Have you noticed that, this time, Trump isn't bothering to claim he's |hiring the very best people?"
Lutnick is another billionaire corporate huckster who was a
campaign bagman for Trump, and now he’s Trump’s pick to become Commerce
Secretary. But first, he’s been tasked with picking hordes of corporate
loyalists to be placed in Trump’s government as friendly “regulators” of
corporate hucksterism.
Convenient, huh? This is what Trump & Company mean by
saying they’ll make the government “efficient.” Instead of corporate powers
having to lobby regulators to get special favors, corporate officials
will become the regulators. That is so much smoother for
Lutnick and his ilk, who look forward to four free-wheeling years of devouring
our economy.
In choosing who to police corporate price gouging, workplace
rules, bank rip-offs, and such, Lutnick has been calling Wall Streeters,
Silicon Valley tech bosses, corporate giants, and billionaires, telling them to
send their best operatives to Trump’s regime. “Let’s
get them into government,” he exults!
Notice that he’s not calling any union leaders, consumer protectors, or other real public interest watchdogs.
By the way, Lutnick himself is in line to profit from the
corporate feeding frenzy he’s now staffing. He is invested in everything from
health care profiteers to cryptocurrency flimflams — and while he’s been doing
Trump’s work, he’s simultaneously been pushing Congress to do favors for his
personal holdings.
But he insists that there is no conflict of interest in his
efforts. After all, he says with a straight-face, he holds his government
policy meetings in separate rooms from his own business pleadings.
And that paper-thin wall of separation is Trump’s new ethical standard for protecting us from raw corporate greed.
OtherWords columnist Jim Hightower is a radio commentator, writer, and public speaker. This op-ed was distributed by OtherWords.org.
