In early April, Stephen Bannon, the current president's chief political advisor was removed as a principal from the National Security Council.
To anyone with a forward-thinking approach to life, this news was most welcome.
As you may recall, Bannon, a former CEO at Breitbart News, was a proponent of "dismantling the administrative state."
While he remains as the current president's chief political advisor, Bannon's own ill-conceived ideas are no longer as influential in the West Wing.
In further good news, it seems as if Sebastian Gorka, an advisor on national security and a former co-worker of Bannon's at Breitbart, may also be on the way out. Gorka's the same guy who earlier boasted, "the alpha males are back," in Washington.
According to the New York Times, Gorka has been very vocal in stating that violence is an essential part of the teachings of the Quran. He was also a strong proponent of the infamous travel ban that has been twice thwarted in federal courts, being found unconstitutional.
Gorka also had high praise for Michael Flynn, former head of the National Security Council, calling his leadership "sterling," only 12 days before Flynn was forced to resign or face being fired due to lying about his ties to Russia.
In other news, over the weekend Congress averted a potential shutdown of the federal government. While the legislation still needs to be voted on, from all indications it should pass. It includes additional funding for the National Institutes of Health (going against the current president's wishes) and does not contain funding to build the infamous wall across the Mexican border.
The New York Times pointed out that this bipartisan effort may indicate that Congress isn't in total lockstep with the current president - bucking against his wishes to reduce funding for practically all federal agencies not aligned with defense, and not approving funding for the wall.
However positive these pieces of news may be, they are significantly minimized by the report that the current president has invited Rodrigo Duterte, the alpha-male president of the Philippines, to the White House.
Duterte has gained a sordid reputation internationally due to being accused of extrajudicial killings of over 7,000 drug suspects as part of his notorious crackdown on the drug trade.
The New York Times reported that it's not clear if Duterte would even be admitted to the US on a visa, due to human rights abuses, if he were not the leader of a country. "Trump is now morally complicit in future killings (of drug suspects)," said John Sifton, Human Rights Watch's Asian Advocacy Director.
In any event the possibility of Duterte coming to the White House has stunned both critics and allies of the current president.
In terms of the political outlook in D.C., there is still a long road ahead for any person with a progressive-minded world view. That's undeniable.
The current president has only been in office a little over 100 days. Thankfully, he has accomplished very little of what he told his followers he would do "immediately." He has not repealed and replaced our health care system. He has not begun to built a wall. The truncated tax reform plan he proposed will most likely not pass. It's actually a good thing that the current president hasn't been able to deliver on the promises he made to those who voted for him.
He has not yet dismantled the "administrative state," and that's a positive sign. After all it's the same "administrative state" that has given us social security, affordable health care for over 20 million Americans, world-leading scientific research and free public education (K through 12) along with a free press. And while there are constructive things that can be done to strengthen each of these systems, they are worth fighting for and retaining.
For extra credit, you can view Shields & Brooks' analysis of the current president's first 100 days.
Photo Credit: washington.org
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