The New Robber Barons and Single Party Government
By
Leonard Zwelling
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/01/18/opinion/trump-inauguration-indoors-cold.html
I think that one of the keys to Donald Trump’s victory in 2024 was the belief of the majority of the American people that he was the better choice to keep us safe. In the second op-ed above, Peggy Noonan (WSJ, January 18) discusses this in the context of the California wild fires. To summarize, California’s government was so busy “preoccupied not enough by primary responsibilities of government and too much by unquantifiable secondary and tertiary issues—world climate change, notions of equity.”
The response to the fires has been inadequate. Resources were short. Fire crews stretched. The government was not able to protect many of the people in California. Many.
Noonan blames much of this on one party rule in California. There was no competition in government. “You can’t govern successfully for long as a one-party state.” Lest we forget, Texas too is a one-party state. Is Texas ready for a disaster of its own? The freeze of a few years ago and Hurricane Harvey suggest the answer is no.
A monopoly in government is bad for good governance.
In the first op-ed, Maureen Dowd bemoans the return of Trump in the context of January 6. She is horrified that America chose to return an insurrectionist President who tried to block the peaceful transition of power four years ago and now he is bringing along his billionaire buddies from Silicon Valley, making sure he extends their tax cuts, and in general creates a new American oligarchy putatively chosen by the American people. For this, she and I blame Biden.
In 2020 Joe Biden had only one job—get rid of Trump. He did it.
Four years later he had another, make sure Trump never comes back. He failed.
It is not far-fetched to imagine a recreation of the trusts of Teddy Roosevelt’s time led by Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg aiming to control information, a commodity almost as valuable as Rockefeller’s oil.
While I understand that over half of the country thinks:
- Trump really won in 2020
- Trump was guilty of no crimes but was the victim of Justice Department abuse.
- Only Trump can save America from itself
- The new robber barons are a force for good.
All of this is wrong. I believe that it will all be proved to be wrong. And I don’t think it will take very long.
As for one-party rule, whether in Texas, California, or Washington, it always leads to bad governance.
And, while we are thinking about heavy-handed, unopposed rule and bad governance, beware at MD Anderson. It couldn’t handle the last hurricane. Now it’s closing before the freeze. This may be indicative of bad decision making. The latest closure may have been wise. Either way, it is certainly indicative of one-party rule.
In theory, MD Anderson is not political. LOL! It’s a state agency with a budget in the billions. There needs to be some oversight of the leadership. There is none. Now there have been three presidential implosions in a row at Anderson. Maybe MD Anderson needs another party watching. Someone ought to be.
