An by impossible I don’t mean the election of Donald Trump to the presidentcy of the United States. It was always “possible” just very improbable. No, by impossible I mean conducting an experiment in Political Science. One of the great limitations in studying Politics in a scientific way is the inability to conduct real world experiments. The election of Donald Trump has set us all on the road to a very great experiment.
The experiment is just how well a person who has had NO expreance governing will govern this country. So far we have a few clues from who he is placing in his staff. His chief of staff will be Reince Priebus, a man with a great deal of expreance in politics, but none in real word governing. He does have many contacts with the GOP members who do have governing expreance but little to no contacts with anyone else. Not Democrat, not independent, not anyone of any political persuasion. We will now get to see how well Pres. Trump is able to work out political deals to get work done.
President elect Trump has also placed Steve Bannon, the CEO of Breitbart New in another key position. Mr. Bannon also has no expreance governing. He does have a great deal of expreance selling ideas, what is often call propaganda in Political Science. That the ideas he is selling are often anathema to half the country is not nearly as important as that he has no expreance getting those ideas implemented by government.
So what is the experiment? I think it is can an amateur really do as good a job governing as a professional? I think we will see very soon.