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Donald J Trump has taken to his month-old presidency with the same brand of brashness, bluster, haste and "gut" instinct that propelled him towards his $US4-5 billion net worth and through the rigours of his against-all-odds victory last November.
Those traits have not served him well so far.
Of all his travails in the White House since January 20, three have unravelled spectacularly to stand as signature errors of a rookie administration:
- The botched implementation of his snap "Muslim ban" executive order on immigration
- The appointment of Mike Flynn as national security adviser
- The abandoned nomination of burger chain CEO Andy Puzder as Secretary of Labour
But in confronting this trifecta of failure, Mr Trump and his team appear to have drawn on the resolve of businessman Trump, tweeted nearly three years earlier:
Only one month into a four-year term, it is far too early to say whether the Trump administration is "winning", but there is enough evidence to suggest it is at least capable of regrouping from the loss of a few battles.
After the horror start to February, dogged by a leaky bureaucracy, nervous relations with allies and deteriorating ties with Congressional Republicans, the White House is close to rendering reversals of the most egregious aspects of its triple folly with:
- A new executive order on immigration — one that actually involved planning to make it implementable
- A national security adviser in General HR McMaster, regarded as an "intellectual", fiercely independently-minded general, also described as "the Colin Powell" of his generation
- An establishment, Harvard-educated Republican lawyer in Alexander Acosta for Labour Secretary
Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly overhauls 'Muslim travel ban'
Unlike the January 27 executive order which threw dual-nationals, green-card work permit holders and inbound travellers into doubt and despair, some degree of planning has gone into how the second version of the "travel ban" will work.
The new regime will come as no consolation to those vehemently opposed in principle to country-specific visa bans — especially those exclusively targeting majority-Muslim nations.
But Mr Kelly has signalled that this time he has had the opportunity to work on "a rollout plan, in particular to make sure that no-one, in a sense, is caught in the system of moving from overseas to our airports".
According to Mr Trump, the revised executive order has also been "tailored" to deal with legal objections that caused the courts to temporarily halt the application of the January order.
Adviser HR McMaster — no Mike Flynn
Second time around, the Trump administration has a far better national security adviser in Herbert Raymond McMaster than it had in the demonstrably flaky Mike Flynn.
General Flynn was a partisan 2016 campaign booster and confidant to Mr Trump with opaque ties to Russia.
Within 24 days of entering the White House, he managed to distinguish himself as untrustworthy — especially towards Vice-President Mike Pence — and was forced to go.
Lieutenant General McMaster is an altogether different proposition.
A serving 3-star General, he had little choice but to take the job once Mr Trump had settled on him as his preferred candidate in a field of roughly half a dozen who were considered.
Lawyer Acosta — no Andrew Puzder
To Australia and the rest of the world beyond US borders, the appointment of a secretary of labour does not register as headline-grabbing material.
But the nomination of Mr Puzder (burger chain Carl's Jnr is among his brands) stands as classic Trump cabinet folly.
Mr Puzder withdrew at the eleventh hour to save himself from the looming humiliation of failing to gain Senate confirmation, once it became clear a handful of Republicans was prepared to vote against him.
A more politically seasoned White House would never have nominated him in the first place — with skeletons in his closet including his tax records, hiring an undocumented migrant as a housekeeper and the resurrection of decades-old dealings with his former wife.
Mr Trump's new nominee is a study in contrasts.
Mr Acosta is an accomplished Harvard-educated lawyer, District Attorney from Florida and legal academic of Hispanic background.
He could hardly be considered controversial, having cleared the Senate confirmation process for three previous jobs, dating back to George W Bush's administration.
Righting wrongs?
Only the brave or crazy could suggest that the West Wing has learnt all its lessons on judgements and missteps in just four weeks.
If form is anything to go by, chances are Mr Trump and his team will provide us with an endless supply of the outrageous, the provocative and the downright false until 2018 at least.
But on three significant counts over the last week, America — if not the world — can take some consolation that failure can produce a better result.
Or, as the President might put it — he lost some early battles, on the way to working out how to win a war in Washington.
Topics: world-politics, united-states
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