City workers in Berkeley voted to authorize a possible strike on Wednesday, though if or when a strike would happen remains undetermined.  

Service Employees International Union Local 1021 announced the results of the strike vote today, saying that 99 percent of workers who voted during a day of demonstrations outside Berkeley City Hall on Wednesday authorized a strike.  

According to the union, the city's maintenance and clerical employees have been in negotiations for two months and negotiations are scheduled to end on June 16.  

Workers are seeking more compensation, better health and safety protections and a community outreach program the union has proposed, according to union officials.  

The union also made allegations today that city managers had conducted surveillance on employees and intimidated workers but did not elaborate. A union spokesman did not immediately return a call for clarification.  

Regarding safety, the union is arguing that the city has not sufficiently protected workers' safety after a garbage truck driver, Johnny Tolliver, was killed in 2016. Tolliver was pinned between his truck and a utility pole while working on his regular route.  

The California Division of Occupational Safety and Health eventually imposed a $31,810 penalty on the city, which was reduced from nearly $100,000 after an appeal.  

City spokesman Matthai Chakko said in a statement that the city and union have not reached an impasse and have three meetings scheduled before the 15th.  

Chakko argued that city employees were well compensated and receive generous compensation packages and ranked very favorably when compared to comparable city and county agencies.  

But the city is also facing rising pension and healthcare costs along with other economic challenges, he said. Chakko's statement did not include information about the content of any offers the city has made in negotiations.

Ninety-nine percent of the hundreds of city workers who voted at Berkeley City Hall authorized their bargaining team to call for a strike. A strike date has not been set. 

Contract talks between Berkeley’s maintenance and clerical employees--including sanitation workers, mechanics, and clerical staff—and City administrators have failed to reach an agreement. City workers have filed charges against Berkeley managers alleging intimidation of workers, unlawful surveillance, and interference with employees’ protected right to protest. 

In addition to the unfair labor practices committed by City administrators, Berkeley workers’ calls for safer working conditions remain unanswered. Following the 2016 death of Johnny Tolliver, a Zero Waste Truck Driver, workers responsible for difficult, dangerous, and dirty work maintaining city streets and facilities want stronger safety protections. The City of Berkeley has been fined by Cal OSHA nearly $100,000 for the accident and the conditions surrounding the accident. 

“Our jobs are one of the top 10 most dangerous jobs in the nation. City administrators are ignoring our plea for improved safety on the job. We don’t want another person to suffer another death because of deteriorating working conditions,” said Danny Walker, a Solid Waste Truck Driver and President of the Maintenance Chapter of SEIU 1021. 

Contract negotiations for Berkeley's maintenance and clerical employees have been going on for two months and are scheduled to end June 16. 

Garbage truck horns blared, workers chanted, Aretha Franklin's "Respect" blasted and hundreds of city workers demonstrated for safer conditions and better pay outside Berkeley City Hall today. 

Billed as an opportunity for the city's maintenance and clerical employees to vote on whether to go on strike, the 12:30 p.m. downtown event was a combination picket line, rally and block party. 

The block of Milvia Street where City Hall is located was blocked off between Center Street and Allston Way. Before the event began, about six white city trucks rolled down the street, horns blasting. About 13 city parking enforcement vehicles parked up and down the block. 

"Make some noise!" Sandra Lewis, an accounting technician and clerical staff union leader, yelled to the crowd as she stood by the entrance to City Hall. 

Contract negotiations for Berkeley's maintenance and clerical employees have been going on for two months and are scheduled to end June 16, according to Carlos Rivera of the Service Employees International Union Local 1021. 

The three points of contention are health and safety processes, compensation and a community outreach program proposed by the union, according to Rivera. 

The approximately 1,500 members of the local include trash collectors, mechanics and parking enforcement officers. The union passed out burritos and bottled water today and members stepped up to a sidewalk table and voted on whether to strike. 

"It's health and safety. One of our own was killed," Jenny Seay, an accounting technician, said in an interview. 

Seay was referring to the death of 52-year-old Johnny Tolliver, a city of Berkeley sanitation worker who was killed when he was apparently pinned between a garbage truck and a utility pole while on his regular route in the Berkeley hills in 2016. 

The California Division of Occupational Safety and Health issued six citations after investigating the death. Initially, the agency imposed penalties of $98,805, but the city appealed and the penalty was reduced to $31,810, Frank Polizzi, a spokesman for Cal/OSHA, said in response to an inquiry. 

