The post-speech people are talking to Rep. Chris Collins (R-NY) from the Finger Lakes region, which I call something close to home. Asked about how Trump can restart industry and create all the new jobs we need, and the $1 trillion infrastructure bit, Rep. Collins was stuck with tariffs and maybe repatriating profits from corporations.
Nothing, in other words.
The commentators noted that Trump didn’t appeal to American ideals and American goals. It was nationalistic and smaller: that wonderfully fascist ‘America First’ thing.
Rep. Chuck Schumer says that Trump’s big goals have s nothing behind them. He’s slashing the exact same programs he touts about increasing. He brought up the Democratic infrastructure suggestions that have simply died in still waters. He talked about the Trump administration not just not draining the swamp, he’s filling his positions with swamp creatures. Nice sound bite.
Schumer does repeat that the reason Trump isn’t filling his positions: he’s just not nominating people, and the people he is nominating aren’t vetted, so all that work is front-loaded. He didn’t talk about Trump only nominating criminals, clowns and charlatans, but I’m sure he was just a breath away.
The talking heads admitted that he was just repeating his normal stump speech points, with no backing, but they characterized it — especially Chuck Todd — as more open and cooperative than normal. I’m not sure I see it. I saw several hand-waving attempts, but like Trump’s claim that “dying industries will come roaring back to life”, there was nothing behind it. ‘And if the Democrats would just do what we ask, things would move so much faster.’
We’ve all heard Trump’s stump speech before. Why are we taking this iteration more seriously? There are only a few differences from his normal shtick.
FYI, this afternoon, Trump signed the law that allows mentally incompetent people to buy guns again. You get to figure out how that makes next to Trump’s declaration that he was already making our cities safer again.
