Riderless Cycles Tend to Crash

By Michael Brendan Dougherty

Wednesday, June 22, 2022

 

Does it feel like a moderate Democrat named Joe Biden is in charge at the White House?

 

I don’t think so, either.

 

Not when the White House is whining about not being able to spend $6 trillion to transform American society and the federal government. And not when the White House is issuing executive orders attacking perhaps a majority of therapists as little better than snake-handling fundamentalists because they don’t immediately schedule a gelding the first minute an insecure boy says he’s unsure of his manhood.

 

In HBO’s comedy Veep, the White House chief of staff explains to the characters, “We all know the White House would work so much better if there wasn’t a president, but there is, so we work around that.” This was a joke in 2013, but in 2022, it’s beginning to feel like the order of things.

 

In this case, Donald Trump was a pioneer. Trump’s envoy to Syria, James Jeffrey, once gave a valedictory interview to DefenseOne, bragging about how he deceived the public and the president himself on the number of American troops in Syria, thereby helping to keep them there. “We were always playing shell games to not make clear to our leadership how many troops we had there,” he said. Jeffrey went on to explain, “My job is to make a quagmire for the Russians.”

 

Had the president told him that was his job? Had Congress? Of course not. He was following the dictates of a foreign-policy consensus. This is created by a set of people who were previously courtiers of presidents, a group of people that effectively detached itself from the control of Congress decades ago. But now this set has recently begun to detach itself from the presidency, even as it operates throughout the executive branch.

 

Donald Trump had this problem constantly. His team of advisers had steered him away from his desired troop withdrawal from Syria. Then, speaking on the phone to Recep Erdogan, he asked Turkey’s dictator if Turkey could handle things in the region. When Erdogan said yes, Trump reportedly shouted down the line to John Bolton, “Start work for the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Syria.” Shortly thereafter, Trump announced the withdrawal on Twitter. A few weeks later, the “White House” announced that 200 troops would stay; only 90 percent would leave. A few days later the Wall Street Journal reported only half would leave. Maybe there was actually an increase. Apparently, it’s not the president’s choice, or any of our business, either.

 

Historically, most cabinet members and staffers have relayed that even when they disagreed with their president, they always sought to faithfully carry out his will. But under Biden, even the top people in the job seem to not know the mind of their own president, or to simply disregard it.

 

In April, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin told an audience that the U.S. wanted Ukraine to win its war, and for the result to be a “weakened Russia.” At the same time, other Biden officials were filling up the cocktail-party scene with visions of regime change in Russia, according to historian Niall Ferguson. Secretary of State Antony Blinken publicly agreed with Austin’s comments.

 

President Joe Biden had to scold them privately. According to a report in the Hill, Biden was worried that their rhetoric “could set unrealistic goals and up the chance Washington could get pulled into a direct conflict with Moscow.”

 

Maybe they were caught up in the same atmosphere that informed James Jeffrey that his job was to weaken Russia.

 

Now of course, it is the job of advisers to float and advocate for courses of action that may be wise, even if unpopular. But it’s not hard to spell out precisely why it is so dangerous for the executive branch to brazenly detach its own head, and continue to operate. The political responsibility falls to the president himself. He is the one that people elect.

 

The presidency has evolved into a cumbersome office, and the executive branch is a gargantuan monstrosity in our republic. When the presidents are disorganized, lack focus, become overwhelmed, or are too enfeebled, we end up with the worst of all worlds. We end up with the courtiers to the president effectively seizing power from him without having any of the final responsibility. Biden’s right; you could end up in a direct conflict with Russia this way.