In response, Matthai Chakko, a city spokesman, said, "Safety of employees is paramount. The city has proposed additional safeguards that Zero Waste drivers are required to immediately report and cease driving any vehicle that may be unsafe until cleared by the mechanic staff." 

As Wednesday's event rolled along, workers walked a picket line outside City Hall, carrying signs including, "Support the union - a livable income in the most expensive state." 

Chakko said that the city "deeply values its employees," saying that Berkeley pays 100 percent of all medical premium costs based on the Kaiser premiums for employees and their families. 

Also, Chakko said, out of 11 comparable city and county agencies, SEIU 1021's clerical and maintenance members are in the top two of the highest compensated such workers. 

Out of the 11 agencies surveyed by the city, only Berkeley and Santa Clara County use the highest pension formula offered for employees, Chakko said. 

The spokesman said Berkeley is challenged with pension costs that "are expected to rise over the next five years to unsustainable levels." 

Chakko added that 74 percent of the city's general fund budget is dedicated "to funding employees who provide quality service to city of Berkeley residents."  

Pension and health care costs are rising by 2.27 percent, or $5 million, starting this July, in addition to increases currently being negotiated, he said. 

He also noted that there are currently more retirees receiving medical contributions than active employees. The city's retiree medical costs have seen double-digit increases in healthcare premiums over the past two years, he said. 

"The city is developing a plan to begin funding these costs to ensure that the employees' retiree medical program is sustainable," Chakko said. 

The deadline for voting on the strike was 5 p.m. today and the results should be known by Thursday afternoon, according to Rivera.

Under the aegis of The San Francisco Early Music Society, the biennial Berkeley Festival & Exhibition opened on Sunday, June 3, and runs through Sunday, June 10. This much-loved festival brings together musicians, scholars, instrument-makers, and just plain folks who cherish early music. As in past years, I plan to attend as many main-stage events as I can, beginning with the Monday evening concert I attended in St. Mark’s Church featuring soprano Christine Brandes and Baroque violinist Elizabeth Blumenstock. Rounding out the instrumental ensemble were Mary Springfels on viola da gamba and Katherine Heater on harpsichord. The program featured two French cantatas centered on notorious women who enacted violent retribution against their male counterparts.  

Opening the concert was the cantata Judith by Elisabeth-Claude Jacquet de la Guerre. Born in 1665 to a family of musicians and instrument-makers, Jacquet de la Guerre showed such early musical talent that at age 15 she was taken into the court of Louis XIV and placed under the tutelage of the king’s mistress, Madame de Montespan. Later she became the first woman to compose an opera in French, Céphale et Procris, based on the myth told by Ovid. Jacquet de la Guerre’s cantata Judith was based on the Biblical tale of Judith severing the head of Holofernes and thereby saving the people of Israel. Christine Brandes used her crystalline soprano voice to bring the human character of Judith to life, and the instrumental accompaniment was exquisite. Likewise, the program’s second work, Marin Marais’s Sonnerie de Sainte-Genevieve, was given an exquisite rendition by Blumenstock, Springfels, and Heater.  

After intermission, the instrumental ensemble performed Sonata in A Major by Jean-Marie Leclair (1697-17764), then accompanied Christine Brandes in the cantata Médée by Louis-Nicholas Clerambault (1676-1749). In this version of the Medea story, Medea’s violence is turned not on her own children by the unfaithful Jason but only on his new bride. Christine Brandes brought great intensity and expressiveness to her vocal portrayal of Medea, and there were moving instrumental passages from Elizabeth Blumenstock on violin, Mary Springfels on viola da gamba, and Katherine Heater on harpsichord.  

If this excellent concert is any indication of what is to come, this year’s Berkeley Festival & Exhibition promises many glorious opportunities to hear fine performances of early music. Among many highlights are performances by Philharmonia Baroque Chamber Players on Thursday, June 7, Voices of Music performing Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas, and the Belgian chorale ensemble Vox Luminis in two concerts June 8 and 10.

On June 1st at about 6:30 pm, BPD received several reports from the community about hearing gun fire in the area of Sacramento Street and Oregon Street. 

Officers responded to the area and stopped a vehicle near San Pablo Avenue and Ashby Avenue that they believed may have been involved in the gunfight. Officers discovered that the occupant of the vehicle had been shot and called for medical aid. During a search of the vehicle, officers also located a handgun. The occupant was subsequently transported to a local hospital with non-threatening injuries. The occupant (Darelle Antoine Kimball, 27 years old, of Vallejo, CA) was arrested on suspicion of assault with a deadly weapon and carrying a loaded/concealed firearm. 

