The grift that keeps on giving
Who remembers how Republicans rolled their eyes to the sky, clutched their pearls and whined FOR YEARS about how Hunter Biden once made a few million dollars (the estimates constantly vary) on his famous father’s name? Remember, Hunter Biden was never an elected official. He was not a civil servant. He took no contracts from the American government and his father was NOT President of the United States at the time.
Nevertheless, once Joe Biden became President, Republicans bitched and moaned about Hunter Biden for years. Fox “News” did nightly stories on “Hunter Biden’s laptop” non-story. Republicans launched committee investigations of him. They shockingly displayed nude photos of him in committee. They excoriated him every day and destroyed his name.
All because he made some money that he wouldn’t have made had his father not been famous. That’s it. That’s the whole story.
So where are those Republicans now? In the more than five months he’s been “president,” Trump has, through illegal stock manipulations and his “meme coin” illicitly gained nearly three billion dollars of personal wealth. That’s Billions, with a B.
If you assume that Trump won’t get any greedier than he is now — which is giving him frankly more benefit of the doubt than he merits — Trump will have exploited the presidency to the tune of more than twenty-four billion dollars by the time he leaves office. But let’s face it, Trump isn’t going to be satisfied with that. He will want to be the world’s first trillionaire. With a T. And he just might pull it off.
We have from Michael Cohen that Trump’s admiration for Vladimir Putin is no mystery. Putin has nothing on him. (Besides, think of it yourself: what could anyone have on a man who has no shame?) Trump regards Putin as his perfect example of success. Trump wants what Putin has, the ability to have anyone murdered he doesn’t like and unlimited wealth. If Trump can achieve those things in the next four years it will be a malignant narcissist’s dream come true.
If Trump could attach a spigot from the US Treasure to his personal bank account he would do it. He’s exactly that corrupt. Whether or not he does something that obvious is immaterial. He’s already obvious, and the pious hypocrites in the Republican House, Senate and SCOTUS are letting him get away with it. Indeed, they’re paving the way.
Naturally if Trump is going to want to steal a trillion dollars he’s going to need help. He’ll need to make many members of Congress very, very rich. He will also need the willing cooperation of millions of stupid Americans, of which there appears to be no shortage.
After all, millions of Americans now believe that the moon landings never happened, that the earth is flat, that 9/11 was an inside job, that vaccines have microchips in them, that crashed spaceships and dead extraterrestrials are in Area 51. How hard can it be to steal under such noses, where hardly any brains are attached?
There is only one solution. We don’t just need a blue wave in 2026, we need a tsunami, a thousand foot touring wall of blue water to crush the life out of these vermin. Then Trump will need to be quickly impeached and quickly kicked out of office. Barring that, there’s the Grim Reaper, who has his own schedule. Would that I was his appointment secretary, if only for a day.
Robert Harrington is an American expat living in Britain. He is a portrait painter.