And Then They Came for the Librarians...

~ I wrote the following in response to a friend who referenced this article in the New York Times - https://www.nytimes.com/2025/05/10/us/education-politics-learning.html?searchResultPosition=3 "I found the New York Times article's title intriguing enough to subscribe so I could read it. Not a hopeful picture of education but here are my thoughts. - I think learning is still a priority for the Democrats and independents of this country and they will always support a free and diverse curriculum. The GOP/MAGA on the other hand, seem to want an uneducated citizenry who will blindly follow whatever leader is in power. Hence, the elimination of the Dept. of Education, attacks on institutions of higher learning, the defunding of libraries and museums, and the latest - the firing of the Librarian of Congress, a smart, well-educated (Strike1), black (Strike 2) woman (Strike3). - In their plans for education as well as their overall political rhetoric, the GOP/MAGAs seem to be capitalizing on the shorter attention span that social media has spawned in the past decade or so - hence we end up with Steve Bannon’s “food the zone” tactics at every turn. - Somewhere along the road we lost the notion that education is not a business. It does not need to make money - it should be an investment in people and their futures and by extension, the future of our country. But politics, both local and national, raised their hand and got involved and here we are. The MAGAs are all about the dollars and so anything that has intrinsic value gets monetized. (See selling off public lands for logging and development.) ~ I fear that the orange man’s choice of a new Librarian of Congress will be yet another unqualified bright shiny object and/or another attempt to troll the Dems. I have worked in a library under a top administrator who received his title because he earned an advanced degree (not in Library Science!!!) and the college administration didn’t know what to do with him so they made him the Dean of Libraries. It was a disaster - he had no idea what anyone in the library did, what the mission was, what basic practices were. But, boy, was he ever good at taking credit for everyone’s work and schmoozing at conferences. He would be Trump’s choice for sure. (Perish the thought.)" ~ And today it was announced that Trump has named one of his gaggle of attorneys, Todd Blanche, as the new acting Librarian of Congress. Blanche is currently the Deputy Attorney General, confirmed in a 52 - 46 vote back in March. He was one of the team representing Trump in the 2024 criminal trial that resulted in the 34 charges against the President. Other clients include Rudy Guliani and Paul Manafort, not known for their scruples or respect for the law. I suppose it could have been worse - it could have been MTG or Bobert, although I guess he's been told by the GOP heads to keep his hands off current members of Congress (see Elise Stefanik.) ~ In other news, Trump has declared that the government of Qatar wants to gift (grift???) him a Boeing 747 with all the regal trappings for him to use as Air Force 1 until Boeing can get the planes he ordered to him , hopefully before he leave office. Of course, there are arrangements that will somehow by-pass the emoluments clause - the plane will actually be given to the military and will transfer to the Trump presidential library once he leaves office. Should be plenty of room in there for that 747 because there certainly won't be any books - Maybe some old classified documents but no books. Good place to note that like his boss, FBI director Kash Patel also has a problem focusing on his daily briefings and "adjustments" have been made. Good God - I just want a competent government, not a bunch of cosplaying social media hounds.