As the investigation of this incident continues, the Berkeley Police Department is asking for the community’s assistance with this crime. Anyone who lives in the area and has surveillance is cameras is asked to review their footage. If they witnessed the crime or have information regarding the case, they are asked to contact the Berkeley Police Homicide Detail at (510) 981-5741.

So I’ve been waiting to share my meditations on the electoral process until we got a final vote count for Assembly District 15, but I’m realizing that it could be a long time coming. If you want the latest version, possibly even the final, click here for the very competent web site which will tell you the latest numbers.

As I wait, I’m realizing that it really doesn’t matter much. The short answer is that well-endowed newbie candidate Buffy Wicks got a short third of the votes, less than 20,000 as the polls closed, and all the others, some of them very plausible, got all the rest. At the time of writing Dan Kalb and Jovanka Beckles, both well qualified in their own ways, were divying up another 19k or so, with a ~300 vote margin pointing to Kalb as Wicks’ November opponent, but that could change. Another short 20k was divided among candidates Katz, Bartlett, Appel and Pardue-Okimoto, all knowledgable East Bay officeholders, each with appeal to various segments of the progressive voter populations.

How many more votes are out there, still to be counted?

I posed this question to Berkeley voting statistics maven Rob Wrenn of the Berkeley Progressive Alliance. He opined that based on trends in Alameda and Contra Costa counties from 2014 to 2016, with only 20% of possible votes reported when the polls closed on Tuesday, there could easily be a third of the total still to be counted to get close to the 50% who voted in the 2016 presidential primary. 

Most voters I queried in the progressive circles I frequent were having a hard time deciding between Kalb and Beckles, which is reflected in the tally so far. A couple of less-engaged “regular” Democrats of my acquaintance were swayed by Buffy’s fresh face and flood of glossy mailers, especially the one with the Obama selfies, which hinted at but did not actually claim an Obama endorsement. 

Supporters of the other candidates, those with totals somewhere in the thousands, are likely to be on the progressive end of the spectrum, especially as regards certain specific issues: education (Appel), health care (Pardue-Okimoto), environment (Katz) or diversity (Bartlett). 

If the rough percentages from this election hold up, it seems likely that in the fall either Kalb or Beckles will get a significant percentage of the vote from the 60+percent of the remaining not-Buffy candidates, almost all of whom are more progressive than Wicks. The fact that Wicks has been heavily funded by the neo-Liberal and conservative donors to the Govern for California independent PAC will not work in her favor if word gets around. 

There’s no reason that supporters of any five of the six quasi-progressives in the race won’t be willing to vote for either Kalb or Beckles, especially because many of them (myself included) had trouble choosing between those two in the first place. Anyone with any sense could live with either of the two. 

The outcome of this race points once again to the superiority of ranked choice voting to the insane and expensive top-two method. It’s a good bet that a healthy number of the ~40k non-Buffy voters in this election were ready, willing and able to choose a second choice last Tuesday, saving the public a lot of money which will now go into the runoff. 

The problem, of course, with ranked choice, is that it’s counter-intuitive for American voters brought up on the two-party system. It’s the same reason that third parties no matter how virtuous have never gotten anywhere in this country, despite Europe’s success with multi-party systems. I did a term paper in high school (more than a couple of years ago now) on the dreary history of third parties, and remarkably little has changed. Americans think binary where elections are concerned, even if, as in Berkeley, the two choices in my time here have been captioned roughly moderate vs. progressive, since we’re almost all some kind of Democrat at heart (even the Berniecrats) or at least never Republicans. 

In Buffy Wicks some voters will believe they have a standard issue Democratic Central Campaign Committee candidate—or maybe not exactly. From the Govern for California website: “…courageous legislators cannot win without the support of political philanthropists.”  

Really? And what will she do with their support? 

She will appeal to fans of charter schools, backers of Costa-Hawkins-type limits on rent control, and those who applaud efforts by Scott Wiener and Nancy Skinner and their allies to shift control of land use away from cities like Berkeley to those Sacramento legislators and their "philanthropists". 

