Transition Team/Cabinet Thread

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

Isn't Zinke supposed to be marginally less of a slash-and-burn right-Promethean than most other Western Republicans? If so, this is almost but not quite a relief.

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

http://www.politico.com/story/2016/12/ryan-zinke-interior-secretary-trump-232590

Politico reporting that Zinke has been selected as Interior Secretary. No word on if he has accepted the offer or not. I hope this is true, because this will eliminate Tester's toughest challenger!

Whoa, color me surprised. Maybe Tim Fox will give it a try, he'd be a strong candidate as well. Or more likely... Gianforte?

Gianforte is a raving right wingnutjob, who couldn't beat a not-that-popular governor in a generally good year for Republicans. Tester is probably hoping  that he gets to run against him.

[MT Treasurer]

http://www.politico.com/story/2016/12/ryan-zinke-interior-secretary-trump-232590

Politico reporting that Zinke has been selected as Interior Secretary. No word on if he has accepted the offer or not. I hope this is true, because this will eliminate Tester's toughest challenger!

Whoa, color me surprised. Maybe Tim Fox will give it a try, he'd be a strong candidate as well. Or more likely... Gianforte?

Gianforte is a raving right wingnutjob, who couldn't beat a not-that-popular governor in a generally good year for Republicans. Tester is probably hoping  that he gets to run against him.

Except Gianforte is neither a right-wing nutjob (he's a somewhat Trumpish businessman) nor is Bullock "Not-that-popular". Nice try, though.

[Santander]

Trump has only appointed 2 women to actual cabinet positions, one of which has been in Washington forever. He needs to appoint women to both agriculture and sec. Vet Affairs if he wants to show the gender proper respect.

Yeah because nothing says respect like quotas.

Well actually quotas is exactly what Trump is doing when he appoints one black person and one Asian to his cabinet just so that he can claim his cabinet is diverse.
The problem here is that Trump doesn't have a diverse social and business circle, he comes from a circle where it's ok to say things like "I like beautiful women eating burgers in bikinis.  I think it's very American"*
I'm sorry but that's not my America.

*This is an actual quote by the new secretary of Labor, Andrew Puzder.

He appointed Ben Carson because he's been a loyal supporter during the campaign and because he's very popular with Republicans. (and even some Democrats) He appointed Elaine Chao because she's also a well-known Republican and her husband is Mitch McConnell, someone he wants as an ally for the next 4 years. They were appointments that made sense for Trump and not tokens.

Are there women and minorities qualified to be Cabinet secretaries in this country? Yes, of course. But the reality is that the majority of people in significant leadership roles in this country in both the public and private sectors are white men. It is even more so among those who identify as conservative or Republican. (that is not a good thing, but that is the reality) Cabinet positions are also political appointments, so they require appointees to have some degree of ideological compatibility with the President. So while there are plenty of women and minorities in the pool of qualified candidates for Cabinet appointments, they are far outnumbered by men, and it's very hard to appoint many of them without willfully ignoring men who may be more qualified or ideologically compatible.

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

http://www.politico.com/story/2016/12/ryan-zinke-interior-secretary-trump-232590

Politico reporting that Zinke has been selected as Interior Secretary. No word on if he has accepted the offer or not. I hope this is true, because this will eliminate Tester's toughest challenger!

Whoa, color me surprised. Maybe Tim Fox will give it a try, he'd be a strong candidate as well. Or more likely... Gianforte?

Gianforte is a raving right wingnutjob, who couldn't beat a not-that-popular governor in a generally good year for Republicans. Tester is probably hoping  that he gets to run against him.

Except Gianforte is neither a right-wing nutjob (he's a somewhat Trumpish businessman) nor is Bullock "Not-that-popular". Nice try, though.

Bullock was polling in the mid-40s in the run-up to the election. He won with over 50%.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0BxxpEMTW3kArck4xWGRaUEVid1U/view
http://www.politico.com/2016-election/polls/person/latest/steve-bullock?filterDate=

Gianforte funds a museum to creationism that denies evolution and pretends the Earth is only thousands of years old.
http://billingsgazette.com/news/features/magazine/dinosaur-museum-presents-biblical-view-of-origins/article_1c9ac218-bab0-11de-84f1-001cc4c002e0.html

I can't blame you that much though. If I were a Republican, I wouldn't want to admit how deplorable my party was either.

[Sir Mohamed]

Let alone the fact that several dudes the Trumpster selected for cabinet posts have zero political experience, I think it is DEVASTATING that as of now he only appointed two women to real cabinet positions. Two! And not even important departments. I mean, it’s not that there are no competent women… Sad!

[Attorney General, LGC Speaker, and Former PPT Dwarven Dragon]

> Calling Education "Not Important"

[Santander]

> Calling Education "Not Important"

Yes, because saying that the Department of Education, by far the smallest and least significant Cabinet department, is not particularly important is the same thing as saying education is unimportant.

[Sir Mohamed]

> Calling Education "Not Important"

Education is not such an important department at the federal level since education policy is actually a matter/responsibility of the states. State, Justice, Treasury, Defense, Homeland Security and Commerce are the important posts, especially the first four I mentioned. All of them are going to be old white men.

