What If?

By David Glenn Cox

The Japanese Prime Minister stopped by Washington the other day. Just to remind us to look both ways before crossing the street. Trying to remind us, it’s a dangerous world out there and not to juggle hand grenades just for sport. He spoke to the crazy house and told them it was imperative for the US to support Ukraine. That the US needed to get off its ass and lead.

As a Prime Minister, it’s his job to wonder, just what kind of ally is this? Would they ever do my country this way? Washington Republicans fiddle while Kiev burns. The Republican Party is in shambles and only an election is going to fix it. The House speaker Mike penile euphemism Johnson spars with the lunatic fringe of the lunatic fringe of his own party in Marge Traitor Greene.

You know you have failed, and your speakership is doomed to end when. When you can’t get past the lunatic fringe. Johnson promises to bring the Ukraine aid package to a vote, but first. Could Congress please authorize a Liquefied Natural Gas Plant for me in Louisiana? The folks back home would surely appreciate it! And I know how Ukraine really needs those weapons. See, we have all this wonderful petroleum, and we can’t ship it overseas fast enough.”

The old “I’ll do the right thing if you pay me enough. What will you give me?” Just imagine being a Prime Minister and coming to the United States with the ridiculous job of telling Congress to wake the fuck up! That it is global tectonics going on all around us and what happens here also affects over there.

The US, Great Britain and the Australians are partnering to build the Aussie’s a fleet of nuclear submarines to counter the growing China threat. What happens in Ukraine affects what might happen in Taiwan or the Philippines. A successful Russia will destabilize Western Europe and roil markets in a major way. Eventually, reverberating back to the United States as probably at least a recession or at worst, a world war.

Withholding aid from an ally in need and hurting ourselves in the long run. All in an effort to make the President look bad. But instead, making the United States look bad in the eyes of the world. Raising the spirits of our adversaries everywhere.

Johnson promised under certain circumstances, he could bring the aid measure to a vote but made no further promises. This is the crazy house, and they can’t agree to go pee after drinking lemonade. It’s the Goetz guerrillas again. Dedicated to the proposition of bringing the government to a halt. And successfully coming damn close, making this Congress the least productive in history.

Attention: Joe Biden! Harry Truman never said the word Congress, without inserting “Do nothing” in front of the word Congress. They were and shall always be the “Do nothing Congress!”

“I never did give the Republicans hell. I just told the truth, and they thought it was hell.” – Harry Truman

The Republican house has broken into factions. Some agree on this or that but are unwilling to agree to anything at large. And because their majority is so slim and because every vote counts, you have the rise of little Napoleons everywhere. Everybody wants something and Johnson is Speaker and not Santa. The Goetz Gorillas say no to all spending! We’ll have to draw the line at one LNG plant for my district! They really don’t even like each other, and in some cases don’t even speak to each other. The pot boils over as even other Republicans begin to say, Wait a damn minute! This is nuts!

An amalgamation of Trumpers, stumpers, claim jumpers, Bible thumpers, carpetbaggers’ ambulance chasers and scallywags. Each with their own agenda or wrinkle to pet and nourish. But to be noticed in the crazy caucus you must out howl the loudest wolf. You must call extremism laziness and bath yourself in the warm soft lights of conservative media.

All this as a side show as in the center ring where we have the moldering Trump campaign. “Yeah! Vote for Trump. He’s not guilty!” The campaign has become the court cases and the court cases the campaign. Trump’s vision for America is “Not Guilty!” I say moldering because I believe the apogee has been reached. Trump’s big buck big wig benefit banquet only netted him $50 million and that’s not near enough. And he can’t ask them again.

You invite two hundred uber wealthy people and net fifty million. Do the math. “Sure, I’ll support your campaign. Let’s see; I’m worth six billion dollars. Will five hundred thousand be enough?” Pity donations. They don’t want to say “No” to the old guy and get him upset. They know how he can be! But they don’t really believe that Trump can win, and friendship only goes so far. You don’t get to be a billionaire by writing big checks to losers.

Foreign aid can come simply by buying shares of Trump media. But you had better hurry up.

But looking past the end of their shoe tips is the realization the Republican Party is headed for an iceberg at a high rate of speed. At the end of the next election which Donald Trump will lose, what will be left to build on? How can you have a Trump party without Donald Trump? What? Wait, four more years? I don’t think so. The cow says, “Moo!”

One of those historical moments where maybe we look back in reflection and ask, “what if?” What if Congress had done their job and just sent the aid to Ukraine? What if they’d stopped the Nazis at the Sudetenland?

“Fame is a vapor, popularity is an accident, riches take wings, those who cheer today may curse tomorrow and only one thing endures – character.” ― Harry Truman