With Wicks on the right flank, the other candidate, whoever he or she turns out to be, might be tempted to drift toward the center. We’ll just have to remind them that, in the immortal words of Jim Hightower, There's Nothing in the Middle of the Road but Yellow Stripes and Dead Armadillos. Fortunately, whether it’s Beckles or Kalb on the ballot, progressive voters in AD15 are fully capable of doing just that. 

AD-15 is made up of only parts of these two counties, so many of the uncounted votes are from other Assembly districts. Even so, because there are a lot more in Alameda than Contra Costa, Wrenn says he thinks Kalb is likely to win.  

Acting like a mafia Don, President Trump has lied and bullied his way to the White House. He pursues a ‘take no prisoners’ approach which has generated a dangerous tribalism. In most of the world religions, most notably Sikhism, God is defined as TRUTH. At the core of Trump’s system of power is contempt of the truth and blatant embrace of falsehood. This is his prescription for political survival. President George Bush and his partner in crime, Vice-President Cheney perfected the art of the big lie falsely claiming Iraq’s existence of WMDs that dragged us into a costly war and plunging the Middle East into utter chaos. 

The Don perfected the art of lying during his corrupt business practices which sank him into perpetual debt and drove him and his sons into the web of Russian oligarchs and into the lair of his “best friend” Vladimir Putin. 

When power dominates truth criticism is interpreted as betrayal and the consequences have been swift and brutal. White House leaks are the safety valve serving as red meat to the media to stabilize the ship of state. Mr. Trump and his pliable Republican members of Congress tout the success of the big tax cut unconcerned that it adds over one trillion dollars to the national debt The regulatory roll back will damage our fragile planet for all future generations. George Mason said it best in 1787, “Shall that man be above justice who can commit the most extensive injustice?”

What would be the principled stance that progressives should take about the status of undocumented immigrants? To answer this question it is important to recognize that the concept "illegal immigrants" is a fiction created by the ruling circles in the United States (U.S). Just before the U.S. declared war against Mexico (1846-1848) wealthy citizens claimed that God supported the effort of the United States to expand its dominion and to spread capitalism. This doctrine, Manifest Destiny, served as the ideological basis for imperialistic expansion. In effect, the U.S. stole land from Mexico that would become the states of Arizona, California, New Mexico, Nevada, Utah, Southwestern Colorado. and Southwestern Wyoming. Aside from annexing Texas, the U.S. obtained 55 percent of Mexico's territory. 

California is now the home of over two million undocumented immigrants. Close to a quarter of the nation's so called illegal immigrants live in California. About two-thirds have resided in California for ten or more years. Yet they lack the most important asset of living in a democratic society, which is the right to vote. 

In addition, their non-citizen status makes them very vulnerable. As a result of being undocumented, they could be evicted from the state if they act out of line. This dilemma undoubtedly instills fear among many of these non-citizens. Among the consequences is that it discourages undocumented residents from engaging in organizing activities, particularly militant actions on behalf of their interests.  

Clearly, as a result of Mexico losing the war, those who now reside in these illegally confiscated states have lost their rights as citizens. So millions of legal immigrants are living in illegally captured territories. The undocumented residents in California and the other states that were ceded to the U.S. should be immediately given full citizenship.

Can we stop racism and oppression? We do notice unjust treatment of minorities and people of color. I hear long talks about the mental illness of people who harm others, but we don’t address the real issue behind the causes of their harmful behavior.  

I believe inequality, racism and oppression are the root causes of depression among young people who don’t have the power to express their feelings about social injustice and their sufferings. 

They don’t get the chance to express their needs to someone who is empowered to help them. Some of them even lack the ability to have proper food clothing and shelter. In their everyday lives they see that while affluent young people get all that they desire, they themselves are ignored. In order to forget the real world, they get into drugs and alcohol. It hurts them. Sometimes they do feel that it will destroy their future. Since they don’t know any other way to provide an outlet for their emotions, they become more addicted to these substances, and lose respect both within their families and community. 

Our government and people in power are ignoring the truth about depression. These depressed young people are portrayed as criminals, shooters and robbers. 

How long we will take to remove the cause of their depression which results in other social problems? 

The time is now to help them out of their depression, so in the future, they will follow norms of behavior and will treat others as respected human beings. I hope our country’s leaders will set an example with their own behavior and bring hope and sunshine for all.

