out with the sovereignty; in with the Lebensraum
New World Order: Part Two
“We need Hawaii just as much and a good deal more than we did California. It is manifest destiny.”
President William McKinley, 1898
Happy January 6th Insurrectio-versary to you! Please accept this bedraggled copy of Nancy Pelosi’s day planner, with a big, muddy bootprint on the torn cover, as a token of my incomprehension.
We watched an insurrection unfold out of the false premise of a stolen election, just think! The power of marketing! And you voted for him again, my incorrigible freckle-faced rascals. I guess democracy and the rule of law aren’t important because, face it, ICE wasn’t going to come for YOU, were they?
But don’t get me started.
So, the end of another year, certainly a year without parallel in my lifetime, and to put that in context, I know where I was when Kennedy was shot (the first one).
Thinking to comfort myself up here in the frigid north, I broke out of polar bear jail, crawled into my igloo and started to do some piece work I’d taken on—smelting aluminum and assembling car seats, if you must know—and I smiled sweetly as I anticipated the slo-mo collapse of the clown cabinet (my current fave? The Education Secretary, in an interview, raving about the great potential of “A-EL”); the clowns in the clown car leaving skid marks on the paved-over Rose Garden; Pam Bondi throwing a cream pie at Susie Wiles, but she ducks and some tech bro gets it in the kisser instead. It was a nice fantasy.
But whoah, sisters and brothers! The invasion of Venezuela and the kidnapping of Maduro has stopped our hearts, because there was no clowning to be seen. It was swift, unexpected, (as much as anything is, in retrospect), obviously planned down to the split second, and—here’s where it gets tricky, right?
Because Maduro is genuinely autocratic, and really is not the legitimate leader of Venezuela, so in some kinder, gentler universe, we might believe that a brave, wonderful thing has happened, until we realize that what has happened is a terrible unprecedented and destructive thing, a thing of chaos and confusion.
Maddeningly, the escapade has been able to employ that sleight of hand that’s taken us in before: cloaking itself in that “who cares about the niceties of international law, he’s just a criminal, let’s getter done, y’all” and that whole Trump as righteous renegade who blasts through the red tape boondoggle.
It’s the same sleight of hand, you’ll recall, employed when hundreds of Latino “immigrants” were branded as gang members, scooped up and sent to a torture prison in El Salvador, with no proof offered that any one of them had committed crimes. But who cares about due process for “criminals” and “gang members”? That’s the unspoken belief with much of the public, who generally don’t understand the importance of the rule of law, that due process applies to everyone (not to mention that people are innocent until proven guilty).
It will take a few more random shootings for the majority to understand that, at this point, anyone can be branded a “criminal” or “domestic terrorist”.
This means that the pea-brained public is glossing over Trump’s breach of both human rights and international law, and its dire implications, and cheering on the prospect of, who knows, democracy? not noticing that, once again, the US is treating South America like its personal daycare facility.
Also not noticing that Maduro is not really a drug lord, which was the pretext for the kidnapping, and anyway, Trump just pardoned a genuine drug lord.
Trump wants the oil. Doesn’t he? Let’s remind ourselves: The United States has huge reserves of oil, producing 13 million barrels a day, enough to cover the vast majority of its needs.
The US doesn’t need Venezuelan oil.
And decades of mismanagement and sanctions have left Venezuelan oil infrastructure in such poor condition, that its output has fallen to 1% of global production, making it a marginal player.
Adding Venezuelan oil to the current worldwide glut of supply has the potential to depress prices to under $50 per barrel. American companies will suffer from this added “competition”, potentially leading to bankruptcies, spending cuts… CEO’s are viewing their mega-salaries with alarm as we speak.
This is not even considering the rise of other, clean energy technologies, which make further long-term investment in oil extraction a questionable strategy—not that the Trump administration is thinking about strategic planning to phase out fossil fuels in favor of sustainable energy sources!
I haven’t been into the cooking sherry, I promise, but is it just conceivable that Trump’s voodoo economics is at work here? That “tariffs will bring manufacturing back and punish our trading partners!” thinking, morphed into “let’s monopolize oil supplies! Then we’ll make all the oil revenue in the world!” totally forgetting to factor in plummeting prices due to oil glut, and the gradual phasing out of fossil fuels worldwide… Can even Trump and his toadies be that dumb?
