Cha-ching
In a previous article I mentioned that the incoming Trump “administration” will be a kakistocracy, that is, a government composed of the least competent, least suitable and least ethical clown car parade of halfwits, nitwits and shitwits imaginable. But it will also be a kleptocracy, which is government by thieves. Yes, they can do both. They really are that, er, “talented.”
Donald Trump is about to become that thing that has eluded him all his life. He is about to become an actual billionaire. And because the dumbest and most corrupt Supreme Court in history, or at least since Chief Justice Roger Taney delivered the majority opinion on the Dred Scott case, has just effectively indemnified him against prosecution for life, Donald Trump isn’t going to pay any taxes on the money he steals. He is going to, metaphorically speaking, back an 18 wheeler up to the treasury building and happily load ‘er up. Or order it loaded up, because he’s lazy. Make that a fleet of 18 wheelers.
Anyway … meanwhile, Elon Musk is going to become that thing that he’s always wanted to be. He’s going to become the world’s first trillionaire. With unlimited access to government contracts and greed unlimited, Tesla, Neuralink, TBC, SpaceX, Xcorp, xAI, X, etc, will likewise intravenously feed, to the point of gluttony, on the world’s biggest money IV bag, the US Treasury. Conflict of interest? What’s that? Get outta here, Gordon Gekko. Greed ain’t just good, it’s fantastic AF!
Meanwhile a whole gallery of evil Bond Villains (or Batman Villains) and rustlers, cutthroats, murderers, bounty hunters, desperados, mugs, pugs, thugs, nitwits, dimwits, halfwits, vipers, snipers, conmen, muggers, buggerers, bushwhackers, hornswogglers, horse thieves, train robbers, bank robbers, shitkickers and Methodists will be lining up for their double portion of schadenfreude pie. It’s going to be quite a spectacle, and if it weren’t for the fact that it will involve the metaphorical rape of Lady Liberty, it would almost be entertaining.
But they will all have to be careful. Unlike Trump they won’t be immunised from prosecution. They’ll have to figure out a way to get Trump to steal, rape and pillage for them. That way if anybody is going to be prosecuted, Trump will have to be prosecuted first, and he can’t be. Yes, no bigger, stupider, more egregious collection of little boys have ever contemplated a larger, shinier, better-stocked candy store in all the history of little boys and shiny candy stores. It’s going to be quite a feast. To borrow a phrase from the re-emerging Asshole-in-Chief, nobody has ever seen anything like it.
But wait, there’s more. Trump and company won’t just have to focus on stealing from and taking vengeance upon the poor, bleeding Lady Liberty, oh no. They have the whole world to plunder, rape and despoil. Dictators both tinhorn and ironclad will be lining up with wheelbarrows full of money and flunkies engaged to tote them. It’s going to be a very happy time — from the tents of MBS to the Dachaus of Vlad to the palaces of Xi Jinping. Those few, those happy few, those band of assholes.
So get ready for the world’s biggest garage sale. Get ready for the biggest theft in history. It will be conducted so openly, so brazenly, so shamelessly, that Americans will stand before it with their incredulous mouths hanging open to a monumental degree equal only to the outrages being committed. Nobody will be able to believe it. Nothing like this will have ever happened before. And if we all live to tell the story, let’s hope — for once — we will learn this lesson of history.
Robert Harrington is an American expat living in Britain. He is a portrait painter.