The Rise of the Trump Reich

[BoSoxGal]

Marc Murphy is a lawyer, law professor, political cartoonist and essayist who I follow on Facebook and Substack. This post (for free, not paid, subscribers - thus, I think, okay to share) is from yesterday, and it is so spot on that I wanted to share with youse guys.

The Junior Varsity Fascists Invade Venezuela
White Guys Rule!
Marc Murphy
Jan 5

I know these guys. Most white men my age who were in grade school in the 60s and high school in the 70s have known a lot of guys like this in our seven decades. Insecure, not the brightest, loud, cocksure. The weak man’s idea of strong men. Bullies and their hangers-on. You know. D*cks.

Many of them grew up. Took the time to understand this complicated world. To appreciate that people who weren’t as physically strong or didn’t have the advantages they had should be valued. Often a tragedy or setback in their own lives opened their eyes to the larger world and, god forbid, empathy. Shame that it took that but at least they embraced the grace hard experience gave them.

Some did not grow up. They’re running our country now.

While the attack itself on Venezuela is today’s actual national (and international) self-inflicted disaster the press conference that followed is a window to the painfully juvenile and embarrassing cruel and stupid high school locker room that is now our Oval Office. I was exhausted with shame as an American over this felon President’s tenure long ago. Knowing I can read transcripts of his and his sycophants’ statements after the fact, I stopped wasting my time watching him or his press conferences. Morbid curiosity – and the fact that we had just literally kidnapped a foreign leader on behalf of our oil companies and oligarchy - made me watch this one from Tacky Camp David.

For nearly an hour Donald Trump, first, then each of his sad lackeys proved to the world that in America there is still very much a place – a well-compensated and powerful place – for under qualified white men who are willing to do anything to be a Big Shot. Or at least be in the room with a Big Shot. The worst of these, of course, were Pete Hegseth and Marco Rubio. Every word they uttered to prove they were strong laid bare their weakness. Every phrase they angrily and comically spit from their reddening cheeks to show they are tough only revealed that they are soft, their pathetic brave warrior posturing leaving no doubt that they are cowards.

World leaders on the world’s stage – which Secretaries of State and Secretaries of the Department of Defense of the United States of America used to be – make their points effectively and intelligently without impersonating (or actually being) 2nd rate talk show hosts and accusing the subject of “f*cking around and finding out” or that [Maduro] “started acting like a Wild Man”. Those and other schoolyard phrases don’t inform or advance a debate or agenda, they reflect a vacant and reactive mind. Which in fairness describes our current foreign policy, but still.

Adolescent bullies who never grew up aren’t heroes to the rest of us, not even to other white men who may have laughed at their jokes in the 11th grade. We, especially, recognize them in the wild – they’re easily spotted. Still telling their lies, bragging about their salaries and their sexual conquests. Complaining about DEI unironically, unaware or not acknowledging that the road they think they forged to their success was built specifically for them.

And, yet, time after time, we reward them in America by electing them to office and labeling anyone who isn’t’ “a businessman” with “conservative values” a Socialist, or worse. Usually, like the guys standing behind the President on Team Venezuela, they aren’t even good at what they’re doing. That’s because the point isn’t to “do” anything. It’s to “be” something. Tough. Manly. In Control. When, in fact, they are very much not any of those things. You’re kidding yourself if you think there’s even “a concept of a plan” for Venezuela. This was clear in real time during the press conference itself. In any responsible setting among even marginally competent adults the reaction to the words “We are going to run Venezuela” would have been greeted with howls of laughter by everyone in the room whether it was in reference to a school board or a football team, much less a nation of 30 million people. That typically reckless and childish threat (?) promise (?) guess (?) was not planned and was as big a surprise to Rubio, et al., as it was to the rest of us. Now, as with nearly every single other thing this White And Gold House does, it will be made up as it goes while the cult of the GOP and MAGA shuffle with vacant eyes ever onward into a future where all they want to know is whether they, and their white privilege, will be protected.

At everyone else’s expense.

[Bicycle Bill]

-"BB"-

[Crackpot]

From the silence it sounds like the oil companies don’t even want part of this mess.

[Sue U]

From the silence it sounds like the oil companies don’t even want part of this mess.

I can't imagine why they would. US oil refineries are already operating close to 100% capacity and given the (rest of the) world's drive to reduce fossil fuel consumption, I'm not sure anyone really wants to make an investment in new refineries. While there is a lot of oil in Venezuela, from what I've read it's not that great "quality" and has a high sulfur content, so more expensive to refine and less profit margin. The extraction infrastructure in Venezuela is ancient and crumbling, and would require significant expenditures to upgrade. Plus, now Trump has introduced major political instability and that is always bad for business. If there were any interest in developing additional Caribbean oil extraction, a much safer course with more sustainable long-term viability would be to back Guyana in its 200-year border dispute with Venezuela and secure the disputed oil-rich territory diplomatically.

[Scooter]

This is diplomaspeak for "keep your fucking paws off Greenland".