So if it’s not about, can’t be about, the oil what is it about? The triumph of democracy over an authoritarian regime and the liberation of an oppressed people? Excuse me while I keep a straight face…. there, ready.
In case you hadn’t noticed, Trump is busy destroying democracy at home, and turning US citizens into an oppressed people. The Maduro government is still in charge, and “regime change” seems to have fallen by the wayside. And anyway, how do you wrangle democracy out of an illegal invasion and a kidnapping?
Oh god, does this mean that the clown car chaos in the Oval Office is just static, that someone has a vision, albeit an evil one? Are you hyperventilating yet…? Should I turn my root cellar into a bomb shelter and lay up some preserves…?
It’s about the power. Sabre-rattling, we-want-Greenland, try-to-stop-us power. It seems to be working, because the Greenland rhetoric is only getting louder, and only Denmark and Greenland have voiced any protest. (How do we handle one NATO country threatening another NATO country?)
Even Canadian PM Mark Carney, who looks more like a weasel every day he governs, went so far as to say he welcomed the Venezuelan invasion and that he was optimistic about its democratic future! He voiced no concerns that I could hear about the upending of 80 years of international law, and the sacred inviolability of borders. Spoken like a banker, Mark, but not like a leader. One day soon Trump is going to yell “51st State!” again, and mean it, and you’re going to have to yell right back.
And it’s about the deals! How much, I wonder, will it cost Maduro for his pardon? How many dollars, how much humiliation? How long will this little scenario play until the next distraction, which I assume is the annexation of Greenland and the replenishment of the dwindling US stores of smoked fish and elk prime rib? Europe is appalled, walking on tiptoe so as to not wake Trump up, and desperate to express inchoate fears for the future without making Donald think they, you know, blame him or anything.
But not to worry: this is a supremely transactional government. Just don’t forget your bag of cash. You can get anything with money, just ask the tech bros.. Normalized: The President, Melania, Donald Jr and Eric Frankenforehead, all using the Oval Office as the ultimate prestige branding for their various side hustles: Trump bibles, Trump watches, Trump barely-legals, Trump cryptocurrency. Things go better with Trumpstuff, yo!
You forgot about that, didn’t you? All the grift, the pump ‘n dump. Go on, admit it! We forgive you, and, really, to keep every kidnapping, firing, disappearing, executive order, tantrum and statutory rape available for recall, you’d have to develop the kind of tricks used by Homer when reciting the complete version of The Iliad, from memory.
And thank Minerva we can finally drop the pretense of Ukraine negotiations. Endless talks, meetings, Trump with Putin, Putin with the EU, and where has it led?
Cease-fire? asks a journalist. Oh no, not a cease fire, says Trump, Putin has to hold something in reserve, in case the war continues.
Zelenskyy, seated right next to Trump as he mouthes these inanities, squirms like he’d love to shit his combat pants then smear them all over the gilded White House walls.
Of course the war will continue, because Putin will continue it. It was never going to be otherwise. The war will continue, Russia will have its way, it will have benefited from the ugly conflict that Putin started, it will prove that Russia will do whatever it wants while America does whatever it wants. Russia’s predatory, fascist expansionist project is normalized because so is Trump’s.
And the world’s shame, Gaza? Right now, explain to me like I’m five how Netanyahu’s devious bad faith is any different than Putin’s. Why would he give up now, when he is wrapping up his dream? Every home razed to the ground, every hospital a pile of rubble, all the universities destroyed, a generation of children exterminated.
And the winter rains wash over the ruins and the broken survivors. Sorry, it’s Christmas, I know I shouldn’t kill the vibe. Fa-la-la-la-la, or something.
Nothing astonishes me now more than my gutless expectation that goodwill and grace, that granting of what you don’t deserve, might prevail. Why did I think this of a war criminal?
All that was missing was a little gleeful provocation. A stink bomb tossed into a punchbowl of egg nog during a Muppet Christmas Movie. Wait, here it is: thus, the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee thought it would contribute to the constructive dialog —
—ha ha just kidding! You shoulda seen the look on your face! They sought to stir things up and all power to them. So they messaged New York City via Times Square billboard that “Jesus is a Palestinian”.
