[SpicyLemonZest]

Once you accept that Trump is literally senile, a lot of things click into place. Why does he seem unable to predict obvious consequences of the actions he takes? Why does he fixate on random mean words and repeat them with no regard for normal political strategy? Why does he randomly fall asleep on camera?

When he says that he has no reason to worry because the polls show everyone loves him, I think he genuinely believes that.

[cmrdporcupine]

That's a given, but what is the excuse for Bessent and so on, who are clearly very smart. Just in a really bad way.

[kashunstva]

Bessent is really smart? It’s possible he may be; but he communicates so poorly, that unless you knew anything of his background (I do not.) then it would be hard to assess. If he understands anything about monetary policy, apart from personal enrichment - which of course is a given in this administration, one couldn’t discern that from his public utterances.

[cmrdporcupine]

I'd say it's not ... smart about economics. No, he clearly is not. He's a blunt ideological tool for a kleptocracy.

More smart about politics and power in the Machiavellian sense.

[SpicyLemonZest]

They correctly understand that a boss who randomly assigns them new shoes (https://archive.is/2Z4qS) is too far gone and will not reward them for bringing attention to political issues he thinks are fake news. I'm sure Bessent is already planning his tell-all memoir about how he worked hard behind the scenes against the scheming viziers who were causing all the problems.

[thatguy0900]

To some extent those people have all been vastly enriching themselves with insider trading. They're going to be getting pardons as well. What's the worst that will probably happen to them, they retire to some country with their new fortunes?