KOA Headlines
11 15 24 Atlantic writer Tom Nichols on several of Trump's announces cabinet picks
But there's only one feeling like knowing your banker personally, like growing up with a bank you can count on, like being sure what you've earned is safe, secure, and local. There's only one feeling like knowing you're supporting your community. You deserve more from a bank. You deserve an institution that stood strong for generations. Bank of Colorado, there's only one. Member FDIC. Head over to NFLShop.com today for the largest collection of officially licensed gear from all your favorite brands. NFL Shop is your ultimate destination for the official NFL sideline collection worn by players and coaches on game day. Explore the same sideline and on-fuel gear worn by your favorite players and coaches at NFL Shop. To shop now, go to NFLShop.com. Looking for excitement, Chumba Casino is here. Play anytime, play anywhere. Play on the train, play at the store, play at home, play when you're bored. Play today for your chance to win and get daily bonuses when you log in. So what are you waiting for? Don't delay. Chumba Casino is free to play. Experience social gameplay like never before. Go to Chumba Casino right now to play hundreds of games, including online slots, bingo, slingo, and more. Live the Chumba Life. Chumba Casino.com. BTW Group. No purchase necessary. Board work, prohibited by law. See terms and conditions. 18 Plus. The recent cabinet nominees of President-elect Trump has experts and professionals in the realms along with some lawmakers on both sides of the aisle scratching their heads of Fox News weekend anchor and former service member nominated for the Secretary of Defense and a former congresswoman who seems to be cozy with foreign dictators and adversaries at the U.S. as director of national intelligence just to name a two. Joining us now in the KOA Commisspreet Health Hotline former aid and advisor to the late Pennsylvania Senator John Hines, retired naval war college professor and expert on Russia and author and current writer for the Atlantic. It's Tom Nichols. Tom, welcome back to Colorado's Morning News. You had first foretold that the picks by President-elect Trump would be way different this time than his first presidency, but are they even more outside of what you thought they originally would be? Well, yes. I keep thinking that if Saturday Night Live or the onion had done this and suggested that this would be the Trump cabinet, that the Republicans would be complaining about bias in the media. But he went there. I mean, he has gone full trolling, I think, on some of these. I think these are picks that are, in a way, they're kind of spiteful. He picked them specifically because he knows how much they're going to make people angry. And he thinks that when people are angry, and I think this is true of a lot of his supporters, he thinks that if a lot of people are angry, he's doing the right thing. That chaos means that he's succeeding. But this isn't a rally, this isn't a talk show, this isn't an episode of The Apprentice. When you're talking about putting Robert F. Kennedy at Health and Human Services, you're talking about endangering the lives of tens, hundreds of millions of people, including our children, including kids and grandchildren, and older people, and a lot of other very vulnerable folks. At some point, it's not funny anymore. It's bad enough. I would say the four worst picks so far have been Pete Haggseth, which I think is actually the most dangerous of all of these picks because you can't take somebody like that and put them in the nuclear chain of command, Tulsi Gabbard, who I've written about, who I think is a national security risk, and of course Matt Gates, who I think has no chance of making it, and I suspect was thrown out there as chum or as a distraction. But these are people's lives in danger now, and I think I hope that even Trump's own supporters and the Senate get out of political mode and start getting back into the mode of protecting the American people. Well, Tom, you said that Matt Gates has no chance of making it, but how many of these will actually go through? Will President-elect Trump convince Senate Republicans in order to pass all these? Or can any go through in any other logistical sense without Senate approval? Oh, he has options. If the Senate caves, I mean, this all really one of the most important people in America right now is John Thune, the new majority leader. I suspect that Trump would probably accept throwing Gates overboard because Gates is just so hated in Washington, even within his own party, and then says, "But I want everybody else." And if he can't get that, there is a thing called recess appointments where the Senate can decide, "We're not in session, we're just not available." And the Constitution in that case says that the President can simply snap his fingers and appoint people. Now they're only good, their appointments would only last to the end of the legislative session, but in this case, that would be two years, and it would be long enough for all kinds of chaos and all kinds of terrible things to happen and for people's lives to be in danger. But he can do that only if Senator Thune decides to go along with that. Remember that Mitch McConnell took Barack Obama to court overdoing that and went to the