"A Regime with Its Heart in Dixie"

"As a Georgian who spent some years working in community and economic development, once the thought occurred to me, Trump's behavior struck me as entirely predictable. In places that don't have a whole lot going for them to create new jobs or attract investors, public officials (especially governors) spend a lot of time pretending they personally have a big brawling, deal-making effect on decisions to keep or retain jobs. Because their individual efforts are vastly more tangible than the thousands of public policies that affect the viability of a state or locality, they get away with taking credit for private-investment decisions. And the investors involved are always happy to go along with the game in exchange for tax or infrastructure or regulatory concessions. While this is a bipartisan habit in the South and elsewhere, southern Republicans are especially eager to treat public resources from school revenues to labor and environmental regulations as expendable if giving them up creates a ground-breaking or ribbon-cutting opportunity. Everything about the Carrier case smells like that sort of scam."

Ed Kilgore at New York characterizes the incoming Trump administration as "Alabama With Nukes."