The Daly Weekly (2/7)
Trump on Gaza, USAID and DOGE, favorite politicians, and more.
Hi everyone.
Welcome to this week’s Daly Weekly, where I answer whatever questions you throw at me.
Let’s get right to it…
John: There's understandably a lot of focus in history on presidents - good, bad and in between. Do you have a favorite non-presidential politician? Someone you admire as having special skills or force of personality for the good? — Steve R.
Hi Steve. I’ll give you a couple of fairly recent people: Paul Ryan and Liz Cheney.
I liked Paul Ryan, especially before he reluctantly agreed to become the Speaker of the House (and thus had to adjust his priorities), because he was one of the very few leaders in DC over the last 15 years or so who both understood the dire state of our country's fiscal situation AND had the courage, knowledge, and drive to actually try and fix it. During the Obama years, he repeatedly put forth serious entitlement-reform legislation to address the national debt. He also tutored fellow Republican leaders on fiscal issues, and taught them how to talk to their constituents about them. Ryan wasn’t in office to stroke his own ego, or to become a celebrity. He was a workhorse policy-wonk who truly wanted to leave the country better off than he found it. And while some readers will assuredly scoff at my description of the man (being that much of the modern right vilifies any Republican who doesn’t sacrifice every ounce of his or her dignity for Donald Trump), people should keep in mind that Ryan was the legislative architect of what Trump calls “the greatest economy of all-time.”
Liz Cheney was another workhorse, mostly on foreign policy issues until the 2020 election and January 6. At that point, she demonstrated extraordinary political courage and patriotism by sacrificing her political career to try and hold Trump (who she had previously supported twice) to account. She held the third-highest position in the House GOP, and could have remained Wyoming’s sole congresswoman for the rest of her life, if she had just fallen in line with the rest of her Republican colleagues. Instead, she did right by her country, and paid a big price for it. I admire that.
What do you think are some of the good things Trump has done this time around? — Alex D.
Withdrawing from the UNHRC and ending funding to the UNRWA was definitely a good move. Ratcheting up pressure on Iran is good (Trump has always been better on Iran than his Democratic counterparts). Getting hostages back from Venezuela was obviously good. And of course, I’m all for increased border security, and prioritizing the deportation of criminal illegal-immigrants.
Sir John, Trump has announced that he wants the U.S. to take ownership of the Gaza Strip and that he plans to relocate numerous Palestinian residents out of the area, although some may be able to remain there and work in the numerous future jobs that he claims will be created. Yeah….sure… okay. Personally I believe he’s just blowing smoke. I ask: what do you think he hopes to accomplish with this move? Why would he think the leaders of Egypt & Jordan would suddenly change their minds and allow Palestinian refugees to relocate there? What makes him think that a U.S. takeover of Gaza would be a good thing? How did he come up with this scheme? —“Make Gaza Great Again!” regards from The Emperor
Who knows, Emperor. Maybe he figured out that he couldn’t get Greenland, and Gaza started with the same letter.
This is who Trump is. He makes an outlandish, totally unrealistic declaration that throws people in a tizzy. Then he doubles and triples down on it with virtually no additional detail. Then his surrogates are left to try and clean it up, either by twisting themselves into pretzels to explain “what he really meant”, claiming it’s a “negotiating tactic” or 4D-chess move (that us mere “checker players” are too stupid to comprehend), or just blaming the whole snafu on the liberal media. Rinse and repeat.
On a side note, I find it pretty ironic that conservative Trump-critics like me have, for almost a decade now, been called “neocons” and “globalists” by the Trump faithful. Yet, I can’t think of anything more neoconservative or globalist than what Trump is proposing here.
Did you happen to see the viral video of Chuck Schumer chanting in protest of Elon Musk’s DOGE work? If so, what did you think? — Ben G.
I did see it, and it made me laugh. I don’t think someone can make it as far as Schumer has without political talent, but he has always struck me as an awkward phony. And the older he gets, the sillier he comes across trying to energize his struggling party.
When will you and Bernie comment on USAID and DOGE or are you taking a pass on that? — lensattic
Hi Len. First, I should note (for everyone) that Bernie and I each write about one column a week (two max) on stories in the current news cycle (of which there are always plenty to choose from). So, if we don’t tackle one you think is important, it’s not because we’re ducking it. It just means there are other topics we’re more interested in writing about. If readers want my thoughts on a topic I haven’t written a column on, they can either check out my hot takes on “X,” or ask me questions for the weekly Q&A.
Regarding USAID, it’s important to note right off the bat that a number of claims that were tossed around this week by Elon Musk, Republican leaders, and right-wing commentators were not true. This includes the Politico receiving millions of dollars in taxpayer funds, and celebrities and other individuals being paid millions to go to Ukraine.
What is true is that USAID has/had a good amount of waste that wasn’t going toward humanitarian purposes. Reform is/was absolutely appropriate. But reform can be done without pulling out a chainsaw and cutting off aid to 20 million HIV patients, the production and distribution of malaria nets, and the addressing of other legitimate health crises. I’m not for throwing out the baby with the bathwater, and I do think that goodwill efforts abroad are a decent use of the less than 1% of federal spending that goes toward foreign aid (not just for humanitarian reasons, but also to leverage support against our global adversaries).
Regarding DOGE: As a fiscal conservative, I think the mission of cutting government waste is a good one. What I don’t like is Elon and his aides being granted possibly illegal access to classified systems and the U.S. treasury checkbook. If Biden had given that kind of access and control to George Soros and his entourage, the political right would be in hysterics (and rightfully so).
Lastly, I can’t emphasize enough that until our federal government addresses our imploding entitlement programs and the interest on the national debt, these other cuts amount to rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic.
Thanks everyone! You can send me questions for next week by leaving a comment in the comment section.
I cannot speak to DOGE’s access to classified info but It’s access to treasury info is “read only.” As Senator Kennedy noted, it’s difficult to monitor spending without seeing spending. Agreed that something must be done about entitlements and that will be painful. As to the interest expense, that can only be reduced by having surpluses to reduce debt. Do you have another solution?
John: You and I both are traditional conservatives, especially when it comes to advocating for limited government with regards to size, scope, reach, and regulation. What is your opinion on Trump's efforts to reduce the size and role of the federal government, both generally and tactically? Is this a threat to democracy, or a threat to the bureaucracy?