Why did it take so long for ABC to cancel its hit show, “Roseanne”? Bathing in the swamp of racism, satanic Roseanne recently tweeted, “Muslim brotherhood & planet of the apes had a baby=vj” which was a disgusting reference to Valerie Jarrett, longtime adviser to President Obama, who’s African-American. She’s made similar racist comments about Susan Rice, resembling her to an ape. 

She also accused George Soros of being a Nazi collaborator and attacked Chelsea Clinton. The decision to cancel Roseanne was made by Channing Dungey, the first African-American president of ABC. Roseanne’s recent disgusting tweets should come as no surprise. Her racist tirades are completely consistent with what she has been saying for many years. She has spewed some of the most vulgar racism against Arabs and Palestinians accusing them of being inferior, being prone to violence, and deserving to be slaughtered. The popularity of her show reflects badly on her listeners who find it amusing to listen to her racist rants.

Many with a schizophrenic-type illness, and many with some forms of bipolar, are vulnerable to developing "delusional systems." A delusional system is an erroneous belief system or system of thought produced by a brain malfunction. A delusional system is one way that the individual's thinking and perception of the world can become "split-off" from reality.

When psychiatrists say that psychosis is "split personality," it is important not to confuse this with multiple personality disorder. The actual meaning is that the person's personality is split off from reality.

There are numerous ways that this can happen, and a brain malfunction is one of them. Another example is where a person joins a cult group, in which the person could be kidnapped, and their environment is controlled by the group's attempt to brainwash the new member.  

Most people obtain their version of "reality" through a combination of the mass media, contact with people, and through some amount of observing with the body's five senses. Isolating is one way in which a schizophrenic person may deteriorate. They do not have the opportunity to sync their reality with that of other people. 

Some people who are more experienced with psychotic illness may be able to spot their own delusional system in early stages, before it has grown to the extent that symptoms have obliterated the higher faculties. In that case, an attempt to deprogram it through one's own "internal resources" (such as meditation or other exercises), by itself, may not be adequate. 

If the delusional system in part was initially caused by isolation, then contact with people could be part of the remedy. If it developed due to inadequate medication or due to going down or off medication "AMA" (against medical advice) then the solution may be to resume medication. Or, if already medicated, the dosage of antipsychotics may need to be raised. (Yet, if the dosage is far in excess of what is appropriate, the dosage may need to be lowered.) 

Delusional systems can develop in part because of unhappiness. Unhappiness is sometimes a symptom of clinical depression, but sometimes a person is just unhappy either because things are not going well, or because a person has poor mental hygiene--e.g., predominance of negative and dissatisfied thinking. If a person expects life to be easy or if they expect to have things that they realistically cannot get, it causes unhappiness that should not be considered clinical depression. 

Either way, unhappiness can be a hotbed for the production of delusional thought (if a person has a predisposition for psychosis). 

The person may be trying to generate an explanation for why things are difficult, or they may be trying to raise their mood, and the delusional thoughts may bring either pleasure or relief at first, at an early stage before the psychosis worsens. 

A single delusion can turn into a "delusional system" when it becomes incorporated into the thinking as a basic assumption. When someone has an erroneous basic assumption, which is affecting how they interpret everything, it quickly becomes a delusional system. 

Once a delusional system has fully taken over a person's mind, that person may not be able to dig their way out, and they may require intervention, in some instances by force. 

However, the mental health treatment system is so sorely lacking in adequate resources, that in modern times, there isn't nearly as much help as I received in my past. 

Our government must provide resources for people with psychiatric disabilities. Doing that, in addition to prudent gun control, would significantly reduce the number of shootings perpetrated by disturbed, bullied people. Additionally, we deserve more help than we are getting, since we didn't create our disabilities, and currently there is a lot of discrimination against us. This is due to human ignorance of "normal" people. 

The Trump Administration is so dreadful they've made the George W. Bush Administration seem almost acceptable in comparison. Dubya surrounded himself with qualified staff. Trump has surrounded himself with syncophants. One of the most influential is the new Secretary of State, Mike Pompeo.

Unlike many of those in the Trump inner circle, Pompeo had an impressive career before entering politics. After graduating from West Point -- number one in his class -- Pompeo served five years in the Army. Then he went to Harvard Law School and briefly worked for a Washington law firm. In 1996, he moved to Wichita, Kansas, and helped form Thayer Aerospace -- with funding from the Koch brothers. In 2006, he was elected to the House of Representatives -- once again with help from the Koch brothers.

