American Psycho
In which an abundance of unhinged blurts reveal a madman in decline
A particular challenge of life in the American Trumpocene is handling the sheer volume of muck that Trump and his flunkies spew. A reasonable human cannot keep up, so the reasonable human does what reasonable humans do: adapts, shifts mindsets, avoids the crazy, resigns to a new reality. I guess this is how it must be.
When I’m tempted to just accept and adapt, I recall this tweet from Garry Kasparov, the Russian chess grandmaster turned anti-authoritarian dissident:
“The point of modern propaganda isn't only to misinform or push an agenda. It is to exhaust your critical thinking, to annihilate truth.”
Exhaust your critical thinking: no four words better describe how I’ve felt these last four years.
I’ve certainly never intended for this dorky little substack newsletter to be anyone’s source for news (can you imagine!?); it’s merely a reflection on whatever strikes me as worthy. But sometimes, simply retelling the news plainly can serve as a kind of reflection on it.
So let’s look, together, at a few minor things that Trump has said or done in just the past few days. None of these made major headlines. But consider how any one of these blurts would have been evidence of utter unfitness, even of debilitating illness, if it had happened in any previous administration. With Trump, the volume of crazy has a weird effect of dampening the crazy. I think that’s what Kasparov, the chess master, means by exhaustion and annhiliation.
A smattering of Trump’s recent madness, incomplete
He’s campaigning against…Hillary?
2016 worked out OK for Trump. So he’s replaying his 2016 setlist like an aging band playing their old hits at a county fair. There’s no bigger hit than villifiying that election’s opponent, Hillary Clinton — who, it must be said, is not running for office. But her absence from the race doesn’t prevent him from attacking her. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo promises to investigate her emails. Trump says “Lock up Hillary” at his rallies, while the crowd goes wild. It’s like 2016 all over again.
Imagine Obama attacking John McCain — in 2012, when he was running against Romney.
Imagine Reagan stirring up voters against Jimmy Carter — in 1984, when he was running against Mondale.
Vote for me because of Hillary is a senseless argument, except to those Red Hats for whom Clinton-Obama-Biden are all the same names for a bogeyman representing everything they fear or hate.
But that too is senseless.
He wants us mistrust our own democracy
Trump continues to question the foundational act of a government by the people: voting. He usually does this in his “hey, I’m just asking the question” mode that is maybe OK for a crank at the bar, but certainly not for the president of the USA.
Unencumbered by any obligation to adhere to reality, he just invents events, circumstances, statstics. Once it was thousands of ballots in a living room. The other day, at a rally in Michigan, he asked, “Did you see that they found fifty thousand ballots in, like, a river?”
I’ll answer. No, Donald Trump, we did not “see” that “they” found “fifty thousand” ballots in a river. I mean, who? Who found fifty thousand ballots in a river? And fifty thousand? That’s a lot. In a river? What river? At the bottom of it? Drifting down it like leaves? Who counted these wet, muddy ballots in a river? How do you even count river-logged ballots?
Once, when I was eleven years old, my dad’s wallet was in a satchel that dumped in the St. Louis River on a canoe expedition. We recovered the bag and the wallet, and I recall peeling the soggy bills apart and spreading them out to dry on the dashboard on the drive home. There were maybe ten or twelve bills, and preserving and counting them was a kind of valiant chore requiring patience and care. Is Trump telling us that “they” (who, Donald?) performed this same chore, but with fifty thousand ballots?
Friends, “they” did not find fifty thousand ballots in a river. A few weeks back, someone in Wisconsin apparently found three trays of mail in a ditch. There may or may not have been absentee ballots in this cache of mail. I assume this is the seed of the story that Trump has turned into FIFTY THOUSAND ballots in a river. He blurts a huge number, mentions a river — the archetypical location where poets from Shakespeare to Neil Young say that tragedy and crime occur — and expects us to just accept his annihilation of truth.
We shouldnt’t let this go. Because no one would want someone who lies about such a thing to be president, if you think Donald Trump should be our president, you are required to believe this. Therefore, you — I’m talking to you, 40 percent — should have some darn good evidence of this river, and of these fifty thousand ballots, drifting tragically downstream, like Ophelia.
So please: share it. I’m eager to hear it.
He associates Joe Biden with, of all people (?), the Grinch
A new seasonal tradition has arisen during the Trumpocene: Trump depicting himself as Defender of Christmas, a kind of Kris Kringle meets Batman. And this October, right on schedule, he’s stoking the Christmas Fear for one last time. He actually said that Joe Biden will cancel Christmas if he is elected president, like a plot of some kind of Rankin-Bass holiday special. Seriously: this is exactly what the Grinch tried to do, before Cindy Lou Who and some joyous singing caused his heart to grow three sizes.
Remember that weird thing last year where Dope Number Two and his wife Lara explained, without evidence, that a war against Christmas had been won? The gist seems to be that before her father-in-law became president, Lara Trump would encounter these really difficult situations where she wanted to say Merry Christmas, but was prevented from doing so, apparently because of Obama. However, during the Trump administration, in those same situations she can now say Merry Christmas with freedom and joy. No I’m not kidding. This is something Lara Trump has said is happening. Trumpists apparently believe it.
What Trump Doesn’t do
Never, you’ll notice, does he actually make a case that he’ll promote policies to improve the well-being of all manner of struggling humans. Never does he present an inspiring vision of America’s role in the world, promote the common good, or advance freedom and opportunity.
There’s no hope, inspiration, vision, or actual accomplishable tactics in Trump’s mad rants at the end of his term and of his time. It’s all resentment, rage, narcissism, emptiness, and hate. It’s as if that’s how he wants be remembered; I suppose that’s all he’s capable of.
Now let’s make a change
I’m so tired of this, friends. My critical thinking has been exhausted for the better part of the last half decade, and I’m not sure how much longer it can last. So I’m begging you, everyone: please vote. Please do something about it.
The time is upon us. At some point soon, we can — and must — deal with the dynamics that got us here, ferret out the combination of shame and misinformation and strange national values (was The Apprentice that good of a show?) that ever caused anyone to think a narcisstic spoiled tabloid star should be entrusted with the defense of the US Constitution and the well-being of the American citizenry. First, though, let’s rid ourselves of this charlatan. The next thirteen days won’t be easy, nor will the next three months, nor the next four years.
But the reckoning starts with a purge.
And it’s just 13 days away.
Ophelia, by John Everett Millais, 1851-52 , The Google Art Project. Source: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/94/John_Everett_Millais_-_Ophelia_-_Google_Art_Project.jpg
Garry Kasparov image source: http://www.kasparovagent.com/photo_gallery.php. Copyright 2007, S.M.S.I., Inc. – Owen Williams, The Kasparov Agency