“Clowns to the left of me, Jokers to the right”

The New Yorker, which broke the news of Anthony Scaramucci’s incredibly foul mouth in the first place, continues its Pulitzer-destined reporting on this important story:

“Comedians Protest Anthony Scaramucci’s Ouster”

By the way, I’ve now served almost as long in a senior White House position as Mr. Scaramucci did.

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“Why Scaramucci had to go”

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I was speculating to my wife yesterday that it was John Kelley, the former Marine general who is now White House chief of staff, who got rid of the loathsome Mr. Scaramucci.  The news media had been suggesting various other people, including Kellyanne Conway.

But I was right:

https://www.cnbc.com/2017/08/01/kelly-flexes-muscle-his-first-day-on-the-job-at-white-house.html

No tough, disciplined military officer, accustomed to clear chains of command, was ever going to put up with the kind of offensive idiocy displayed by Scaramucci.  It wasn’t just the (unspeakably) foul language; it was the brazen, bare-knuckles bureaucratic infighting.  That simply couldn’t be permitted.

Some folks have been worried about the ascendancy of generals in the Trump administration.  I understand, but I’m not (currently) particularly worried.  If ever a presidency required discipline, this one does.  And the best military officers bring a wealth of international experience, discipline, managerial background, knowledge of international politics, and so forth to whatever positions they take after their time in the services is done.

General Kelly absolutely must succeed if there’s any hope of making the Trump presidency rise above disaster.  And, much as I regret Mr. Trump’s ascendancy to the White House, I don’t want his presidency to be a disaster.  We face too many challenges — e.g., the loon in Pyongyang, an ascendant China, Vladimir Putin, an imploding health care economy, and so on and so forth — to allow ourselves that luxury.

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Arizona’s admirable (and Latter-day Saint) junior senator, a fellow member of the Never-Trump movement, speaks out:

“Sen. Flake: GOP should have stood up to Trump”

The interview was prompted by the appearance of a new article from Senator Flake.  I regard this devastating essay — an excerpt from his new book titled (in clear homage to the late great Senator Barry Goldwater of Arizona) Conscience of a Conservative — as a must-read for serious political conservatives:

“My Party Is in Denial about Donald Trump”

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Just back from a tour of the Missionary Training Center in Provo.  It’s quite a bit different from my days at the old Language Training Mission, where we slept in dugouts; walked twenty miles uphill to class and and twenty miles uphill back from class every day, in six feet of snow, in July; and had to find our meals by rummaging in dumpsters.  These young’uns have things a whole lot better.

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Walker Wright, I think it was, reminded me of this book the other day:

Tom Nichols, The Death of Expertise

I hope to get a chance to read it.  I think about this topic every time I’m challenged on topics related to Islam by somebody whose background on the subject, I can readily tell, goes no further than having skimmed a few tendentious propaganda sites online.

I make no claim to infallibility, and I’m not overawed by doctorates — a large proportion of the people I know have them, after all; it’s no big deal in my circles, just (basically) an entry-level union card — but I do believe that there’s a price that needs to be paid, in many subjects, before one can really have a very meaningful opinion on them.  I’m the chairman of a foundation that publishes work on the Book of Mormon and the scriptures, for example, often written by people lacking doctorates or with doctorates in quite unrelated fields.  Credentials aren’t the issue — although most of us wouldn’t go to a medical hobbyist for brain surgery — but evidence of having done at least the minimum necessary work is definitely required.

I would never presume to lecture my mechanic on the details of automotive engines.

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The situation in Venezuela continues to deteriorate, as Nicolás Maduro, not content with destroying his nation’s standard of living by means of socialist command-and-control economic policies, persists in his effort to institute a Castroite dictatorship:

“Venezuela: How a rich country collapsed”

“Venezuela’s election losers”

“Maduro’s War on Democracy”

“Venezuela opposition figures taken from their homes”