by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner
I’m fond of the State Department because I sure would rather things on the world stage peacefully than have to put military forces in harm’s way. And, yet, over the last few years, Republicans have done everything in their power to destroy the State Department.
A little context. This is not the first time Republicans have gone bonkers over the sages of Foggy Bottom — in the late 40s and early 50s, the Republicans were rabid dogs over the idea that the State Department was full of pinkos. We know now that, lulz, it was (to a certain extent.)
Flash forward a number of decades, and now the Republican Party wants to atomize the staff of the State Department because….what, they think they’re too woke or something? There’s a huge difference between pinkos and people simply being “woke” — whatever that means. But that doesn’t stop people like Ted Cruz from having new appointments to the State Department in a “death grip.”
Here’s what I think is happening — the Trump Department dropped a neutron bomb on the State Department by simply pushing people out through horrific management and abuse. What they couldn’t get through working within the confines of politics — a reduction the State Department’s staff — they did through brute force. So now that they have what they want, they’re simply never going to let the positions ever be filled again.
Republicans are notorious for this type of bullshit. There are three cabinet level positions they think simply shouldn’t exist. Since they can’t get rid of them playing fair and square, they now, when they have the opportunity, put the worst possible human beings to fill the positions. In fact, Trump’s first Secretary of Energy, Rick Perry, was a huge advocate of eliminating the department — until he couldn’t remember it’s name in a debate!
It’s shit like this that is an indication that the next time Republicans gain power — and they will, one day — they’re unlikely to give it up peacefully. They’re going to establish an autocracy that’s it.