[KingSweden]

Honestly, I don't think Zinke and CMR have THAT different on views regarding BLM and such Interior matters. CMR would have brought more of a focus on hydropower (fine by me) but other than that no big difference.

So why dump her for the GOP's best crack at Tester? Doesn't make sense

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

Honestly, I don't think Zinke and CMR have THAT different on views regarding BLM and such Interior matters. CMR would have brought more of a focus on hydropower (fine by me) but other than that no big difference.

So why dump her for the GOP's best crack at Tester? Doesn't make sense

Only so many token girls allowed in the club?

[2016]

My Speculation: Rep. Cramer of ND gets Agriculture and Rep. Gabbard of Hawaii Veterans.

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

Honestly, I don't think Zinke and CMR have THAT different on views regarding BLM and such Interior matters. CMR would have brought more of a focus on hydropower (fine by me) but other than that no big difference.

So why dump her for the GOP's best crack at Tester? Doesn't make sense

Game theory

[KingSweden]

My Speculation: Rep. Cramer of ND gets Agriculture and Rep. Gabbard of Hawaii Veterans.

Haha McConnell would melt down if Trump took two of the NRSC's top recruits into Cabinet

[MT Treasurer]

Bullock was polling in the mid-40s in the run-up to the election. He won with over 50%.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0BxxpEMTW3kArck4xWGRaUEVid1U/view
http://www.politico.com/2016-election/polls/person/latest/steve-bullock?filterDate=

Gianforte funds a museum to creationism that denies evolution and pretends the Earth is only thousands of years old.
http://billingsgazette.com/news/features/magazine/dinosaur-museum-presents-biblical-view-of-origins/article_1c9ac218-bab0-11de-84f1-001cc4c002e0.html

I can't blame you that much though. If I were a Republican, I wouldn't want to admit how deplorable my party was either.

Uh... that's ONE questionable poll from a very questionable pollster who got many races wrong this year. Most people predicted that Bullock would reelection by a somewhat comfortable margin. In fact, he was up eight points (48-39) in the Atlas polling average, so you could argue that he underperformed expectations on election day. Nice cherry picking right there. Just get a D-CO avatar already and check the facts.

[President Johnson]

My Speculation: Rep. Cramer of ND gets Agriculture and Rep. Gabbard of Hawaii Veterans.

I doubt it. Scott Brown could be at Veterans.

[2016]

My Speculation: Rep. Cramer of ND gets Agriculture and Rep. Gabbard of Hawaii Veterans.

Haha McConnell would melt down if Trump took two of the NRSC's top recruits into Cabinet

Agriculture is between Cramer and Heitkamp at this Point IMO.

[Heisenberg]

My Speculation: Rep. Cramer of ND gets Agriculture and Rep. Gabbard of Hawaii Veterans.

Haha McConnell would melt down if Trump took two of the NRSC's top recruits into Cabinet

Agriculture is between Cramer and Heitkamp at this Point IMO.

What about Sonny Perdue (though he's been silent lately) or Chuck Conner (he said he didn't want it two days ago, but fellow Indianan Pence really likes him)?

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

Bullock was polling in the mid-40s in the run-up to the election. He won with over 50%.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0BxxpEMTW3kArck4xWGRaUEVid1U/view
http://www.politico.com/2016-election/polls/person/latest/steve-bullock?filterDate=

Gianforte funds a museum to creationism that denies evolution and pretends the Earth is only thousands of years old.
http://billingsgazette.com/news/features/magazine/dinosaur-museum-presents-biblical-view-of-origins/article_1c9ac218-bab0-11de-84f1-001cc4c002e0.html

I can't blame you that much though. If I were a Republican, I wouldn't want to admit how deplorable my party was either.

Uh... that's ONE questionable poll from a very questionable pollster who got many races wrong this year. Most people predicted that Bullock would reelection by a somewhat comfortable margin. In fact, he was up eight points (48-39) in the Atlas polling average, so you could argue that he underperformed expectations on election day. Nice cherry picking right there. Just get a D-CO avatar already and check the facts.

Actually, it's two polls, but I'm hardly surprised that someone who supports creationists and other deplorables has problems with basic reading comprehension. At least you have enough decency to be embarrassed about it. (Or, rather than avoiding admitting what a nutcase Gianforte is, did you just have problems reading that, too?)

[Heisenberg]

Heitkamp staying in the Senate.

[The world will shine with light in our nightmare]

Trump picks Cramer for Agriculture

[Heisenberg]

Trump picks Cramer for Agriculture

Rickroll!

[KingSweden]

Trump picks Cramer for Agriculture

Nice nice.

From some light reading, Zinke actually seems like a really solid choice for Interior (from a GOP perspective). He's one of the only Western GOPers who is against selling off public lands and seems to have a conservationist streak. Much better than, say, Raul Labrador

[The Other Castro]

I'm feeling Sonny Perdue for Agriculture.

[The Other Castro]

I don't really like where this is going...

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