Fighting Progressives

President Donald J. Trump concludes his remarks at the 450th mile of the new border wall Tuesday, Jan. 12, 2021, near the Texas Mexico border. (Official White House Photo by Shealah Craighead)

Make America Great Again

Like many in America, Francis Menton wonders if Donald Trump, during his first term as president, did not “hit the ground running.” Possibly, Trump was as surprised as Hillary, and the media wonks were that he had beaten her.

Whether that’s true or not is debatable, but Donald Trump did not seem as though he was ready with a checklist of nominees to fill the top cabinet and other posts. This time is different, explains the Manhattan Contrarian. This time, Donald Trump looks much better prepared, ready to fight the Deep State. If both houses of Congress come through for Trump, he can use this as an opportunity to come in with an immediate “shock and awe” cascade of initiatives to put the Deep State on the back foot.

Next, Francis Menton gives readers a list of actions that he hopes Trump will heed. For the moment, the Manhattan Contrarian is going to set aside climate/energy (forthcoming posts) and talk about other ideas the 47^th President can put in play.

Communications

Francis Menton would have the Trump administration take immediate control of all government websites and replace the messaging of the left with the messaging of the new administration.

This is not something that requires any Congressional action, nor going through any kind of complex process to revise regulations. You would think that this item would be an obvious first priority of any incoming administration. However, the first Trump administration was inexcusably slow to take control of the communications function of the government. Dozens of government websites continued to parrot the left’s messaging years into Trump’s first term. In an example that I am most familiar with, the websites of EPA, the Department of Energy, and others continued to broadcast the climate alarm message two years and more into the first term, and when the sites changed, that occurred slowly and piecemeal.

Immobilize the Bureucartic Enemies of the Administration

The federal bureaucracy consists of well over 90% partisan Democrats, and large numbers of them are hard at work right now figuring out ways to “Trump-proof” their agencies, and to stall and undermine any changes the new administration might want to make. Meanwhile the career functionaries have what is called “civil service” protection, and theoretically can’t be fired without some proof of “cause” and a lengthy process. How to deal with that? The best suggestion I have seen comes from Steven Hayward writing at The American Mind on October 25: “Trump ought to have his cabinet officials determine who is useless or obstructive and order them to work from home. Then cut off their email and access to department computer servers the next day.”

Francis’s only quibble with this is that he doesn’t see any reason why, with 2 million or so federal bureaucrats, this needs to be an individual process where cabinet secretaries make decisions person by person. This process could be applied wholesale to entire groups advancing agendas that the new administration opposes.

Department of Justice and FBI

These agencies have been shown over the last eight years to be thoroughly corrupt, with corruption for these purposes defined as participating in using the processes of criminal justice to attack political enemies. It’s not just that a few partisan people at the top got involved in illegitimate prosecutions of Trump or January 6 protesters or Trump allies; it’s that every single person went along, and not a single person spoke out against this. The entire top echelons of both agencies should be fired immediately, no questions asked. Those at mid to high levels with theoretical civil service protection should get the treatment of the prior bullet point. At lower levels (line prosecutors) it won’t be possible to fire or immobilize everybody, because there won’t be enough people left to do necessary work; but I would recommend erring on the side of getting rid of people.

Mr. Menton doesn’t have a problem if the feds bring fewer prosecutions for some time.

Indeed, in Menton’s experience (observing federal prosecutions over the course of his caree), a high percentage of them are dubious, more designed to bring down some big target and to advance the career of some prosecutor than to deal with real criminality. The highest profile prosecutions were often the most dubious, and also consumed disproportionately large amounts of resources.

See Menton’s tag Phony Prosecutions. In the case of the FBI, Mr. Menton would recommend shuttering it and creating a new agency with a new name. Current FBI agents could apply for employment at the new agency.

January 6

The Manhattan Contrarian has seen multiple calls for immediate pardons for all January 6 defendants, but he would not go that far. Instead, Menton suggests getting a panel of Republican lawyers to review the convictions.

In each case the conviction should be reduced to what would be the norm for the conduct at issue in non-political circumstances, which in the most severe cases will be something like misdemeanor criminal trespass; and the punishment should be commuted in each case to the extent that it is beyond what would be the norm for the conduct in question in non-political circumstances. That would mean no jail time for any but those who committed actual acts of violence. Those who merely wandered around the capitol non-violently should get full pardons.

Under this regime, continues Mr. Menton, essentially every J6 defendant still in prison will be immediately released. The worst offenders will be left with a misdemeanor conviction on their record, which is appropriate.

Anyone who was prosecuted for something that would not be prosecuted in normal circumstances should have his attorneys’ fees paid by the government.

Anyone who was incarcerated for longer than would be the norm for the conduct in question should receive compensation for the time.

Meanwhile, the entire team of J6 prosecutors in the Justice Department, and everybody in the FBI who worked on this, should be fired immediately.

Also, the records of the DOJ and FBI should be de-classified to reveal how many sources the feds had among the protesters, and the extent to which the government sources instigated or directed the rioting.

Prosecution of Eric Adams

According to Menton, this is about relatively minor conduct, none of it involving any federal office.

Given the overwhelming stench at Justice and the FBI, there is a reasonable hypothesis that this prosecution is revenge for Adams speaking out about the migrant crisis.

Menton recommends that Trump (or his new AG) refer the case to the Manhattan or Brooklyn District Attorney’s offices, for them to decide whether to pursue the case as a matter of state bribery law.

Media and Social Media Censorship

No doubt that a vast network of media and social media censorship organizations continues to operate in the federal government, theorizes Mr. Menton, even after the extensive exposure of that network that has occurred via litigation of the New Civil Liberties Alliance and others.

A little-remarked aspect of this problem is that it seems to have originated — or at least first grown to critical mass — during the first Trump term, as a response of the public health authorities to what they saw as Covid “disinformation.” I doubt that Trump himself was much aware of this, but still, it was on his watch. Anyway, these censorship bureaucracies should be immediately dismantled, and their personnel fired. If that’s not possible, see second bullet point above (Immobilize enemies of the Trump administration.)

DEI

This cancer took off and metastasized throughout the federal government during the Biden administration.

Biden issued multiple Executive Orders calling for more and more DEI initiatives, for example this one on his first day in office, January 20, 2021; and this one on June 25, 2021; and this one on February 16, 2023. Trump can and should revoke these Executive Orders on day one. Equally important, the entirety of the DEI bureaucracies in every agency should be dismantled, and the personnel fired.

Defund the Left

Well, here, Mr. Menton regrets, is something that will not happen on Day #1.

But there is a lot that can be done without waiting for new acts of Congress. Throughout the federal government, grants are being made on a daily basis to fund things like critical race theory, anti-Israel propaganda, “history” projects that teach hatred of the United States, and so on and on. This can be greatly reduced by a determined effort to take control of the grant-making bureaucracies, currently in the firm grip of the left.

Who Is Francis Menton?

Francis Menton lives in one of the most attractive urban neighborhoods (the West Village in Greenwich Village ) in America. According to the Manhattan Contrarian, it also suffers from a stifling political and ideological orthodoxy. Mr. Menton has long realized that not only does he not subscribe to the orthodoxy, but he disagrees with it in more or less every respect. Thus, the name of his blog: Manhattan Contrarian.