3/13/2025

 Thursday, March 13, 2025

D+126/53

1954 Viet Minh General Giáp opened the assault on French forces at Dien Bien Phu

2005 Terry Ratzmann shot and killed seven members of the Living Church of God, including the minister, at Sheraton Inn in Brookfield, Wisconsin, before killing himself

2012 Encyclopaedia Britannica announced that it would no longer publish printed versions of its encyclopaedia

In bed at 10:15, awake and up at 4:45.   

Prednisone, day 326; 4 mg., day 9/21; Kevzara, day 9/14.  2 mg. of prednisone at 5 a.m. and  5  p.m.  Other meds at 11:30 a.m.    

My waking dream was of attending a pentacostal church in the inner city and sitting next to Troy Major.  I asked for and Troy gave me his phone number, address, and his wife's name, which I couldn't recall.  All the members of the congregation passed by and blessed me because my mother had died and I had to go to her funeral, but my car was parked some distance away.  Troy offered me a ride, but we stopped at his house and at a Catholic Church where a concelebrated mass was about to occur. I was greeted like a returning prodigal son.  The priests were from several different orders, all dressed in their liturgical vestments.  I met many members of my former community at St. Francis. At some point, Kitty and Jim found me and were angry with me for not being at my mother's funeral.  I was anxious and frustrated about not being able to get to my mother's funeral. What would Freud say?  What would Jung say?  What do I say?

On Morning Joe this morning.  Opening chatter about Trump's tariffs and their effect on the national and world economy.  David French: "Trump is supplementing his malice with his incompetence.  His team is supplementing their malice with their incompetence.  I agree with Bret (Sephens) that incompetence may be the thing that undermines this administration, even more than malice."  Bret Stephens, in his op-ed: "This won't end well, especially in a no-guardrails administration staffed by a how-high team of enablers and toadies . . .  Trump's critics are always quick to see the sinister sides of his actions and ure of his policymaking.  Democracy may die in darkness.  It may die in despotism.  Under Trump, it's just as likely to die in dumbness."  

Schrecklichkeit.  Donald Trump and his myrmidons are terrorists.  Their regime is waging a war of terror against Trump's opponents and adversaries, or, as he thinks of it, his "enemies."  This is directly related to his Fred Trump-Roy Cohn-inspired need and desire for revenge or retribution.  During his first administration, when asked by an interviewer for his favorite biblical passage, he first evaded the question by saying that he 'liked them all,' but then said, "Maybe, an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth."  In 2011, he addressed the National Achievers Congress in Sydney, Australia, to explain how he had achieved his success. He noted there were a couple of lessons not taught in business school that successful people must know. At the top of the list was this piece of advice: “Get even with people. If they screw you, screw them back 10 times as hard. I really believe it.”  He has demonstrated his adherence to this philosophy more times than one can count. witness his petty attacks on anyone who has stood in his way or supported an opponent, like the women who have accused him of sexual assaults, or Rosie O'Donnell, or Megyn Kelly, or Elizabeth Warren, or Nancy Pelosi.  

In a 2012 speech, he advised:

One of the things you should do in terms of success: If somebody hits you, you’ve got to hit ’em back five times harder than they ever thought possible. You’ve got to get even. Get even. And the reason, the reason you do, is so important…The reason you do, you have to do it, because if they do that to you, you have to leave a telltale sign that they just can’t take advantage of you. It’s not so much for the person, which does make you feel good, to be honest with you, I’ve done it many times. But other people watch and you know they say, “Well, let’s leave Trump alone,” or “Let’s leave this one,” or “Doris, let’s leave her alone. They fight too hard.”  I say it, and it’s so important. You have to, you have to hit back. You have to hit back.

In a 2007 speech, he described his first rule of business:

It’s called “Get Even.” Get even. This isn’t your typical business speech. Get even. What this is a real business speech. You know in all fairness to Wharton, I love ’em, but they teach you some stuff that’s a lot of bullshit. When you’re in business, you get even with people that screw you. And you screw them 15 times harder. And the reason is, the reason is, the reason is, not only, not only, because of the person that you’re after, but other people watch what’s happening. Other people see you or see you or see and they see how you react.

