Tom Nichols: The Buzz Has Worn Off
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What challenges is Trump facing in the current political climate?
President Trump made the right moves to get Puerto Rico out of a mess, putting private enterprise to work.
The electrical grid and other infrastructure were already in very, very poor shape. They were at their life's end prior to the hurricanes. And now virtually everything has been wiped out. We're literally starting from scratch.
But Governor Gonzales Colon thinks she knows better. Innovative companies ran to meet the challenge to rebuild Puerto Rico's grid. Now she's blowing up a valid contract to siphon money back to her closest political advisors. President Trump puts real businesses to work instead of fueling government waste. Don't let the governor send Puerto Rico back to square one. Support the rule of law. Visit PuertoRicoInvestment.org. Paid for by the Committee for Puerto Rican Investment Incorporated. President Trump made the right moves to get Puerto Rico out of a mess, putting private enterprise to work.
The electrical grid and other infrastructure were already in very, very poor shape. They were at their life's end prior to the hurricanes. And now virtually everything has been wiped out. We're literally starting from scratch.
But Governor González Colón thinks she knows better. Innovative companies ran to meet the challenge to rebuild Puerto Rico's grid. Now she's blowing up a valid contract to siphon money back to her closest political advisors. President Trump puts real businesses to work instead of fueling government waste. Don't let the governor send Puerto Rico back to square one. Support the rule of law. Visit PuertoRicoInvestment.org. Paid for by the Committee for Puerto Rican Investment, Inc.
Hello and welcome to the Bulwark Podcast. I'm your host, Tim Miller. By popular demand for Christmas, we've brought to you our in-house Ebenezer. He's a staff writer at The Atlantic and professor emeritus at U.S. Naval War College. His books include The Death of Expertise. It's Tom Nichols. How are you doing, sir? You're a powerful speaker, sir. I wonder you don't go into parliament. We needed a little Scrooge, you know? If you want my corn, gentlemen, you'll have to meet my price.
Yeah.
Other than that, I'm great. Tim, how are you? I'm doing pretty good. Things are bad for Trump and all my podcast competitors are feuding. And I'm well. You're like Switzerland in the middle of all this. I was looking at the rankings, it's like feuding, feuding, feuding, anti-Semite, feuding. Anyway, we've got a lot to talk about today. And based on your expertise and my lack of expertise, I figured we'd start with the discussion of the new ships. We're getting some new big fancy ships, apparently. Donald Trump did a press conference yesterday announcing he had, we have a new fleet, a golden fleet of really big boats. So there you go. Could you tell us a little bit about this? It's nuts. Yeah, it's nuts.
Is there anything else you'd like to know?
I mean, I've been under the impression that we do need new boats, that we're a little bit behind China on the boat front. So, you know, maybe there's something not nuts about this or what's the nuts part? You know, first of all, what the Navy has figured out, and I don't know, you know, I'm not really a close observer of the Navy, only having taught for 25 years at the Naval War College. Over these years, what the Navy figured out is, no, we need to be maneuverable, fast, lighter, more float like a butterfly, sting like a bee, more maneuverable. What Donald Trump wants are big. He's in love with the idea of battleships. We have to have battleships. You know, big battleships. Big green boats, maybe.
Golden boats, because gold floats. The mainstay of the American fleet right now is the Arleigh Burke destroyer. And those are pretty good ships. By the way, when you say ships for the surface fleet, you say boats, people think submarines. So we're going to say ships to be good navalists. Got it, okay. What trucks are posing are ships that are like three times the size of an Arleigh Burke because what he really wants is like – he's so stuck in his youth.
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