When Kellyanne Conway tried to hawk Ivanka Trump products while she was seated in the White House briefing room, everyone with even a hint of reasonability knew Conway had crossed a line. But Conway didn't because she is part of an entourage of current White House occupants who have exhibited total ignorance and often complete contempt for the standard decorum and even legal constraints associated with their new seats of power. But their ignorance isn't a bug, it's a feature, writes Politico.
President Donald Trump’s team rejected a course for senior White House staff, Cabinet nominees and other political appointees that would have provided training on leadership, ethics and management, according to documents obtained by POLITICO.
The documents suggest the program could have better prepared officials for working within existing laws and executive orders, and provided guidance on how to navigate Senate confirmation for nominees and political appointees, how to deal with congressional and media scrutiny, and how to work with Congress and collaborate with agencies — some of the same issues that have become major stumbling blocks in the early days of the administration.
That program—the same one used by both the Obama and Bush administrations—was never implemented because "after the election the transition team shifted its priorities." The effects of that calamitous decision have also trickled down to the agencies.
Several political appointees at agencies said they received very little training and that the period between the election and Inauguration Day was hectic. There has also been little contact between the political appointees at agencies and the longtime civil servants because of a lack of trust, several of these people said.
In some ways, that willful ignorance has also hamstrung team Trump’s ability to implement the worst of their impulses. With a little more training, for instance, Steve Bannon and underling Stephen Miller might have actually written their Muslim ban in a manner that passed legal muster.
In the meantime, we have a crew of Bannons and Kellyannes running around a West Wing full of buffoons when it comes to the legalities that circumscribe their existence there. Ivanka-gate and the Muslim ban will likely be the first of many White House initiatives that completely test the bounds of reason not to mention permissibility. May the havoc they wreak be forever hobbled by their own incompetence.