I wrote recently that with Brexit, the UK is experimenting on itself. The Trump administration is doing something similar: it’s testing the theory that the US can be run without experts. Trump’s point-man for China, Iraq and the Israeli-Palestinian question is Jared Kushner, a real estate heir. Scott Pruitt, who heads the Environmental Protection Agency, has no scientific training. The administration seems to be handling North Korea almost without reference to diplomats or Korea experts. And senator Lindsey Graham, who ran the latest Republican push to dismantle Obamacare, admitted afterwards that he’d started from ignorance: “Well, I’ve been doing it for about a month. I thought everybody else knew what the hell they were talking about, but apparently not.”
我最近寫過，英國正在通過脫歐(Brexit)拿自己做實驗。川普政府也在幹類似的事：他們正在驗證一個理論，離了專家美國也照樣玩得轉。川普在中國、伊拉克及巴以問題上的偵察兵傑瑞德•庫許納(Jared Kushner)，是個地產集團繼承人。美國國家環境保護局(EPA)局長史考特•普魯伊特(Scott Pruitt)，沒有受過科學訓練。川普政府在處理北韓問題時看上去幾乎不徵詢外交官或北韓問題專家們的意見。而最近一次代表共和黨爲廢除歐巴馬醫改計劃(Obamacare)做出努力的參議員林賽•葛瑞姆(Lindsey Graham)後來承認,他開始做這件事時對情況一無所知：「好吧，我幹了差不多一個月。我以爲別人都知道他們到底在說啥，但顯然不是這麼回事。」