If you've been puzzled about how Donald Trump has got to where he is, consider the many people who sold their souls to him. And then consider how many of the sellouts used to bitterly oppose him. Frank Bruni writes:
There’s no way that Mike Pompeo actually venerates Donald Trump. I doubt he even likes the president much.
Pompeo graduated first in his class at West Point decades ago, a feat that suggests enormous reserves of discipline, a profound respect for tradition and a talent for self-effacement when the circumstances warrant it. Trump possesses none of those qualities.
Pompeo is an evangelical Christian, steeped in the very dictums that Trump has spent a lifetime mocking with both his words and his deeds. And Pompeo has long believed in the importance of American military intervention abroad, the kind of activist role that Trump railed against during his campaign for the Republican presidential nomination.
But Pompeo isn't the only sell out:
I’m looking at you, Lindsey Graham, who somehow decided that Trump was the new John McCain, which is like deeming tripe the new tenderloin. Hell, I’m looking at most of the Republicans in the Senate. I’m not so much looking at Attorney General William Barr, odious as his behavior has been, because it’s clear in retrospect that he never made much of a pretense of rectitude, at least not in the context of Trump. He also wasn’t on record trashing Trump, not the way Pompeo and Graham and so many others who now dutifully echo him and gaze beatifically at him were. They must have broken necks from their moral whiplash. Barr’s neck supports that big head of his just fine.
Kellyanne Conway was a respected, reasonably mainstream, uncontroversial Republican pollster and strategist. Just months before she joined Team Trump, she correctly labeled him “vulgar,” said that he wasn’t presidential, called him a liar and demanded his tax returns. Then he offered her the lofty job of managing his presidential campaign — and all the television airtime that came with it — and she turned herself into a kowtowing cartoon. She’ll never be seen the same way again. Was the ride really worth it?
And what was Mick Mulvaney thinking when he agreed to be Trump’s third chief of staff, having witnessed the tortures of chiefs Nos. 1 and 2? Before Trump was elected, Mulvaney called him and Hillary Clinton “two of the most flawed human beings running for president in the history of the country,” and lest you think Trump was merely collateral damage in her disparagement, Mulvaney separately called Trump “a terrible human being.” Now he calls him boss. Amazing how revulsion crumbles when relevance is in the equation.
It's another retelling of the Faust tale -- or, for Americans, The Devil and Daniel Webster. When you sell your soul, the devil always shows up to collect on the debt.
Image: You Tube
10 comments:
Let me know when they're all in prison. Only then will I consider the debt collected.
Trump's people are counting on never being held responsible for their crimes, and for good reason. Look at all the monsters from the Bush II regime still walking among us as respectable citizens, collecting big salaries at universities, think tanks and corporate boards, and regularly being asked their opinions in the media. Hell, Kissinger's been showing how it's done for the last 50 years when he should have been doing time in maximum security! I won't be holding my breath waiting for justice to catch up with Pompeo, Graham, Conway or any of the other clowns that have serviced Trump.
Cap
After Watergate, lots of Nixon's people spent time in the Graybar Hotel, Cap. It remains to be seen whether any of Trump's people -- or Trump himself -- will find accomodation there.
.. its hard to imagine 'HISTORY' will be kindly to Donald Trump et al Inc.
Last I looked, John Wilkes Booth still seen as shooting Abraham Lincoln in the back of the head. Benedict Arnold, though a special case, still a byword for 'Traitor'.. Sirhan Sirhan, James Earl Ray, Lee Harvey Oswald.. aint gettin much love. The Nixon gang have not fared well either, though they may have made a good buck.. via books.
Trump seems a novel case.. his failures and flops too numerous to remention.. his immediate family too indolent & grasping .. greedy for intense humungous wealth.. evermore.. declasse 'trophy hunters' & wealth gatherers.. scrambling in Washington for plunder.. hogs in a trough.. (apologies to the porcine species)
Seems they all want 'time in the trough'.. but they all point to what scumbags now proliferate in the upper regions of American politics.. Mitch McConnell jumps out as a candidate for infamy, as does Mike Spence, Sean Hannity. Tell me its been a career highlight for Secret Service detailed to Trump or Melania or the immediate family.. How many seperate details is that ? Seven ? Eight ? Most of it posturing and preening in so called 'high society. And the golf detail !.. deary me.. hiding in sand traps, wandering the rough with the jackass President.. as he pauses for a munificent 'presidential' tweet about.. uh nothing.. or 'liddle' somebody or 'greasy' her or him..
But his problems lie deeper.. he can't take the money or properties or his golf clubs or security detai, or Marine One with him. Certsinly there must be US Marines who's military orders dictate saluting a jackass coward and bully.. The Supreme Commander.. Well, the commander is doomed.. sayonaro sucker.. The pus sack president is going hysterical.. as if he wasn't already
As the facts pile up and the walls close in, sal, Trump will spend more and more of his time in the Land of Illusion. The big question is: How many others will join him there?
The force, a.k.a. the evil spirit of Roy Cohn, is strong in the Mango Mussolini. Trump is an inspiration to all who pursue the Thug Life including our own Jason Kenney and Doug Ford. I don't know what sort of disinfectant it will take to rid us of this stench.
Even though Roy Cohn was eventually disbarred, Mound, there are those -- Trump among them -- who still view Cohn as smart and successful. As long as that definition of success permeates society, things will always stink.
You can't sell what you don't have Owen. They are soulless individuals.
- J.
That's a point worth considering, J. Perhaps they're zombies.
Its all about the money and the perceived power. They sold their souls for it. They were flawed individuals at some level to begin with. Lindsay Graham many allege has secrets. Perhaps he wants to keep them.
Kelley Ann Conway, is punching above her weight. She wanted to move "on up" and she has. She is very good at the job trump hired her for, may not like how she does it, to trump, she's good.
Pompeo, who knows why he took the job, the power most likely, or he thought he'd have the power, but actually he nor those who went to work for him, got any.
Some people value power beyond everything else, e.a.f. And they'll do anything to get it.
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