(it’s what we do)
Message to P-E Donald Trump
If you want your children off limits, if you don’t want the distraction of fighting battles your adult children have no business bringing to you, adding potential conflicts of interest, tell them pointedly “you weren’t elected, this is my deal with the people . . . they elected a CEO, not a dynasty . . . not princes or princesses . . .you can help me with the policies the people elected me to fulfill . . . this isn’t about you.”
Message to Ivanka . . . So don’t try . . .
Ivanka Trump will have difficulty pushing father to left on environment (excerpts)
Ivanka Trump got former Vice President Al Gore inside Trump Tower to talk about global warming with President-elect Trump. If she uses her role as first daughter to serve as an informal climate change czar, her success could end there.
The eldest Trump daughter is close to her father. But she is not a Republican and is less conservative than her brothers Eric and Donald Jr. Ivanka benefits the most from the Trump family brand being about wealth and glamor, the least from its association with right-wing politics.
It’s nevertheless been reported that Ivanka wishes to assume the bully pulpit usually wielded by the first lady and that climate change could become one of her signature issues. She has already served as an ambassador of sorts for her father in more liberal settings, such as her September appearance at “Weekend with Charlie Rose” in Aspen.
Donald Trump was elected president by Rust Belt states, with strong support from voters list environmental regulations alongside trade agreements as the reason for the decline in manufacturing jobs. He ran up huge margins in coal states, beating Hillary Clinton by 30 points in Kentucky and almost 42 points in Kentucky.
“He didn’t win on an Al Gore environmental platform,” said a Republican consultant. “Quite the opposite.”
Trump defended coal jobs during the campaign and is said to have been frustrated with some of the regulations he personally encountered in real estate. Thomas Pyle of the pro-energy Institute for Energy Research is the transition team’s point man for the Department of Energy, the Competitive Enterprise Institute’s Myron Ebell at the Environmental Protection Agency. Ebell in particular is no fan of Gore or the EPA.
. . .
Even in his meeting with the New York Times, where he pledged to keep an open mind about climate change, Trump said what he would do about it would depend on “how much it will cost our companies.”
It’s possible, of course, that Ivanka Trump will be able to promote smaller ball environmental initiatives that are less costly.
The problem with the latter is that NO unnecessary cost is appropriate. NO hobby projects or personal passions that cost real businesses, real consumers, real money for no useful purpose is appropriate. If Ivanka wants to demonstrate some expertise in computer modeling, rather than fashion marketing, climate simulation rather than fragrance simulation, then she can put her bonifides up with the chemists, physicists and meteorologists, farmers and engineers that deal with “climate policy.” Ivanka would not hire a daughter of a chemist in her company to make fragrances without credentials, too much is at stake with the brand. Ivanka should not presume to inject herself into her father’s new business.
And for crying out loud Ms Trump you and Al gore fly around on private jets, and probably use more energy for personal convenience than a small city. Do not lecture the rest of the world on energy or amounts of CO2 used.
And then there is this via The Hill from some months ago;
“I’m an independent, and I’ve always voted based on the candidate, as opposed to based on the party. And it was actually a very interesting experience,”
She made the comment with regard to the embarrassment of her and one her brothers not being able to vote in the New York Republican primary for her father.
If one does not like any of the existing parties, fine, don’t belong to one, but do not pretend that voting for the “candidate” in the general election is not wrapped up with what party the candidate is wrapped up with. It is a lazy ignorant non-engagement to vote “based on the candidate” as if party does not matter. A lot of people voted for Donald Trump because he was a Republican who would then have a party apparat to help make things happen. It is also why he ran as a Republican.
Now if Ivanka had just left it at this: (Salon)
“I am not a surrogate. I am a daughter”
Whether or not Gore thinks so, maybe the meeting with Ivanka was no different in substance than what we presume was the case in Gore’s same day meeting with P.E. Trump. In the latter case we hope merely a pro-forma indulgence and /or superficial political correctness. Trumps transition leaders for the Department of Energy portend real change. Let’s leave that at that as well.
