The New Trumptington

Gators and Mosquitoes swimming in the New Trumpington:  The president-elect isn’t “draining the swamp” — it’s about to get bigger and more dangerous.

Donald Trump was elected on Tuesday based on a quite powerful but simple pledge that resonated with millions of Americas:  “I’ll drain the swamp in Washington, D.C.,” he said.

Sounds good.  Even many of those who voted for someone other than Trump, or didn’t bother to vote at all, would likely agree with this fashionable conviction that our federal government all too often doesn’t represent our interests.

What does is mean to “drain the swamp?”  One assumes that an incoming Trump Administration could spell the end of powerful special interests, swindling lobbyists, the corrupting influence of big money in politics, and the troublesome practices of jaded jackals and legal leeches who have collectively and quite willingly transformed the shrine a people’s democracy into — not a place of patriotism and pride — but a justifiable target of our mass anger and ire.

Yet, only days after getting elected, early signs indicate the D.C. swamp isn’t about to get any smaller.  To the contrary, the murky political waters of infested Washington are about to become much larger and far more dangerous.

Consider if you will the reaction of financial markets, which are perhaps the truest (impartial) barometer on the real presumptive winners and losers in Washington the New Trumpington.  Wednesday and Thursday, two days following the election, the biggest stock gains were posted by the following:

— Private prison companies

— Defense contractors

— Pharmaceutical companies

— For-profit colleges

— Financial speculators / Wall Street investment houses

Translated, this means the same scumbags who currently profit off the incarceration of millions (of mostly non-violent drug offenders), the military and intelligence industry (which has fearmongered us into a permanent state of global war), the fat cat financial barons (who produced the worst economic collapse since the Great Depression just a few years ago), the big drug companies (who gouge Americans on the price of medications charging double and triple the prices in other countries), and the scam-ridden diploma mills (like scandal-plagued and now defunct Trump University) appear to be the biggest winners from Tuesday night’s stunning electoral fallout.

So, what does this all mean for the rest of us?

The New Trumpington looks to be a frightening place.  Even if we give Donald Trump an extraordinary degree of benefit of the doubt and if we were to assume that he earnestly means what he says about cleaning up the mess, his transition team and many of the names now being floated for top cabinet positions is a clique of buttressed beltway insiders with glaring conflicts of interest, ties to troubling institutions that have failed us, and burned-out former politicians who are desperately looking for one final government gig before they tumble into the grave (Rudy Guiliani, please pick up the white courtesy phone).

The Trump inner circle includes someone named Ken Blackwell, who is reportedly going to head the president-elect’s transition team on all matters of domestic policy.  For those unfamiliar with Blackwell, he’s a senior fellow at the notoriously right-wing religious organization known as the Family Research Council — which is infamous for opposing gay rights and protections, promoting Bible-based creationism being taught in public schools, opposing all forms of gambling, and working tenaciously to oppose women’s reproductive rights (not just in the U.S., but even in overpopulated nations plagued with starvation).  Read more HERE.

Myton Ebell is being pegged as the primary counsel to the incoming president on environmental matters.  Trouble is, he’s an avowed denier of global climate change.  Read more about Ebell, his past statements, and what his role could mean for the rights of animals, the stewardship of out environment, and the future of the planet in this article from Scientific American.

Wait, there’s more terrible news for the environment.  Republican hired gun Mike McKenna has been hand-picked for a key role on Trump’s transition team, and what’s likely to be a cushy future political appointment.  According to public disclosures, in 2016 McKenna’s clients as a D.C. lobbyist included the Koch Companies (yeah, those Koch Brothers), Southern Company Services, Dow Chemical, and Competitive Power Ventures Inc.

But that’s not even the worst of it, yet.  It’s been reported that Sarah Palin, the half-term, half-wit former governor of “Drill Baby Drill” infamy, is being trial-ballooned as the next Secretary of the Interior.  Gulp!  This isn’t some sick Saturday Night Live skit, folks.  There exists the very real possibility that the nation’s most coveted natural treasures will soon be put into the hands of someone who’s completely clueless on matters of the environment who’s willing and eager to plunder the nation’s public lands off to the highest bidder.

So far, I’ve just scratched the surface on the environmental impacts of what a Trump presidency will mean.  You can be absolutely certain that a similar level of scrambling behind the scenes is taking place in secret circles dead set on digging their fangs into health care, finance and investment, the criminal justice system, national defense, and other vital institutions both public and private which impact our lives on a daily basis.

The swamp creatures are here.  They’ve not only arrived.  They’ve been here inside the Beltway, all along.  Swamp Thing is real.  Rudy Giuliani, Chris Christie, and Newt Gingrich are lurking, waiting for their phone calls.  Indeed, there’s a very good chance that one or more of these scandal-plagued cretins gets picked for a top spot in the Trump Cabinet.

Has the water gotten any lower in the swamp, yet?

Nope.

Welcome to the new Trumpington, which sounds a whole helluva’ lot like the old Washington of eight years ago.

Read more:  Trump campaigned against lobbyists.  Now, they’re on his transition team.