IT'S BEGUN

The photos 

Deliberate poses.  What are we supposed to take from these?  What's the message?

Think it might be "Be scared"? 

 

Remember a recent leader of a country who projected an image that said I'm scary!" 

Just a for-instance:  Remember Duterte, the repugnant president of the Philippines, 2016-2022, the one who ordered over a thousand vigilante killings?  That one.  Tough guy.  Invited to the White House in 2017, by the way.  Where he and Trump had "a friendly conversation."

The film

I spent the evening of the inauguration watching "The Apprentice."  Not that TV series that brought Trump to his first big media audience, but the movie.  It's been widely unseen, and like many others I admit I hadn't planned on seeing it, ever.  But I'd heard an interview on NPR with Jeremy Strong (the feckless son in "Succession") who plays lawyer Roy Cohn, and I got interested in seeing his performance.  Strong, who appeared physically tall in "Succession," looks as if he shrunk for this role,  playing creepy Cohn who is so immoral his ugliness manifests in his face.  The film is as much about about Cohn, evil incarnate, as it is about you-know-who.  It's about what Roy Cohn created.

From a Guardian review:

Having untangled the Trump Organization’s knotty legal woes in his inimitable way, Cohn sets about moulding young Donald into a winner. He rattles off his three rules for success. No 1: attack, attack, attack. No 2: admit nothing, deny everything. No 3: always claim victory, never admit defeat. Donnie gazes at him like a newly hatched chick imprinting on its mother; he swallows Cohn’s wisdom whole and turns it into a personality. And with an All About Eve-style inevitability, the protege usurps the mentor and a force is unleashed.

There it is:

1. Attack, attack, attack

2. Admit nothing, deny everything

3. Alway claim victory, never admit defeat.

Number 4 should have been added:  Say it's all for America, though it really just for you.

Watching I'd expected would be unbearable, like listening to the meanderings of present day Trump.  But it was like watching any movie. If it's any good–and it was good–you get caught up in the plot.  It's a true story, but it's not your story.  Not your present.  It's only history.  

The reality

The present, however, really is our story.  And the road ahead is looking kind of grim.

Four years to go and it's just beginning.  That is, it's supposed to be four years.  What happens in year five is anyone's guess.

Everything is turning upside down.  MAGA cult rules.  

Cabinet nominations to make your head spin.  Have a beef with the DOD, DEA, HHS, FBI, IRS ? Appoint  new chiefs who will tear them apart, remake them in your image, to your liking.  Ditch respect.

Here's a story that could have come right from the film: drug kingpin Ross of the Silk Road illegal drug marketplace, sentenced to life––life––is pardoned.  He had no special connection to Trump, so why did this one happen?  Easy.  It was a deal. (The Trump bio was called The Art of the Deal.)  Ross had support from libertarians that included a bunch of the crypto currency bros.  The head of the Libertarian party promised its support, along with the crypo guys, in exchange.  A good deal.

So it goes.

Living with it

Still have a sign from 2020.  I voted for Biden/Harris against Trump.  In 2024
voting against wasn't enough; there needed to be something stronger to vote for.

Easy for most of us who haven't got actual skin in the game.  Like, a government job.  Like a company that depends on foreign products or foreign workers.  Like someone already living on the edge. Like someone of the wrong color or from the wrong country.  

The better off we are to start with the less pain we're likely to feel.

You could ask yourself:  Who benefits from our going backwards?  Rejecting a clean energy future?  Could it be one of our rivals?  China, maybe?  Other countries who will sell the stuff we're not going to be selling?

 

You could ask yourself:  Why is our country such a magnet for so many people?  Could it be that our country is prosperous and has a lot to offer?  That democracy is compelling?  That it isn't actually in decline or needing to be made Great?

You could ask yourself:  Who's going to be making out, really?

***

Can't wait to see the movie about this when it's all over.