Wednesday, December 14, 2016

Rick Perry nominated to lead department he wanted to eliminate but couldn't name


Five years ago, this happened.


As I wrote at the time, "Sorry, Governor, the correct answer was 'What is the Department of Energy?'"

Yesterday, this happened: Rick Perry once wanted to abolish the Energy Department. Trump picked him to run it.
That brain fart ended Perry’s presidential aspirations in 2012. But it wasn’t the end of the story: Donald Trump has reportedly picked Rick Perry to lead the Energy Department, the very agency he once kinda sorta wanted to get rid of. And while it’s not clear that Perry still wants to abolish the DOE, the climate-denying, fossil fuel–loving former governor from Texas is likely to usher in major changes to this key agency.
...
Donald Trump’s transition team, for its part, has generally signaled that it wants to tilt the Energy Department’s focus away from renewables and back toward programs that support oil and gas drilling (and possibly nuclear power). And Rick Perry — an inveterate climate denier who was governor for 15 years of one of America’s most important oil and gas states — is a natural fit to do just that.
I should be more appalled at what Perry's policies are likely to do to the environment, but I can't help but laugh at the sheer irony of Perry as Energy Secretary.  Given what the rest of Trump's Cabinet of Deplorables looks like, Perry looks relatively reasonable, if in a conventionally awful way.  Besides, Ex-Governor Goodhair is a good stuck clock, so he's right twice a day.  After all, he said this about his boss-to-be.


And this:


He's still right about both things he said about Trump.  I just hope he remembers them.  I will.

4 comments:

  1. Yeah, the hair is definitely way more accomplished than what's below it. The only hope with a lot of these cabinet people is that the bureaucracies are so established that they can limit the damage. Who knew bureaucracies were a good thing?

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    1. I was a National Park Ranger under Reagan. The bureaucracy and institutional inertia kept us insulated for the anti-environmental agenda at the top. Fortunately, I was employed late enough in the Administration that James Watt was no longer Interior Secretary.

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  2. From a post at Mic.com:

    State. Energy. Interior. Environmental Protection Agency. The signal Trump has sent with his picks to head these federal agencies is simple: Fossil fuel industry, America is open for business. After several years of increased regulations on American energy companies, specifically those involved with coal, Trump's appointments are expected to roll back many of the changes made by Obama. Specifically, regulations that target emissions from coal-fired power plants and lessening the environmental impact of coal mining are likely to be hit. (Washington Post) And Trump could cut regulations around hydraulic fracturing and pipelines with the goal of increasing natural gas production, potentially reversing the Obama administration decision to halt development of the Dakota Access Pipeline.

    These are proposals Trump campaigned on, especially in parts of Pennsylvania and West Virginia that still employ coal miners.


    He doesn't seem to have campaigned on them in Maryland, though, or if he did, the Archdruid (to quote a player who ain't with us no more) "has a remarkable capacity for not even hearing about them." Yet another reason I have no ability to adhere to his crypto-Both-Siderist "civility" bullshit. (Oh, if only I could lock him in a box with driftglass and shake it...)

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    1. As you've noted before, Greer is adverse to watching TV, so he may never have seen a Trump speech or a Trump commercial. As for Trump visiting Maryland in person, a Google search indicates he visited the state once, a campaign stop in Baltimore early in September. That's on the other end of the state from where Greer lives, so I doubt he saw him then and there, either. He might have read about it in the Baltimore Sun, but that's about it.

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