The Silver Linings of the New Trump Administration

Many antiwar dissidents were justifiably alarmed by President-elect Donald Trump’s recent appointments for important foreign policy positions—especially Marco Rubio and Mike Waltz. Despite this, other aspects of Trump’s electoral victory should give the same group reason for excitement.

The first and most obvious is that Trump’s ascension represents one of the final nails in the coffin of the corporate media. In recent years, cable networks devoted enormous energy to the Russiagate hoax, the “fine people” hoax, and the January 6 “insurrection” narrative, all while portraying Joe Biden as “sharp as a tack” and selling Kamala Harris as a uniquely qualified candidate and perennial source of joy. Trump’s defeat of Harris, then, means that huge swaths of Americans either questioned its most ridiculous narratives or rejected them entirely.

Make no mistake, the influence of the corporate media has been dwindling for some time. By early 2022, Joe Rogan was already getting more viewers per show than all of his corporate media competitors by a significant margin, and audiences have been flocking to corporate media alternatives.

However, Trump’s victory a few weeks ago seems to epitomize this trend, and his campaign was widely viewed as a repudiation of nearly every establishment narrative. This moment—along with Elon Musk’s acquisition of X—may well indicate the end of corporate media dominance in America.

Several of Trump’s domestic policy appointments are also guaranteed to be a vast improvement over the status quo in Washington, D.C. Standing out among them is Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Trump’s selection to head the Health and Human Services Department, particularly because health was a clear centerpiece of Kennedy’s campaign.

The progenitor of one of his country’s most famous political dynasties, Kennedy has long drawn the ire of establishment politicians for his controversial views on war, the CIA, the military industrial complex, and other topics. Even so, nothing attracted the rage of the political establishment more than Kennedy’s criticism of the COVID regime and his attacks on Fauci.

Because the CDC, FDA, NIH, and other agencies would report directly to Kennedy—should he be confirmed by the Senate—we are unlikely to see any of the draconian COVID guidelines resurrected under a new government “emergency,” nor any of the excesses that transpired during that time.

Another slap in the face to the deep state was the appointment of Tulsi Gabbard for Director of National Intelligence. The defected Democrat has been a fierce critic of many of America’s foreign entanglements and has consequently been smeared as a “Russian asset.” Gabbard has her foreign policy shortcomings—especially when it comes to Israel—but no one can deny she’s a godsend compared to the countless monsters of the deep state who have held that position since it was created in 2004.

And now we come to the new Department of Government Efficiency—or DOGE—headed by Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy. The latter has promised that the new institution will eliminate wasteful spending, enact mass federal layoffs, and even lead to the deletion of “entire agencies.” One dissident camp says DOGE is merely a flashy, toothless entity that won’t be able to enact real change in Washington, while the other believes that the same commission will successfully lead to a substantial reduction in government waste and to the total elimination of state agencies.

While the mere thought of DOGE’s purpose swells my dissident heart, I am tempered in my expectations for it because of obvious political hurdles. Even so, if the institution fails to accomplish all its stated goals, Elon Musk has promised to blast DOGE’s government waste findings all over social media.

The result is that millions of Americans will be exposed to the absurd expenditures and corruption of the federal regime for the first time in their lifetimes, and some will doubt that the swarms of federal workers and agencies who employ them are even needed at all. No matter how you slice it, that’s a great thing for all opponents of bloated and tyrannical government.

It remains to be seen which of Trump’s nominations will be confirmed by the Senate, but his domestic program and corresponding appointments seem to give Americans some tangible hope in areas where it hasn’t been found in their lifetimes.

With maximal liberty as our north star, dissidents must continue to tread the path of America’s corrupt political system in the Trump era with a skeptical mind, but to make the most of things whenever they happen to fall our way. As Thomas Jefferson put it, “the ground of liberty is to be gained by inches, that we must be contented to secure what we can get from time to time, and eternally press forward for what is yet to get.”