This Carbon Based Life

By David Glenn Cox

Stand by Houston, we have hecklers. Yes, hecklers. Donald Trump was heckled yesterday in friendly North Carolina. Soon, very soon, Mr. Trump won’t be able to show his face in public. (See: Nixon’s last days.)  The war resolution recently passed by the House included seven Republican votes this time around. Would-be party survivors refusing to go down with the ship. Kansas incumbent Governor Roger Marshall was eviscerated by an angry crowd at the gubernatorial debate.

Nothing worked! All the patented “magic words” about lower taxes and bringing home manufacturing jobs only made the crowd grow angrier. In Kansas, red, red Kansas! The Democratic candidate, Adam Hamilton, largely just stood there, quietly smiling. “Never mind, you! We have business with Mr. Marshall!” If that debate is any indicator of future fortunes. I’d guess that Mr. Trump is pretty well spooked by now. Like an iceberg in warmer climates, he’s cracking up.

Mr. Trump was asked about Canada’s closer trade ties with the European Union. Trump described it as a hostile act and suggested he might cut off all trade with Europe. Does Canada not have the right to trade with whomever it wants? If Canada doesn’t like Mr. Trump’s trade deal, it’s a hostile act to look elsewhere for greener pastures? Canada has the right to trade with whomever it likes; only they don’t have a right to hurt  Mr. Trump’s feelings or to make him look bad. This is perceived as an insult to Mr. Trump. Trade relations based on his personal feelings.

Whipped into a state of delusional frenzy (not to be confused with North Carolina) Mr. Trump further suggested the Untied Snakes didn’t need to trade with any foreign countries. If he can’t have his way, he’ll pick up his bat and his ball and go home! Fuck everybody! We’ll build our own cell phones and laptops! We’ll manufacture our own drugs and rare earth minerals. Sure, it might take a few years or a decade or so and throw the US economy into unbridled pandemonium. But we could do it! The laws of physics tell us an eccentric orbit can only become more eccentric over time. He’s cracking up.

Witnesses say Mr. Trump threw a full-blown tantrum and a hissy fit over the ruling of the Kennedy Center. Why does so little mean so much to Mr. Trump? With all he has on his plate, why not just abandon the Kennedy Center project like everything else which goes south in the Trump orbit? It’s not a minor affair like rising fuel prices or the Iran War. This is personal! This is something really important because it’s all about him! But it is rightfully all about a continuous unbroken string of political failures and negative court rulings, a feeling that the walls are beginning to close in on him.

I was at the grocery store yesterday (Name withheld for their protection) Ground beef, everybody! Real Argentine and Mexican ground beef, fifty cents a pound cheaper than last week. (Now with more screw-worms!) We’re saved! Never mind the high fuel costs, we’re saving half a buck a pound on the moo. Never mind sacrificing American agriculture on the altar of American fiscal, foreign policy! Whatever happened to America First? Mr. Trump talks one way and then avoids it when it suits him. Remember the other day when Mr. Trump told Ukraine to stop hitting those Russian oil refineries? Well, three guesses what the Ukrainians did yesterday? The failing power of a failing American president.

During the Cuban Missile crisis the American ambassador met with French President Charles De Gaulle and offered to show him photographic evidence of the Russian missiles. De Gaulle waved his hand and answered, “The word of the President is good enough for me.” Can you imagine that today?  Wanna see my new ballroom? Wanna see my Dicktory arch? Mr. Trump asserts that high gas prices are a small price to pay considering all of those great things he’s done for us.

Who fixed the deflecting pool? Who made sure the Epstein files were released? Who built the concentration camps? Who started an unnecessary war in Iran? Who made his wife leave the White House crying? Who made the trains run on time?

The Saudis reported to Wall Street that their East – West oil pipeline will be repaired to some slight, lesser  degree in a few days. A few days is political Trump Speak for an indeterminable length of time, from a few weeks to six months or longer. (See: Iran-War.) Forgetting, of course, that the Saudis have no defense for the pipeline still, and it’s subject to be hit again at any time. Forgetting that the Houthis now control the islands the oil tankers must pass through to enter the Red Sea.

No doubt, the Saudis are on the horn to big, orange Bubba begging for help. “Your call is very important to us. Please leave your name, company name, and phone number, and someone will call you back at their earliest convenience. If this is concerning possible bribes, dial Mr. Trump directly.” Old Mother Hubbard went to the cupboard to fetch her poor dog a bone. But when she got there. Pete had stripped the cupboard bare, and so the poor dog got none. Yesterday, Mr. Trump announced that he is going to send a big shipment of two thousand pound bombs to Israel. I wonder how the Saudis felt hearing about that announcement?  

Of 185 Congressional workdays, the House of Representin has worked just 75. Mike “No Work” Johnson shuts down the institution every time Mr. Trump feels personally threatened. Thomas Massie introduced articles of impeachment against percolated Pete Hegseth, forcing little Johnson to shut down the House yet again to avoid a vote.

All the magic talk of lower taxes and more American manufacturing jobs have been crucified on the cross of an unpopular war and soaring fuel costs. “The dream is over, what can I say? The dream is over yesterday.” Vladimir Putin reportedly told his staff that if he gives in to Ukraine, they will hang him! The case is no different for Donald Trump. If his congressional majorities are wiped out, they will hang him. A wounded animal is the most dangerous kind.

“I saw in their eyes something I was to see over and over in every part of the nation- a burning desire to go, to move, to get under way, anyplace, away from any Here. They spoke quietly of how they wanted to go someday, to move about, free and unanchored, not toward something but away from something. I saw this look and heard this yearning everywhere in every states I visited. Nearly every American hungers to move.” ― John Steinbeck,