The Danger Of Incompetence In High Places

Pick your adjective:  The level of incompetence in the White House is:

• a)Frightening
• b)Staggering
• c)Mind boggling
• d)All the above

Example 3041:  Late yesterday Axios broke the story of a bill drafted in the White House that would allow the United States to withdraw from the World Trade Organization.  From Axios:

• The draft legislation is stunning. The bill essentially provides Trump a license to raise U.S. tariffs at will, without congressional consent and international rules be damned.

Just to be clear, this stands zero chance of passage.  Imagine the turmoil in the world markets if Trump could, on a whim, withdraw the U.S. from a trade pact.

From Jonathan Bernstein at Bloomberg: 

• “Why does it exist, then? Because Trump ordered it, and sometimes the best way to mollify a president is to give him what he wants — very slowly, and without anything actually happening.
• “The president ordered something inept; he’s not going to get what he wanted; and everyone in the administration has egg on their faces over it.
• “What’s even more amazing about this is that Trump seems to be oblivious to all of it. For all we know, he really thinks that North Korea is giving up its nuclear weapons (it isn’t), the border wall is under construction (nope), and that he’s going to get his Space Force (seems extremely unlikely, even if Trump thinks wars against the Pentagon bureaucracy are good and easy to win). “

It seems like a joke, but it isn’t funny.  Perhaps someone in the White House knew just how ridiculous this  idea was.