team Trump’s most human failings may thwart some of their most evil plans.

Take, for instance, appointing Representative Matt Gaetz to be the Attorney General of the United States. If this is a sincere appointment — in other words, if it isn’t a head-fake to get the Senate to accept another candidate later, or a ruse to let Gaetz resign from Congress and avoid a damaging ethics report¹ — it’s an example of self-indulgence thwarting malign intent. Gaetz is a buffoon. He has absolutely no qualifications to run the Department of Justice. Can he wander around firing everyone? Yes. Does he understand how the Department of Justice works in a way that would allow him to maximize its potential for abuse? No. Is he smart enough to figure it out? Also no. Is he charismatic enough to persuade insiders to help him use it effectively? Very much no. Gaetz as Attorney General will do petty, flamboyant, stupid things in clumsy ways. Some of those things will be very bad. But clown shoes are preferable to jackboots. We’d be in much more trouble if someone evil in a smart and competent way who understands how the machine works — say, Jeff Clark or Ken Paxton — took over. That would be terrifying.

Trump’s decision shows his tendency to vent his spleen. Appointing Gaetz owns the libs, humiliates the hated Justice Department, elevates someone who is a vulgar elbow-thrower like him, and is a thumb in the eye to the Republicans who hate Gaetz. It’s not a decision reflecting self-control; it’s a decision reflecting unconstrained anger and resentment. It’s like making your horse a Senator. The point isn’t that the horse will vote the way you want it to. The point is to humiliate the senate and show them you can do what you want. It’s bad, but it’s not smart bad.

Many of Trump’s appointments so far seem to be made out of frailty and not out of calculation. Kristi Noem at Homeland Security is a lightweight whose dubious competence will interfere with plans to genocide immigrants. Pete Hegseth’s chief qualification to be Secretary of Defense is that Trump saw him on the teevee a lot and his tattoos are not, technically, Nazi symbols. Mike Huckabee is a wholly owned trademark of Jack Chick Enterprises Inc. All of these people are ostentatiously evil and shame the institutions they will lead and are a disgrace to the Republic and so forth but do they have the skills or patience to achieve their weird goals? Institutions are very difficult to change. The populist sentiment “send in an outsider and have them clean house” requires an outsider smart and disciplined enough to overcome the fact they don’t understand what they’re changing. Otherwise the inside stubbornly and passive-aggressively thwarts the outsider. You can burn the institution to the ground but that doesn’t leave you with an institution you can use effectively as a weapon.

Trump’s choice of all of these people reflects his resentments and pathologies and insecurities and those of his closest advisors. Plus these nominees all have their own issues. Do you think Matt Gaetz is going to work the hours necessary to not just learn DoJ but run it in detail? All of the interns are college graduates. Does Kristi Noem strike you as someone who handles stress well? Does war crimes enthusiast Pete Hegseth have the people skills to manage the viper’s nest that’s the Pentagon?

Trump’s laziness, poor attention span, tendency to be distracted by petty grievances and threats to his ego, and total lack of loyalty to anyone will be impediments to his agenda. The people he picks tend to be a grab bag of personality disorders who squabble and fight for power, he tends to screw them over when they annoy him, and they’re all quite annoying.

I’m not saying that things won’t be bad. As I’ve said recently, I expect things to be very bad for a long time, possibly a generation, as a result of America’s choice. What I am saying is that perhaps they will not be as bad as they could be because God, in His wisdom, has chosen to make these people weird freaks along the way to letting them run the place. This is a time to cherish every hope and embrace every ally. Trump and Trumpists are dysfunctional weirdos and that fact is our ally. Cold comfort is still comfort.

1  It’s certainly possible this was a gambit to allow Gaetz to resign from Congress and avoid a bad ethics report from being released. That seems out of character for Trump, though. He’s neither loyal nor helpful.