He is applying these principles of revenge in spades in his second administration.  The schrecklichkeit dimension is the most important, that is, the effect of revenge-taking on others who may consider opposing Trump.  The secondary, or perhaps primary, goal is intimidation.  He is a master intimidator.  So is his partner in crime, Elon Musk.  For Republican legislators, for example, if you don't 'play ball,' they will primary you in the next election and publicly badmouth you whenever possible.  Businessmen who oppose Trump risk investigation by any of the federal regulatory agencies that have jurisdiction over them, and the withdrawal of government contracts, and blacklisting for future contracts.  The withdrawal of White House press credentials from the Associated Press illustrates what happens to media companies who don't 'play ball' (in the AP's case, by refusing to call the Gulf of Mexico the Gulf of America).  ABC's and George Stephanopolous's $15,000,000 settlement of Trump's spurious defamation suit is another example.  Elon Musk is wealthy enough to buy any media outlet that he finds problematical to him or to Trump, witness his purchase of Twitter, now "X".  Look at the endorsement cravenness of the LA Times and the Washington Post on the eve of the 2024 presidential election.  Witness Mark Zuckerberg's abandonment of fact-checking for misinformation and disinformation after the election.  

In any event, what got me thinking about schrecklichkeit this morning is Trump's frontal assault on the legal profession with his executive order stripping security clearances from lawyers in the Washington firm of Perkins Coie and denying them access to government buildings.  Perkins Coie was Mark Elias's firm, and it represented Trump's 2016 opponent, Hilary Clinton.  It's a revenge move by Trump, clearly, and is an existential threat to the firm's continued existence, considering its clientele.  What most interested me was the firm's difficulty in finding another law firm to represent it in court.  They ended up being represented by perhaps the best firm in Washington, Williams and Connelly, but not until it was clear that other firms were afraid to represent them for fear of becoming another Perkins Coie, i.e., a target of Trump's vengeance.  Schrecklichkeit.  Much of the nation is intimidated by Trump and his government of henchmen. 

Trump made little effort to disguise his retributive motive for attacking Perkins Coie.  From the text of Executive Order 14230, March 6th:

Section 1. Purpose.  The dishonest and dangerous activity of the law firm Perkins Coie LLP (“Perkins Coie”) has affected this country for decades. Notably, in 2016 while representing failed Presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, Perkins Coie hired Fusion GPS, which then manufactured a false “dossier” designed to steal an election. This egregious activity is part of a pattern. Perkins Coie has worked with activist donors including George Soros to judicially overturn popular, necessary, and democratically enacted election laws, including those requiring voter identification. In one such case, a court was forced to sanction Perkins Coie attorneys for an unethical lack of candor before the court.

The in terrorum purpose and effect of the Order is clear in Section 3:

Section 3. Contracting. (a) To prevent the transfer of taxpayer dollars to Federal contractors whose earnings subsidize, among other things, racial discrimination, falsified documents designed to weaponize the Government against candidates for office, and anti-democratic election changes that invite fraud and distrust, Government contracting agencies shall, to the extent permissible by law, require Government contractors to disclose any business they do with Perkins Coie and whether that business is related to the subject of the Government contract.

(b) The heads of all agencies shall review all contracts with Perkins Coie or with entities that disclose doing business with Perkins Coie under subsection (a) of this section. To the extent permitted by law, the heads of agencies shall:

(i) take appropriate steps to terminate any contract, to the maximum extent permitted by applicable law, including the Federal Acquisition Regulation, for which Perkins Coie has been hired to perform any service;

(ii) otherwise align their agency funding decisions with the interests of the citizens of the United States; with the goals and priorities of my Administration as expressed in executive actions, especially Executive Order 14147 of January 20, 2025 (Ending the Weaponization of the Federal Government); and as heads of agencies deem appropriate. Within 30 days of the date of this order, all agencies shall submit to the Director of the Office of Management and Budget an assessment of contracts with Perkins Coie or with entities that do business with Perkins Coie effective as of the date of this order and any actions taken with respect to those contracts in accordance with this order.

