A Cabinet of buffoons, bomb throwers, and bottom-feeders?

Republican Senators get to decide

In the world of Cabinet nominations, there are exemplary picks, competent choices within the ideological mainstream, competent choices outside the mainstream, and candidates who don’t quite have the experience or chops.

With the arrival of Mr. Trump’s initial selections, it’s time for new categories.

This will be a Cabinet of buffoons, bomb-throwers, and bottom-feeders.

If, that is, the Republican Senate allows it to be. More on that in a moment.

Buffoons, bomb-throwers, and bottom-feeders. These are strong terms. They’re not kind. They’re not respectful. This is not how I typically talk about people.

Yet, with the exception of Marco Rubio and arguably a couple others, taking this group seriously means embracing an alternate reality where nine-year-olds manage porn companies and cats compete in horse races. That’s how nutty these selections are. By “nutty,” I mean so dangerous and irresponsible that only dark humor can allow me to picture them in office without becoming either deranged or depressed.

Someone quoted today in either the Times or Post described these selections as “performance art.”

Here’s a Democratic campaign ad in 2026, as envisioned by David Frum: “Trump appointed a sex trafficker as Attorney General. He appointed a Russian asset as Director of National Intelligence. And he appointed a man who refuses to wash his hands after he goes to the toilet to take care of the health of our troops.”

Nice.

And sad.

That’s the thing about this group of nominees. It’s hard to talk about them without sounding either jaded or outraged. That’s how outside the mainstream of competence and seriousness these folks are.

The decision of who gets these jobs matters. It’s not like we’re talking about marginal departments. If confirmed (or appointed on a Senate recess), Matt Gaetz will run the Justice Department. Pete Hegseth will be in charge of all of the armed forces. People in these roles do big things. If they don’t know what they’re doing and/or are the President’s lapdogs, bad stuff happens. Count on it.

I’ve been wondering what position Marjorie Taylor Greene will get. She thinks wildfires are caused by Jewish space lasers, so Ambassador to Israel would be a natural fit. But that spot’s already taken. I asked a friend what he thought of her chairing an antisemitism task force. Nope. Not Cabinet level. He proposed NASA.

That sounds like a sick joke, but while writing this, I received word that RFK, Jr. will get the nod for Health and Human Services. In the summer of 1990, I interned there in the legislative office. It was a Republican administration. They didn’t do much. But everyone there agreed that vaccinating children was a good idea. Not RFK, Jr.

I’m making light of all this as a coping strategy. Being shrill is exhausting. Being cynical makes you a party pooper. So I allow myself a few laughs at these nominees’ expenses. If they were clients in my leadership coaching practice, I wouldn’t speak about them like this. (I also wouldn’t accept them as clients). But as a citizen dedicated to lighthearted sobriety, I reserve the right to call a buffoon a buffoon.

Which brings us back to Matt Gaetz, the man known for having “the most punchable face in politics.” Look at it, and tell me if you disagree. I stopped punching people in elementary school, but if I were forced at gunpoint to start the practice again, I’d go straight to Mr. Gaetz.

Many Republican Senators apparently feel similarly. Although they seem inclined in general to rubber stamp the President-elect’s picks, Gaetz may be a bridge too far to cross. Many think even less of him than they think of Ted Cruz, the most unpopular person in the Senate. Ouch.

This raises an important point about where we direct our attention. Mr. Trump and his nominees suck up most of the oxygen. But the central actors in this saga are Republican Senators, especially those on the Judiciary Committee. They have two big decisions to make: first, do we follow Mr. Trump’s orders to circumvent the Constitution by allowing recess appointments? Second, if the answer is no, do we give a thumbs up to buffoons, bomb throwers, and bottom-feeders?

Veteran journalist James Fallows has been harping on this point for years. During Mr. Trump’s impeachment hearings, Fallows pointed out that all it would take to convict Mr. Trump were a handful of GOP senators willing to defect from the party line. After last week’s election, he noted the one thing that could have stopped Mr. Trump’s election: not Biden stepping aside sooner, not different campaign tactics by Harris, not a taming of “wokeness,” but Mitch McConnell, in January 2021, voting to convict Mr. Trump in his second impeachment trial and asking several other Republicans to do the same. In the words of Boston College philosophy professor, David Storey, recent guest on my podcast, How My View Grew, McConnell “had the kill shot and didn’t take it.”

Let’s not let Republican Senators off the hook by giving Mr. Trump and his nominees all the airtime. Let’s focus at least as much on these Senators. They have authority to accept or decline Mr. Trump’s selections. They own these choices. They own this saga. They have the power to create a Cabinet of buffoons, bomb throwers, and bottom-feeders. Or they can choose to demand something better.

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