Mattis on Moscow Trump doesn’t seem to mind advisers who disagree with him.
http://www.wsj.com/articles/mattis-on-moscow-1484266642
Perhaps you’ve heard that the dark night of fascist conformity is about to descend on America in the form of the Trump Administration. We’ll let you know when it arrives. But meantime the news at this week’s various confirmation hearings was how often the nominees disagreed with the President-elect who nominated them.
Take Donald Trump’s choice to run the Pentagon, retired Marine Corps Gen. James Mattis, who spent three hours Thursday in front of the Senate Armed Services Committee. Mr. Trump has gone out of his way to praise Vladimir Putin and suggest the U.S. and Russia can find a new and better relationship.
Gen. Mattis offered a more skeptical view. “I’m all for engagement, but we also have to recognize reality and what Russia is up to,” he told the Senators. “There are a decreasing number of areas where we can engage cooperatively and an increasing number of areas in which we will have to confront Russia.”
He added, rightly in our view, that Mr. Putin “is trying to break the North Atlantic alliance” and that Russia ranks among the main threats to the U.S. The general vowed to continue the new military deployments on NATO’s eastern front and said he supports a permanent U.S. presence in the three Baltic states on the northwest Russian border.
In other examples, Rex Tillerson, Mr. Trump’s nominee for Secretary of State, said that as Exxon CEO he supported the Pacific free trade deal, which Mr. Trump wants to kill. Mike Pompeo, the CIA nominee, disavowed harsh interrogation techniques, though Mr. Trump said in the campaign that he might revive waterboarding against terrorist detainees.
Presidents get the last word on policy. But these differences ought to reassure Americans that Mr. Trump is assembling a cabinet of serious men and women who know their own mind. And whatever one thinks about Mr. Trump’s views, he doesn’t seem to mind advisers who are willing to disagree with him. Presumably those advisers have enough self confidence that they won’t be shrinking violets when they debate the hard questions of governance.
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