Robert Reich is pictured above, but I'm betting that you didn't need me to tell you that. I think it's fair to say that Reich is one of our better known "public intellectuals." Most of the people I hang out with, anyway, would immediately recognize Reich if they saw him on the street. Click this link if you would like to learn more about Reich. That link will also furnish you with a picture of a much younger Robert Reich.
My blog posting today comes as a reaction to one of Reich's own blog postings, as published on Substack. Reich's posting on November 14, 2024, had this title: "Trump wants Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to be Health Secretary. OMG. Really?"
Reich doesn't have much good to say about other recent nominations, either:
Friends,
Trump is giving his middle finger to America.
Nominating the alleged sexual trafficker Matt Gaetz to be Attorney General, Fox News host Pete Hegseth to be Secretary of Defense, and bizarro Tulsi Gabbard to be Director of National Intelligence are acts of nihilistic disruption.
Now, nominating conspiracist and fabulist Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to the nation’s leading health job — overseeing the Food and Drug Administration, the Centers for Disease Control, and the National Institutes of Health, among other sensitive positions — is an act of utter hubris.
At a time when the truth is a precious common good, and the public’s health is already precarious, RFK Junior has made a name for himself spreading dangerous health lies.... I knew Robert F. Kennedy, and Robert F. Kennedy Junior is no Robert F. Kennedy. If not for his lustrous name, RFK Junior would be just another crackpot in the ever-growing pool of bottom-feeding fringe characters encircling Trump like ravenous slugs.
In my immediate reaction to the election of Donald J. Trump to the presidency, I said that "we are now likely going to be presented with an incredible opportunity to renew the vigor and effectiveness of democratic self-government in the United States." This rather optimistic statement was based on my prediction that Trump, as president, would do things that would, ultimately, discredit him, and discredit his Administration, and would thus let concerned citizens make some very much-needed changes to our federal government.
So far, these early nominations (aptly characterized by Reich) provide some evidence that I may have been correct in my prediction. We may well find ourselves, sooner rather than later, with an opportunity to make real, substantive changes.
But to take advantage of the opportunities that will come, however and whenever they do, we will need to be actively engaged, ourselves.
"Self-government" does require that we be engaged, ourselves.
Let's not forget that. Let's not drop the ball!
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I could not disagree more. RFK Jr. has not spread a single medical lie and anyone who says he has is a modern Know Nothing who thinks he is intelligent because he mindlessly believes Big Pharma advertising copy and calls it "science".
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