Depravity In A Suit
Yesterday Variety published this:
Speaking at the Milken Institute Global Conference on Monday, Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross recalled the scene at Mar-a-Lago on April 6, when the summit with Chinese President Xi Jinping was interrupted by the strike on Syria.
“Just as dessert was being served, the president explained to Mr. Xi he had something he wanted to tell him, which was the launching of 59 missiles into Syria,” Ross said. “It was in lieu of after-dinner entertainment.””
“As the crowd laughed, Ross added: “The thing was, it didn’t cost the president anything to have that entertainment.””
Calling the casual killing of people “entertainment” and costless is not just poor taste. It is depraved. It is absolutely depraved. Just because he’s in a suit and didn’t personally affix electrodes to someone’s testicles in gleeful torture doesn’t mean it’s not depraved. Depravity in a suit laughing over death and calling it entertainment is nothing new. It is the type of depravity we have seen before. We saw it in the regimes of Adolf Hitler, Joseph Stalin, Idi Amin; we see it now in the form of Trump’s hero Putin, and others he admires, such as Duterte and Kim Jong Un.
I fully recognize that the scale here is different and that Ross has “merely” uttered words, and that Trump’s actions had the putative cover of protecting U.S. interests, however attenuated and however orchestrated to deflect from #TrumpRussia. But Ross’s is the precise mindset of large-scale genocide. It’s funny. It’s entertainment. It requires no thought, or consideration, or weight. It does not weigh on their consciences or souls at all. It’s festive, not the burden of deciding who lives or dies, an agonizing burden that should etch lines in the face of any decent human being and cause them to wake up in a cold sweat in the middle of the night wondering if St. Peter will deny them admittance at the Holy Gates, and asking themselves daily if they did the right thing. But no, it’s fun, pass the chocolate cake.
Note that the crowd laughed, per the article. Laughed. Hardeeharharhar, isn’t it hilarious that we kill people for fun for dessert? Who thinks that is funny? What kind of person? I will tell you. The kind of person who walks into his Jewish neighbor’s home after the family has been sent in a cattle car to die in the camps, and takes all the neighbor’s stuff. The kind of person who watches a gang-rape. The kind of person who participates in, or shows up to cheer on, a lynching. The kind of people who now occupy the White House and most cabinet positions. The kind of person who is our new Attorney General. Wilbur Ross. Donald Trump. Jeff Beauregard Sessions. The sister of Eric Prince. Steve Bannon.
“The thing was, it didn’t cost the president anything to have that entertainment.” Do we think he means “political cost” only, or real costs? It will cost the U.S. taxpayers $60 million to replace the 59 Tomahawk missiles that were wasted on that Syrian airstrip. Approximately 15 Syrians died. We already know there was no “cost” from a conscience or soul perspective. There is a single calculation to every decision Trump makes, whether after two seconds or two minutes of “deliberation”: “is this good for me?” The question itself can break down into categories of financial benefit and political benefit, and that is all. But the statement that the only consideration for Trump was the cost to him — not to human life, or to the U.S.’s broader strategic interests or to the U.S.’s reputation or the taxpayer — is the reveal. Trump had no skin in the game, it’s other people’s lives and money, so who gives a damn?
“The thing is” that this mindset is Trump’s and this administration’s in a microcosm. And it is depraved.
Don’t you tell me “it” can’t happen here.