In Congress, Pompeo aligned with conservative Republicans such as the Tea Party and the Congressional Constitution Caucus. He's socially conservative, a climate change denier, and, as a member of the House Select Committee on Benghazi, an ardent critic of Hillary Clinton.

On January 23, 2017, Mike Pompeo became Trump's Director of the Central Intelligence Agency. Notably, Pompeo personally delivered Trump's daily intelligence briefing at the White House; as a result, the two men have a close relationship.  

After Trump fired his first Secretary of State, Rex Tillerson, he nominated Pompeo for the position. Pompeo was confirmed on April 26, 2018. By most accounts, Pompeo has been more effective than Tillerson. State Department moral appears to be improving. (http://foreignpolicy.com/2018/05/15/pompeo-lifts-hiring-freeze-on-state-department-diplomacy-tillerson-restore-diplomats-swagger-tackle-low-morale/ ) 

At the moment, Mike Pompeo probably has more influence on Donald Trump's foreign-policy actions than does anyone else in the Administration. In most regards, Pompeo's stated beliefs align with Trump's. 

North Korea: Pompeo has been Trump's point man on negotiations with North Korea -- Trump sent Pompeo to negotiate with Kim Jong-un before Pompeo was confirmed as Secretary of State. 

In these negotiations, the key issue is "denuclearization." On May 13th, National Security Adviser Bolton offered a very specific definition of what North Korean "denuclearization" meant: “getting rid of all the nuclear weapons... taking them to Oakridge, Tennessee... getting rid of the uranium enrichment and plutonium reprocessing capabilities.” Bolton said the process should follow "the Libya model." 

North Korea was offended by Bolton's remarks and denounced him. Apparently, Kim Jong-un is looking for a "phased and synchronous" approach to denuclearization; that is, a step-by-step approach whereby they gradually denuclearize while receiving commensurate economic assistance. Nonetheless, Pompeo seems to be aligned with Bolton, telling the Senate Foreign Services Committee that the U.S. wants "rapid denuclearization, total and complete, that won't be extended over time." 

At this writing, Pompeo is meeting with North Korean representatives. He says the negotiations are "making progress" but does not know if a June 12th meeting between Trump and Kim Jong-un will occur. 

Iran: Pompeo has long been opposed to the Iran nuclear agreement --technically the "Joint Plan of Action" (JPA) signed November 24, 2013 . As a Congressman, Pompeo said, "I look forward to rolling back this disastrous deal with the world’s largest state sponsor of terrorism.” On May 8th, Trump declared he was withdrawing the United States from the JPA. 

Trump wants to negotiate a new JPA that specifically limits Iranian missile testing, gives inspectors unfettered access to Iranian military bases, and extends the (old) JPA's expiration date beyond 2030. It's unlikely that either Pompeo or Trump can gain the support of the other signatories: China, England, European Union, France, Germany, Iran, and Russia. 

Russia: To say the least, Trump's attitude towards Russia has been inconsistent. On the one hand he called Putin to congratulate him after he was "reelected" Russian president. On the other hand, he's claimed, "nobody has been tougher on Russia than I have." 

In contrast, Pompeo is more hawkish. During his Secretary-of-State confirmation hearing, Pompeo said: "[Russia] has reasserted itself aggressively, invading and occupying Ukraine, threatening Europe, and doing nearly nothing to aid in the destruction and defeat of ISIS." 

China: To a lesser extent, Trump's attitude toward China has also been inconsistent. Pompeo is a China hawk. In January, Pompeo told the BBC that China is as big a threat to U.S. Security as Russia is, citing efforts by the Chinese to steal American commercial information. 

Strategic Alliances: Trump has also been inconsistent with regards to support for NATO. Pompeo has been more conciliatory but echoes the White House mantra that our European allies should spend more on defense. 

Global Climate Change: While many statesmen believe that Global Climate Change is a national security threat, Trump and Pompeo do not agree. In 2013, while still a congressman, Pompeo said, "There are scientists who think lots of different things about climate change. There's some who think we're warming, there's some who think we're cooling, there's some who think that the last 16 years have shown a pretty stable climate environment... Federal policy should be about the American family, not worshipping a radical environmental agenda." Pompeo opposed regulation of greenhouse gas emissions and efforts to bolster "clean" power. 

Summary: Pompeo is more capable than most of Trump's inner circle. Nonetheless, he's a fellow-traveler, a close associate of the Koch brothers. Pompeo's role is to ensure that Trump's policies align with those of the Republican oligarchs.