A Good Start

            What delicious irony there is in the appointment of Governor Rick Perry to be Secretary of Energy, a department he once vowed to abolish, and of Scott Pruitt to run the EPA, a lawless agency he has long fought to rein in. Similarly, Betsy deVos will, when confirmed as Secretary of Education, ignore the anguished wails of teachers’ unions when she returns to parents the right to choose where best to educate their kids.

            These are but three examples of federal departments that have entangled this country in cobwebs of federal regulations while usurping the constitutional prerogatives of Congress. Bloated bureaucracies are the very institutions that President Trump had in mind when he stated in his inaugural address that he meant to return the power to the people.

            Except for quixotic flailing at unessential issues such as crowd sizes and illegal voting, President Trump, I think, has had a very good start. My favorite image is of him sitting at his desk signing executive orders, while Chief of Staff Reince Priebus stands at his side holding a stack of more orders to be signed. The caption for this image might very well be, “The President at work doing what he said he was going to do.”

            There is more to the job, of course, than reversing President Obama’s extra-constitutional orders. Much of what President Trump has promised to do, like tax reform and repealing and replacing ObamaCare, will require the cooperation of Congress, not to mention a way to circumvent the obnoxious obstructionism of Senator Schumer and the Far Left of the Democratic Party. And let’s see how he establishes bilateral agreements with disappointed trans-pacific partners and renegotiates NAFTA with the pouting President of Mexico. Are we expecting too much of the Great Negotiator?