Renewed Vigor

I have to admit that I was getting a little hangdog about resistance to this calamitous presidency. I was getting Trump Fatigue. He just keeps coming at you, something new and terrible every day. Before one calamity has fully registered, here comes another – or two or three on a good Trump day. Also, I could see that I was preaching to the choir in these Civic Duty columns, but it’s a righteous, thoughtful choir, and I’m proud to add my voice. 

I feel better about all this now. Renewed vigor, as FDR might say. I see a strong glimmer of light at the end of the Trump tunnel. A bunch of things have happened that have improved my mood.

First, there are the kids of America. I guess it’s okay to call them kids, but they are sure acting a lot more adult and responsible and courageous than many of the grownups in America. The Parkland kids started it. They’ve simply had enough. And they have the media moxie and the anger to spread this feeling to their peers 

throughout the country, which will culminate in the short term on the nationwide anti-gun marches on March 24. In the long term, they’re not going to relax the pressure, which has been partially responsible for so many corporations bailing from their NRA associations and for Walmart and Dick’s raising the age for gun-buying to 21 with Dick’s going even further, stopping the sale of assault-type weapons. The Wal-Mart move is huge, a true corporate imprimatur from the company that sells the most weapons in the country. Both companies cited the Parkland shootings as the reason for their decisions.   

The obvious comparison with today’s young protesters is to the young people who took to the streets during the Vietnam era, which had a lot to do with ending that shameful war. Then and now, it is young people protesting both the killing of their own and the politics behind it. Bless them. And a lot of these kids will be voting sooner than later and they’ll want the political piper paid.

I’m really cheered, too, about Jared Kushner’s misfortunes, long-awaited and truly well-earned. He is an unctuous little slick-haired creep totally on the make on the strength of a marriage that looks to have been made in real estate hell. He and his jailbird daddy care vastly more about their crumbling real estate “empire” than the welfare of the country. Jared was both trying to cut money deals during his government travels – a giant no-no – and leaving himself open to targeting and potential influence by the diplomats of at least four countries, according to justice department intercepts. Jared is a patsy the best day of his life in the diplomatic game, just like his father-in-law, who will give you the shirt off somebody else’s back if you even get near his ass with a kiss.

And in what amounts to total diplomatic humiliation, all of what Jared thought was his immunity to any White House constraints has been stripped by John Kelly, finally acting like a fucking general, knocking Sir Jared’s security clearance down to the level of the White House calligrapher (that’s true, really!). Without the forever-temporary Top Secret clearance he formerly had, Jared is now an asshole without portfolio. General Kelly should watch his back, though; Ivanka’s been giving him Lady MacBeth eyes because Daddy let the bad general mans spank Jarey. Poo daddy.

And Daddy wants the bad general to rid the White House of his daughter and her humiliated husband, too, reports say, even though he’s telling them to their faces to hang tough. He hasn’t the guts to fire family. Don Junior and what’shisname better have plan B, C, and at least D ready. Love it!

The Hope Hicks defection is truly delicious. She’s used to dealing with an aberrant narcissist and I have the feeling that in her interviews with both Robert Muller and the Congressional panel she saw the difference between polite but totally serious people going about their business with dedication and integrity – for the most, Nunes et all to the contrary – and a looney tunes bullshitter whose pipeline to his delusional brand of reality is Fox News. She also saw that these gentlemen and women take no prisoners, and thus she headed for the nearest White House exit, long hair flying.  A much better decision than her choice of boyfriends. 

Let’s see: I think it’s cool and encouraging too that in so many special elections Democrats are winning in what were formerly strong Republican districts. Now all the Dems have to do is get truly organized enough to at least take back the House. And find a decent candidate for 2020.

But what really excites me is that Robert Mueller and his cohorts are turning their attentions to financial matters, following the money, as Deep Throat wisely whispered, but, more importantly, finally taking up the one subject that makes the president and his lawyers deeply uneasy: the hacking.

The hacking can take a diligent and intrepid special counsel high up the food chain. To the top? To the Big Mac himself? Whoaa. Think about it. The hacking of the Democratic National Committee’s and Hillary Clinton’s E-mails by the Russians were ipso facto crimes, and if they can be tied to Trump and/or his henchmen, it’s a new ballgame with potential felony charges and/or impeachment proceedings lurking in the wings.

Hope they come out and take center stage. That would be true happiness.