The latest media meme on President-Elect Donald Trump is that his presidential transition effort is in "chaos," "total disarray," etc. Establishment press outlets from the supposedly chastened (but not really) New York Times, to the Associated Press, to the fever swamps at the Huffington Post, are relentlessly playing that tune.
As Bret Baier at Fox News noted on Special Report Wednesday night, this hysterical overreaction has no historical basis. In fact, no party-changing presidential transition in the past 50 years has seen a single appointment take place during the first two weeks after the incoming administration's electoral victory.
In the past seven transitions going back to Richard Nixon in 1968, only George H.W. Bush made any cabinet appointments during the transition's first two weeks. Four of the seven, including Bill Clinton in 1992, made no appointments until Week six. Most recently, Barack Obama had made just one of 15 cabinet appointments by the end of the 2008-2009 transition's third week.
Here's the Fox graphic:
As Charles Krauthammer noted in the Special Report panel discussion, this media obsession is "sort of a tempest in a teapot." More than "sort of," Charles.
The video segment below has three parts. It begins with President Obama, Trump campaign manager Kellyanne Conway, and Vice President Joe Biden saying what one would expect the top people in the outgoing and incoming administrations to be saying. Baier then presents the graphic. Krauthammer's reaction follows:
Transcript (beginning with Segment two, i.e., Baier's analysis, at the 0:28 mark; bolds are mine throughout this post):
(Second segment)
BRET BAIER: In the New York Times today, the headline: "Firings and Discord Put Trump Transition Team in a State of Disarray."
The President-elect tweeting out last night, "Very organized process taking place as I decide on cabinet and many other positions. I am the only one who knows who the finalists are."
Continuing this morning, "The failing New York Times story is so totally wrong on transition. It's going so smoothly. Also, I have spoken to many foreign leaders." And they put out a long list of foreign leaders who have spoken to the President-elect and the Vice President-elect today.
If you take a look at the presidential campaign announcements, in the cabinet announcements from previous presidents, you can kind of follow this chart. And this is the number of weeks you see on the left, Week 1, 2, 3.
President Obama, nearly three weeks before he made an announcement to his cabinet in 2008. There you see Bush 43, who obviously had a unique situation in the recount in 2000. But Reagan was in Week 6 when he made his first announcement, and President Carter in 1976, Week 5 before he made an announcement. Again, it's been one week and one day.
(Third segment)
BAIER: Charles, your take on all this and how it's being covered.
CHARLES KRAUTHAMMER: I think the coverage is slightly over the top. In fact, it's remarkably over the top. First of all, as you showed in that chart, historically there's nothing unusual about not having made an announcement after one week and one day.
Second, the Trump campaign has been described as "in disarray" since about January, and he won the election. And third, I don't think there's any question that if we come to Inauguration Day and we don't have, say, a Secretary of Commerce nominated, the foundations of the republic will not be threatened.
So I think this is sort of a tempest in a teapot.
Bush 41, with four early appointments, is the chart's one exception. That's because the Reagan-Bush 41 transition is the only circumstance presented where the executive branch was given over to a President of the same political party as his predecessor. Additionally, Bush was the first sitting vice-president to immediately achieve the presidency since Martin Van Buren in 1836. Baier's chart shows that no party-changing presidential transition going back to Dick Nixon almost 50 years ago has had a single announced appointment during its first two weeks.
Meanwhile, at PoliZette, Jim Stinson has observed with justifiable dismay that "(the) press (is) actively working to undermine the president-elect's preparation for office," and appears to be getting help from sore losers in the Obama administration:
Media Lusts for Trump Transition Instability
... This should be a time when the media offers advice and helpful historic context.
Editorial boards should tell people to come together. Mild-mannered journalists at great metropolitan newspapers should be urging Trump to hire statesmen and experienced leaders as Cabinet members.
It’s not happening. Instead, there is outright media lust for failure, even expressions of hatred and disgust for the new president-elect.
... "Traditionally, media gives an incoming president a honeymoon period before taking the gloves off," said Adriana Cohen, a Boston Herald columnist and talk show host for the BostonHerald.com. "But with Donald Trump, there won't be a honeymoon period with the press at all."
... An interesting tidbit within the (Huffington Post) story is that the Obama administration is leaking to the press about the transition. Normally, that would raise questions within the media of partisan sabotage. Is President Obama trying to hurt the incoming administration, or are they genuinely concerned the transition isn't moving fast enough?
... the media has seamlessly moved on from a pre-election Trump frenzy — to a post-election Trump frenzy.
But this time Trump is the president-elect. Cheerleading for his transition or presidency to fail is dangerous. It should be beneath the media to do so, but it isn't. They have proved they have learned nothing from Nov. 8.
That includes the New York Times, whose post-election pledge to its readers "to report America and the world honestly" didn't last a week.
Cross-posted at BizzyBlog.com.