Because it stirs everything up: the word “Palestine” immediately evokes “Zionism”, the place that cannot be named brings up the big black monolith that seeks to stamp it out; Christmas is “ruined” because divisive. I can only surmise that we missed the holiday press release that reminded us how united we all are. Pity.
Christmas, the least religious of religious hols, is just a cup of hot chocolate with mini-marshmallows, some gloomy carols, a Bing Crosby movie or two, and a universal feeling that peace on earth sounds like a plan, if only we could find a few more—or even be a few more— men of good will.
It’s hilarious to see how perturbed we are by this simple assertion: Jesus is Palestinian. First of all, it’s not even taking away any understanding of “historical Jesus”, Jesus from the land historically known as Palestine, and he was Jewish, for cryin’ out loud, a crazy dementia praecox Jew who took on the power of Imperial Rome and came to a sticky end.
The Jews were not exactly embracing his kooky message, right? So why would Jews be upset? Please drop the feigned outrage.
Then, to say Jesus is Palestinian brings up an image of him as not our usual, pure white Malibu hippie-Jesus. He’s distinctly brown, rough, manly, middle eastern, dark hair, just my type if you wanna know.
As Yuval Noah Harari, the Israeli scholar and author, has pointed out, Jesus is the most represented face in history, in millions of images worldwide—but no one actually knows what he looked like.
There is not one atom of truth in those images; there is literally not one word of description of what he looked like in the New Testament. So how is it divisive, to make explicit yet one more metamorphosis, a shiny, new non-white Jesus, another flavor of imaginary prophet, rolling out of the bottling plant?
I guarantee that Christians in, say, South Korea have little crucifixes with Asian Jesus, because that’s just who imaginary Christ is. He’s your ghost-buddy in the sky, your hotline to heaven, he’s whoever you want him to be, baby. Like and subscribe!
In America, Christ lives in the worker-serfs, he lives in oppressed but dignified Black bodies. James Cone pointed out the hypocrisy of those who objected to Black Jesus, yet with equal illogic and no more claim to reality displayed European-featured Jesus in every Christian household.
Can we not send a message of solidarity? Does that ‘erase’ Jews? All that was ever necessary was to live peacefully together, sharing the land, all that was necessary was to recognize Palestinians as fully human. Who—in the course of a Zionist project that pre-dates the Holocaust by close to a century—erased whom?
Jesus may have sprung from Jewish roots, but as he revealed his “teachings” in the full flower of their banality, he fell into dispute with the Pharisees, indeed he was ultimately accused of blasphemy. That’s what done him in! He was clear: he replaced the Torah with the “Blood of the New Covenant”, his own blood as the sacrificial lamb. It’s right there, y’all, in the imaginary book!
Here we are discussing the historical accuracy of Jesus’s nationality and his fairy tales of miracles with straight faces! What’s next? A dispute about how many angels can dance on pin-heads? I don’t know about you, Murgatroyd McGraw, but I can’t wait to die on that molehill.
Jesus is white, you know, just admit it. What energizes MAGA is the racism, their insistence that Jesus is the wellspring of their white privilege. When they arouse atavistic hatred in us, they’re trying to distract us and themselves from the nasty truth: that their obscene wealth, the spoils of their war against the working people, and their belief that money is their absolution, that’s the desecration of Christ, not spinning him as Palestinian.
Jesus is Palestinian is not a particularly historically accurate statement, nor is it lacking some truth, but who can look at the plight of the people of Gaza with open eyes and not get the point of this thought experiment? Who can’t see the shocking imbalance of power, the desperation which all but ensures desperate acts, the ruthlessness of an authoritarian state, the gleeful nullification of an entire people by a once almost nullified people?
If there were justice in this world, we would all “be Palestinian”.
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In Other News
An old, racist, right-wing, criminally Muslim-hating Frenchwoman—died.
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Myself, and my apartment, are standing in for the Petrified Forest in a Theatrical presentation of Hansel & Gretel. That’s how ancient and stuck I feel, with no money for any Escape
Avoid the oven, especially if there’s a crone present with a wart on her nose. I hear ya. I’m lucky that CPP + OAS covers the rent with a little left over, once phone and internet are paid, I’m basically licking the carpet for crumbs. Forget those chinchilla lounge pajamas I had my eye on!