The mere threat of official federal investigations by the FBI, the Justice Department, the SEC, the FTC, or any other agency with investigative and enforcement authority is enough to cause private and corporate citizens to retain legal counsel, at a cost of many thousands, perhaps tens of thousands of dollars.  Ditto a defamation or other vindictive, retaliatory lawsuit.  Is the Trump-Musk Devil's duo desirous and willing to exercise schrecklichkeit on the whole country, indeed the whole world?  I think so.  Look at the tariff game he is playing with Canada.  Just today, he threatened to impose a tariff of 200% on imported wine, beer, and liquor: Canadian Club, Crown Royal, cognac, Corona and Dos Equis Mexican beers, Molson and Moosehead Canadian beers, French, Italian, and German wines, etc.  He has instructed the Defense Department to draw up plans directed the U.S. military to draw up options for increasing the American troop presence in Panama to achieve President Trump’s goal of “reclaiming” the Panama Canal. During his address to Congress last week, he said, "to further enhance our national security, my administration will be reclaiming the Panama Canal.” Since then, administration officials have not said what "reclaiming" means.  We read that the U.S. Southern Command is developing plans that vary from partnering more closely with Panamanian security forces to "the less likely" option of U.S. troops seizing the Panama Canal by force, the officials said. Whether military force is used would depend on how much Panamanian security forces agree to "partner with" the U.S., i.e., Trump. 

It's clear to me now that the worst of my bad dreams of America under the thumb of Trump were not bad enough.

Epitaph on a Tyrant

W. H. Auden   1907 –1973

Perfection, of a kind, was what he was after,

And the poetry he invented was easy to understand;

He knew human folly like the back of his hand,

And was greatly interested in armies and fleets;

When he laughed, respectable senators burst with laughter,

And when he cried the little children died in the streets. 

A couple of anniversary thoughts.  First, I was 12 years old when the epic battle of Dien Bein Phu started.  It ended almost 2 months later with an ignominious defeat of the French forces and the beginning of the end of France's overseas empire.  Algeria would follow.  It all seemed so foreign, remote, and exotic to me.  A mere 11 years later, I would step off a C-130 onto Vietnamese soil at Chu Lai, 23 years old and without any clear understanding of what was going on in Vietnam and why my sorry boots were on its ground.  Ten years later, Marine H-34 helicopters were ferrying desperate, frantic, fleeing Vietnamese from rooftops in Saigon to American ships offshore.  Our Dien Bien Phu took not two onths but about 10 years, in the course of which millions of lives were lost, badly impaired, or otherwise badly affected.  Shame on us/U.S.

Second, Encyclopaedia Britannica's decision 13 years ago to stop publishing its print edition makes me wonder about the future of printed books, indeed of print media generally.  The profound impact of social media on our lives in just the last 25 years (Friendster, LinkedIn, MySpace, Facebook, Twitter) makes me wonder whether modern homo sapiens is undeergoing a rapid evolutionary adjustment because of which even Wikipedia will become passe.  What will human communication be like in the next 25 years?  What will learning be like?  The world and Western Culture, or what remains of either, will be unrecognizable.  Sarah and Andy will be about at the age I am now, perhaps wondering the kinds of things that I wonder now.  Will the world have experienced and survived one or more nuclear wars by then?  What will be the effects of climate change?  Will it be a 1984 world?  A Brave New World?  A world run by 1s and 0s, algorithms, and AI?  Is there more reason to be hopeful of the coming world or despairing?

Nostalgically, the Britannica anniversary makes me remember the hours I spent lying on the floor at 7303 S. Emerald Avenue in Chicago, reading our family encyclopedia, the multi-volume Grolier's The Book of Knowledge.  My Dad, with his PTSD, always demanded of my sister and me "a little peace and quiet."  I sought quiet refuge in the thousands of essays in The Book of Knowledge, which also introduced me to the wide world outside our tiny, roachy, 3 rooms in the basement at 7303 S. Emerald Avenue.