Month: February 2025

On The Big Lie(s)

Imagine two husbands who are cheating on their wives and regularly staying out until dawn.

The first husband, whether out of guilt, self-interest, or a misplaced sense of decorum, does his best to devise credible lies to cover up his actions. He had to work late to catch up on a critical project. He was at Frank’s house playing poker with the guys all night, honest! Go ahead, ask Frank! Now, where can I take you for dinner tonight?

The first husband’s wife eventually figures out it’s all a lie, but she pretends to believe him, at least for a while.

The second husband doesn’t even make a pretense of credibility. Instead, his lies absurdly turn the tables on his poor wife and make her the villain. He’s not cheating, she is, the slut! And she better apologize immediately, or she might end up on the street. After giving back her ring!

And the second husband’s wife, whether out of self-interest or plain fear, apologizes, begs for forgiveness, and promises to sever her relationship with her best friend Mona, that lying bitch who told her she saw her husband with Melissa last night at the Tiki Lounge.

The first husband’s behavior loosely describes George W. Bush, who told the American public in 2002 that Iraq’s dictator Saddam Hussein (A) was a perpetrator of the 9/11 massacre of American citizens and (B) was preparing nuclear and (C) chemical and biological weapons of mass destruction in order to commit further atrocities against Americans. He backed up these assertions with “evidence,” including some grainy satellite photos of RVs or something in the desert, and testimony by some guy codenamed “Curveball.” This evidence was convincing enough to get Bush’s sober, honorable Secretary of State, the decorated veteran Colin Powell, to take it before the United Nations and use it to make a case for war.

Remember the aluminum tubes? The “yellowcake”? Anthrax labs? The pre-9/11 meeting in Prague? I’m ashamed to admit that, at the time, I believed that something must be going on in Iraq.

And the evidence was enough for our congress, who overwhelmingly passed a resolution authorizing the war.

After we went to war, we discovered too late that the “evidence” was all a lie. An ex-post-thousands-of-dead-facto justification for the war was that Hussein was a brutal dictator—true enough, but not the reason we were given to start with. I’ve literally grown old hoping for Bush to just admit that he made a horrible mistake.

Why am I writing this? It feels like poking myself with a needle. God, I miss Jimmy Carter.

But at least Bush respected us enough to construct a credible story. Donald Trump’s behavior is exemplified by the second husband. He doesn’t even try to concoct evidence. He doesn’t need to, doesn’t really care whether you believe him or not. He just fantasizes about what he would most like to be true, and then declares it as fact, from the anecdotal (immigrants in Ohio are stealing and cooking America’s beloved pets; little boys are going to school in the morning and coming home in the afternoon as little girls) to the global (Vladimir Zelensky is a dictator, Ukraine started the war against Russia, Panama is ripping off American shippers on behalf of China).

And the Republican Party is like that second husband’s wife, pretending to believe him. Or maybe they actually do. As long as they act like they believe him, there’s no practical difference.

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The End of Parody

If you’ve followed my bloggy offerings for any length of time, you know that I have feasted on our past and present president as a rich comedic source for the past nine years or so. For example, I considered how a Satan presidency would stack up against Trump’s (Satan comes out ahead in terms of experience and basic human decency); what a Trump State of the Union Address from a New York State prison might look like (in the “wishful thinking” category); and a revelation that the sensational “Anonymous” source leaking White House insider info to the media was actually Trump himself, vainly trying to satisfy his bottomless need for attention.

Given current headlines, it looks like our Commander-in-Chief will remain a rich source of material for as long as he remains in office. But the fun part of making fun of his hjinks is gone, for two reasons.

Firstly, I have come to realize that I cannot outdo Trump himself in parodying Trump. Consider that a fundamental device in political humor is the “take-it-to-the-logical-extreme” approach. For example, Trump has loudly speculated about the United States’ right to annex Greenland, so I wrote a recent blog in which Trump threatens to nuke Stockholm, er, Copenhagen, and if that doesn’t work, to impose tariffs.

What of it? I am writing about a man who once gave a press conference in which he suggested trying bleach injections and sunlamps as a cure for the COVID virus. A man who quite recently proposed forcibly and permanently evacuating the two million inhabitants of the Gaza Strip so that he could transform it into a luxury resort. A convicted felon who referred to the convicted thugs who violently assaulted the U.S. Capitol building in 2021 as “hostages” and gave each one a pardon or commutation. How can I out-ridicule a man who is already a walking parody of decency, statesmanship, and public service? I’m a pretty cynical guy, ready to think the worst about the present administration. Yet it never occurred to me to call those monsters “hostages.” Well done, Mr. President!

The second problem is more serious. Political humor these days has started to feel pointless, self-indulgent, even counter-productive. When I watch the master Jon Stewart doing his show before a studio audience that hoots and howls in approval, I have a sinking feeling that we’re just indulging in emotional self-gratification that makes no real difference to anyone. And it’s not even that gratifying anymore.

Meanwhile, there is real blood on the carpet. Trump is outlining proposals for the disposition of the Gaza Strip that would have been too appalling for even Benjamin Netanyahu to propose in public. Human beings guilty of nothing more than lacking proper paperwork are being rounded up and sent on flying prison buses out of the country. Guantanamo Bay is being converted to a concentration camp. Government officers in charge of financial and judicial integrity are being fired or forced to resign. Programs to encourage the development of wind and solar power are being pointlessly scrapped—pointlessly, unless you’re an oil company stockholder. NATO….

But why go on? I can keep on making jokes about it, but it looks like the joke is on us, the American people, in fact, the entire human race.

Maybe one day soon, when cracking a joke or drawing a disrespectful cartoon can get you sent to prison or worse, then political satire will be a meaningful act again. Til then…maybe I’ll start posting recipes. “The One Wrong Thing Everyone Does With Bolognese Sauce!”