Supreme Court and won. So, of course, with the Supreme Court, they seem determined to let Trump do whatever he wants as well, but this all now will come down to whether or not John Thune and other Republican senators take their duty seriously under the Constitution. I wanted to ask this about Michael Anton and Sebastian Gortner and Gortner in the running to be a Trump's deputy national security adviser. I just say this since they talk about being America first, neither of those gentlemen, and North Tulsi Gabbard seemed to be America first in the sense of looking out for America's interests, for at least based on their record coming into this. Right, Gabbard in particular has spent years defending Bashar Assad in Syria and making excuses for Vladimir Putin. And now you can see why this morning, the president-elect doesn't want the FBI to vet these choices. He doesn't want the standard background checks that normally would apply to cabinet officers. He just simply wants to waive them into their jobs without the Senate, without any kind of background checks, without any kind of security checks. And of course, the people who have been defending these picks have been saying, "Well, not to worry. Of course, they have to go through the standard FBI security clearance and vetting process. Trump doesn't want that now, and you have to ask yourself, if the president-elect doesn't want his people to get a security check, it's because he knows there's something bad in there." And that should raise a question about whether these are people you want near the Defense Department, the National Intelligence Services, the Department of Health for that matter, but certainly in the military and intelligence fields. Tom, can anything ever be considered a conflict of interest when it comes to a cabinet position like Elon Musk, he's running SpaceX and the Department of Government Efficiency, what would happen if all of a sudden SpaceX started getting more government contracts than any other department? This administration will be, just as his last administration was, a carnival of conflicts of interest. And I suppose I would suggest that the president-elect supporters, imagine if a Democratic president took one of the biggest defense contractors and said, "Come in and help run the government while holding on to all of your other businesses." There would be a complete uproar about this. But Trump kind of waves a hand and says, "Yeah, but when I do it, it's different." But legally, it's not different. These are immense conflicts of interest. Whether they're legal conflicts of interest, I'll leave that to lawyers. But I'm a former federal employee. I spent 25 years working for the Department of Defense. I can tell you that these are ethical conflicts that no ordinary federal employee would even be allowed to be within 1,000 yards of doing what a lot of these Trump appointees are going to do. It's really shameful. And it's bad for the government. I mean, on top of everything else, it's just bad government and it's bad for policymaking and for our national security and defense. Tom, and wrapping up with you, this is a story that's right in our backyard, the future space command based in Colorado Springs. It seems to be in jeopardy again, President-elect Trump has signaled he wants to move space command to Huntsville, Alabama. Any sense or understanding an insight into that about that move, and it seems political, but from your perch, where is the best place for space command? We're biased. We think right in Colorado Springs with all the infrastructure that's already there. Well, as you can imagine, I don't have any insight or contacts deep in the Trump administration. But I can tell you that when I was a boy, the giant strategic air command base that I grew up next to was closed after the 1972 election by Richard Nixon. So you can draw your own conclusions there about how states vote and where things go. But that's because this is, and as I've been warning for many years, this is a very vengeful guy. He doesn't do what's in the best interest of the country or American citizens. He does things that are in his best interest. And if you cross him, he hurts people. And in this case, it looks like it might be Coloradans paying the price this time. Retired Naval War college professor and expert on Russia, author and current writer for The Atlantic, it's Tom Nichols. Thank you so much for your time here this morning. There's only one feeling like knowing your banker personally, like growing up with a bank you can count on, like being sure what you've earned is safe, secure and local. There's only one feeling like knowing you're supporting your community. You deserve more from a bank. You deserve an institution that stood strong for generations. Bank of Colorado, there's only one. Remember FDIC. Hey, it's Ryan Seacrest. Life comes at you fast, which is why it's important to find some time to relax a little you time. Enter Chumba Casino with no download required. You can jump on anytime, anywhere for the chance to redeem some serious prizes. So treat yourself with Chumba Casino and play over a hundred online casino style games all for free. Go to chumbakassino.com to collect your free welcome bonus sponsored by Chumba Casino. No purchase necessary. VGW Group. Void where prohibited by law. 18+ terms and conditions apply.