Gone Team

“Brilliant, gifted, energetic, yes, but also anxious, greedy, bland, and risk-averse, with no courage and no vision -- that is our elite today.” William Deresiewicz

Imagine the person in the White House whose job it is to update the staff directory, produce stationery, business cards and signage for the offices and the Cabinet. During a “normal” administration, where the key players are largely static for a few years, at least, the gig isn’t too hectic. But we now live in Trump World where chaos and incoherence is the norm, and people come and go in droves. Rex Tillerson, the Secretary of State from Exxon-Mobil, is gone; Hope Hicks, gone; Sean Spicer, gone; Gary Cohn, gone; Steve Bannon, gone; Mike Flynn, gone; Tom Price, gone. A host of lesser people have also been escorted out the revolving door of the White House. Trump, who lives in his own fantasy world of made up facts, claims to be close to having the Cabinet he really wants, which means, most likely, a Cabinet and advisors who will not contradict him or make him feel intellectually inferior, but who will constantly tell Trump that he is the greatest president of all time.

A Cabinet and White House staff populated with mediocrities loyal to Trump no matter how outrageous or dangerous his behavior.

It’s no surprise that Trump is making madness ordinary, just as he is making conflicts of interest ordinary, hardly worthy of notice. The corporate media reacts to every Trump tweet but fails to see and acknowledge the rot and gangrene at the heart of the system, and by “system” I mean predatory capitalism at home, and imperial designs abroad. As long as Trump occupies the national stage I’m going to keep saying this: he’s only a symptom, not the disease. If Trump were to keel over and expire tomorrow, the system -- in all its heartless cruelty, stupidity, and disregard for the common good -- would continue to function.

As a society we can’t agree about facts, even when the evidence is compelling and visible. America has lost its vision, its boldness, and its confidence. When polled most citizens express a desire for  government to provide services that will make their lives easier, less precarious; single-payer health care, free tuition at public colleges and universities, affordable housing, retirement security, clean air and water, safe roads and bridges, but the political class consistently, and blatantly, ignores the will of the people, claiming that such social benefits are too costly and a drag on the country’s “producers” and “job creators.” It was once accepted that creating a broad middle-class was a worthy objective, but that was before Ayn Rand and neoliberal economic ideas infected the policy stance of both parties.

This nation’s priorities emerge in stark relief when we look at what is always affordable: weapons of war, military invasions and occupations, tax cuts for corporations and the wealthy, subsidies for energy extractors, and bailouts when the elites overreach and crash the economy. Owners and investors are afforded a cushioned landing, no matter the cost, workers and the poor foot the bill.

This is a sobering date in American history, the 50th anniversary of the My Lai massacre, when US soldiers murdered some 500 Vietnamese women, children and elderly villagers. The My Lai carnage lasted four hours. These days the US kills civilians with drones, a more sophisticated method, but one no less savage and immoral.