Normalizing The Abnormal

     FBI Director -- and, incidentally, Republican -- Christopher Wray says he's resigning for the very best reasons:  "I've decided the right thing for the bureau is for me to serve until the end of the current administration in January and then step down. My goal is to keep the focus on our mission [...]."

     I'm calling BS.  President-elect Donald Trump wants his extreme loyalist Kash Patel running the FBI and Wray is ducking out before he gets splattered with the weirdness.  A lot of others in the Federal government are doing the same.  Maybe they're hoping to be around to pick up the pieces after it all goes smash; maybe they just don't want to get any of it on them.  Possibly they're hoping it's only four years, the norms and guardrails will hold, and afterward, things will go on much as they have.

     Hey, could be.  I'd be delighted if that was the outcome.  I'd even be happy if the incoming Trump administration wrought their promised land of milk and honey, though my happiness will be greatly tempered if they implement their more Draconian proposals in the doing.

     But neither one of those is the cautious bet.  Maybe trying to sit it out is workable, if you have money in the bank and a place in the country, but for us more or less average types, it's a scary ride.  I'm coming up on retirement, and while I never expected it to be a mainstay, I've counted on receiving a steady pittance from Social Security when the time comes -- a pittance the GOP wants to take an axe to, and even if they don't, their tax reductions for the hyper-rich will inevitably result in benefit reductions for Social Security recipients a few years later.  It's baked right into the law.  Oops.

     It's one thing to stick good Party members in key roles -- of course incoming Presidents do that, and there's a certain amount of quid-pro-quo for some of the sinecures.  But most of the appointees are competent, even if you or I or the person across the aisle doesn't think much of their politics, and the rest know when to shut up and let their staff do the work.  That's not the vibe I'm getting from Mr. Trump's choices; they're a grab-bag of partisan loudmouths, TV hosts, big donors, family members and hangers-on, largely without high-level experience (if any) in the divisions, departments, bureaus and embassies they're being installed to run.

     This is a recipe for chaos.  The only good side is that things are likely to be too fouled up for the new Administration to do as much deliberate harm as Mr. Trump and his sidemen have promised.  Unfortunately, the inadvertent harm will probably be at least as bad.

     I don't like making dire predictions; I'd rather wait and see, and call it out when the mess is obvious.  But a whole lot of people in a position to see further ahead are bailing out, and that's not a good sign.  Especially if you haven't got a parachute.