Trump's Executive Fluff-Items — the Useful and the Useless

Plus: a personal note.

I wanted to start off today’s piece by thanking those of you who reached out to me with their condolences on the passing of my father earlier this week. He was a great man of strong character, and a wonderful father. People can read his obituary here.

The last two years of his life were unfortunately quite rough. Though our family moved him into assisted-living about a year and a half ago, I was his primary caregiver. Between the frequent hospital, doctor, and clinic visits (sometimes two or three a week), navigated bureaucracies, and other caregiver duties, I think I spent more hours a week at his side than I probably did as a child under the roof he put over our family’s heads. He was a lifelong do-it-yourself kind of a guy, and I know being that dependent on anyone pained him — probably more than the symptoms of his health problems.

I’m glad he’s finally at peace, and in a better place. He will be sorely missed.

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Writing is often a distraction, and on a week like this, it’s a welcome one. But rather than writing about a big topic, I figured I’d focus on some small ones.

Since returning to the Oval Office, Donald Trump and his administration have spearheaded all kinds of initiatives, mostly through executive actions. Some have been quite good. Others have been downright terrible. Some are of major consequence, while others are mostly fluff.

Today I’m going to look at the fluff.

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The end of paper straws?

Last Monday, Trump signed an executive order slamming the “irrational campaign against plastic straws,” and declaring it the official policy of the United States to “end the use of paper straws.”

I’m sure this action has huge public support… which, of course, was the point. People hate paper straws. They’re flimsy and off-putting. Sucking a beverage through a paper straw simply isn’t as pleasant of an experience as with its plastic counterpart. And Trump’s absolutely right when he says that the “campaign” against plastic straws was (and is) irrational. I explained why in a piece I wrote a couple years back.

Now, to be clear, Trump didn’t ban paper straws. If he did, I’d be opposed to the measure; I’m a free-market guy. His order merely prevents paper straws from being purchased by the federal government and provided in federal buildings, which means it will have little effect on the general public. I doubt most people realize this, but that doesn’t matter politically. Nor does it matter politically that the private sector had largely already figured out that people were over paper straws (I can’t remember the last time I was even offered one in a restaurant).

All that mattered were the optics — an easy Trump “win” for the American people.

I suspect we’ll see similar actions on other pet-peeve items that Trump has talked about, including water pressure, light-bulbs, and grocery bags. Politically, it makes sense, through practically, like I said, it’s mostly fluff.

A penny saved is a penny… collected?

Trump has instructed the U.S. Treasury to stop producing new pennies. I think this is a fine idea, since it actually is practical. Believe it or not, it costs a little over three cents to make a one-cent penny, and the data shows that most pennies aren’t even spent. They probably end up in jars or drawers, with some fed into change machines for paper currency or as bank deposits.

Though I think Americans could always use more reminders of Honest Abe, shutting down the penny makes sense.

The Gulf of America

I honesty don’t care what that portion of ocean is called, and I’m frankly a little suspicious of anyone who has passionate feelings on either side of this issue.

What I do have a problem with is the Trump administration blocking an Associated Press reporter from entering the White House over the AP Stylebook not being updated to reflect the name change. It’s not only idiotic, but un-American.

“Punishing journalists for not adopting state-mandated terminology is an alarming attack on press freedom,” read a statement from FIRE (the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression). “That's viewpoint discrimination, and it's unconstitutional.”

Bingo.

The Trump administration has been dramatically doubling down on its punitive measure, prompting a clever observation from first-term Trump administration official, Sarah Matthews, that the “Gulf of America is the right’s version of Latinx or birthing person.”

Again, I don’t care about the name change, but people shouldn’t be scolded (and certainly not punished) for not adopting it. Civil liberties matter.

A weird thing to Bragg about

In October 2022, Fort Bragg, a U.S. military base in North Carolina, was renamed Fort Liberty. Like it or not, there was a justifiable reason for the change. Braxton Bragg, the guy it was named after, was a traitor by definition — a Confederate general who fought for slavery.

But as we know, Trump has an affinity for restoring monuments to the Confederacy, which has somehow been sold in the MAGA-verse as an “anti-woke” measure.

That doesn’t make much sense to me, and I don’t understand the offense some took to “Fort Liberty.” Heck, the name feels like it could have been crafted by Trump’s comms team.

Regardless, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has officially changed the installation’s name back to “Fort Bragg.” But to sidestep racist or treasonous connotations, he explained that the base is now named after Private First Class Roland L. Bragg, a World War II veteran who received the Silver Star and Purple Heart for his combat service during the Battle of the Bulge.

I, of course, have no problem with Roland Bragg being honored; he was a true American hero. But if this was ultimately just a game, with a senseless wink and nod to anti-wokesters, was it really worth the estimated $2 million it will now cost to change the name again?

Where was DOGE in all of this?

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Next week, I’ll write about some bigger stuff, but for now, thanks again for the well-wishes. And if you want to ask me a question for tomorrow’s Q&A, just put it in the comment section below.

Take care.