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"It's Worse Than You Thought"
by Bill Bonner
"Even the bravest minds must bend before cunning and fate."
- Homer’s "Odyssey"
Paris, France - "We are enjoying a couple of days, sweltering in Paris. The mercury soared to 95 degrees on Monday. Trees wilted. Sidewalks buckled. Tourists trudged from one crowded shrine to the next.
Paris, in its historic center, has remade itself into the mecca of the tourist trade. Genuine Parisians have largely decamped to the beaches of Normandy or to country houses all over France. What are left are the waiters, cooks, bellhops, and trinket hawkers at the Eiffel Tower. And, of course, Americans. It is an opportunity for the hospitality industry to see how much money it can cadge from these passers-by. And it is an opportunity for the visitors to explore the City of Light and help it pay the electric bill. Most of the tourists probably spend their time as we do - sizing up other tourists. The challenge is always the same - to see which cliché they will occupy.
In the hotel restaurant was a man of about 70. He had white hair swept back, long...wild, and a full mustache. He wore a white linen shirt, buttoned up to the neck and falling loosely over his withered shoulders. His pants were three-quarter length, striped, light green on white, also linen. Beneath them were stretches of white fleshy calves, with black socks and black business shoes. Beauregard T. Beauregard we might christen him. He was surely a professor of modern art at a Midwestern citadel of higher learning...or perhaps he was a New Orleans-based drama teacher…known to occasionally quote whole passages from the "Odyssey" in ancient Greek.
Much more common are America’s solid, middle classes...listing toward ‘stout,’ dressed in shorts and t-shirts, gawking at the Louvre while keeping an eye open for a McDonald’s - ‘Macdo’ in the local parlance. There are geriatrics too, shuffling along in the heat. Some in wheelchairs. Some with fold-up walkers. They want to see Paris at least once more before their lives adjourn. More sophisticated travelers wear polo shirts and slacks. He sells insurance. She is a docent at a neighborhood museum. They look for the ‘authenticity’ of old Paris and don’t mind if it was staged for them as it was for thousands of other visitors.
And then, there are the families. One featured two very cool parents who had brought a Latina nanny to take care of their two young children while they frequented restaurants, cafes, and galleries. Another was composed of a care-worn Dad...smiling Mom in a flowery frock...and two teenage girls. The girls had both reached an age at which Viking raiders might have fought over them - bursting forth as they were from jean shorts and tight, white tee-shirts. This was a family vacation...perhaps the last before the oldest of the girls leaves for college in a couple weeks. This was just the assortment at our Left-Bank hotel.
A cliché of our own, we sit in a café, in the shade, just off the Rue du Bac, and watch the human tide wash in and out again. But we mustn’t forget...we have dots to connect! Yesterday, we - once again - noticed that the man who paid a ghostwriter to write the ‘Art of the Deal’ had flubbed another deal. Reuters: "Iran says no talks are under way with United States after Trump calls off attacks." The Middle Eastern Monitor: "Trump says Hamas has agreed to disarm. The negotiations tell a different story."
Popular commentators struggle to make sense of the Trump phenomenon. They see what they think are ‘errors’...blunders...and lies. They take great pleasure in pointing them out.
But what if POTUS never intended to make a deal? Suppose, instead, that POTUS were merely fulfilling his destiny...carrying out his mission like Ulysses, living out the fate the gods had given him. And just when you think you’ve got it figured out - with a sufficient level of dark, sticky cynicism - lo and behold, it is worse than you thought.
We know...and Trump knows too...that the ‘war’ on Iran is a sham. The US can’t impose its will on everyone. There is no reason why the US should be involved with Iran at all.
And according to the Washington Post people have widely given up worrying about Trump’s outbursts: As Trump nears the midpoint of his second term, officials and analysts say, one of his signature powers - to bluster on social media, shock, spark panic and convert that panic (“thank you for your attention to this matter”) into the outcomes that he wants, has begun to fade. The bully pulpit of the presidency remains, but the audience is no longer quaking in the pews. “We are getting used to these daily announcements,” said Brando Benifei, an Italian member of the European Parliament who chairs its delegation for relations with the United States. “We don’t take them so seriously anymore.”
But the markets still take him seriously. Reuters: "Oil prices tumbled more than $4 a barrel on Monday after U.S. President Donald Trump held off on a fresh attack on Iran, seeking to reach a quick deal that would halt Tehran’s nuclear ambitions and reopen the Strait of Hormuz."
And it gives the insiders a way of making a buck or two. The Washington Post: "Trump stands to profit off US policy announcements by selling fast access to his social media posts. Investors looking to get a jump on White House announcements will be able to buy sneak peeks starting Saturday as a Trump family company starts selling special, fast access to the president’s posts on social media
The cost of the service? $100,000 per month. NPR: “It’s insane,” said one Wall Street executive, who requested anonymity for fear of retaliation from the Trump administration. “I can say for myself and 200 of my friends in finance, we’re not getting anywhere near this. In another administration, this would be considered criminal.”
And here’s more news, from Levelman.com: "Trump Kills the Slush Fund, Leaving Himself, Two Sons, and the Trump Organization the Only Beneficiaries." It is easy to be cynical about the Trump Administration. But it’s hard to be cynical enough.
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