THE RETURN OF THE CRAZY JESUS LADY, TRUMP EDITION.
It's been a while since we had fun with the Crazy Jesus Lady -- which is what I used to call Peggy Noonan, but that was before she stopped being so Jesusy and just leaned on the received wisdom like a one-legged drunk on a bar rail, which is probably what got her the Pulitzer. Well, I recently snuck behind the Wall Street Journal paywall and got a load:
The Missing Order in American Politics
I grow wistful as I watch the congressional chaos while reading Kissinger’s forthcoming oral history.
If only we were murdering civilians, invading Cambodia, and assassinating leaders we didn't like again! One out of three just isn't good enough.
But even before she gets to the war criminal it's gold. First, no regular reader of my work will be surprised to know that, after some early raised-pinky tut-tuts about Trump's lack of polish, Noonan is fully aboard the JustTheTipTrump express and hell, she might just let him shove in another inch.
First of all, the Democrats are really overstepping with all the "Congressional oversight" nonsense:
But there is such a thing as context, and the Democrats seem to be ignoring it. This is a country divided.
Almost half the country is for Mr. Trump—truly, madly, deeply. Half is against him—unequivocally, unchangeably. There is no resolving this. Or rather to the extent it can be resolved, it will be resolved at the ballot box. The presidential election is 18 months from now, on Nov. 3, 2020.
Until then, people are where they are and hold the views they hold, and don’t push them too hard.
Don't push them too hard or what? Support for impeachment has actually gone up since House Democrats started acting like they have some guts -- why, it's almost as if people respect that! Also there is such a thing as acting on principle, but for Noonan that's just something Republicans do, while Democrats just pretend to believe things -- "We’ll see how well Speaker Nancy Pelosi can dance right up to the edge to appease some in her caucus, and not over it," she stage-whispers. Soon Nancy and Donald will be telling each other dirty jokes just like Tip and Ronnie!
[Trump supporters] sometimes tell reporters he’s a man of high character but mostly to drive the reporters crazy. I have never talked to a Trump supporter, and my world is thick with them, who thought he had a high personal character.
Noonan's world is thick with Trump supporters? You mean Republicans? Big shock. But after years of "Character Above All" palaver, you'd think she'd be embarrassed to admit that her party supports scumbags.
Well, turns out Noonan has an escape clause, or at least an escape adjective:
On the other hand they sincerely believe he has a high political character, in that he pursues the issues he campaigned on. They hired him as an insult to the political class, as a Hail Mary pass -- we’ve tried everything else, maybe this will work -- and because he agreed with them on the issues.
"Pursues the issues he campaigned on"? I remember when we were going to be filing our income taxes on postcards. And that the deficit would go down. And so would prices. And... well, to be fair, he still hates brown-skinned people. Noonan doesn't want to get into this, so she talks about how the people -- the same people that loved St. Ronnie! -- love Mr. Trump, and how when they scream obscenities and act like a lynch mob and cheer shooting immigrants, that's just sly American wit:
When they jeer the press during rallies at the president’s direction, they don’t really mean it. They’re having fun and talking back. They’d be happy if their kids became reporters -- an affluent profession, and half of them are famous.
???????????
The president doesn’t really hate the press either, he wants their love and admiration. You don’t need the admiration of people you truly disdain.
If Noonan thinks Trump doesn't disdain his suckers... well, she thought Reagan was on the level, too.
As for her Kissinger tongue-bath, I can't bring myself to touch it, though I will risk vomit damage to my keyboard to mention this bit about Kissinger's hardscrabble, pre-genocide youth:
The tough Italian-American men he worked with teased the German refugee and took him to Yankee Stadium to learn to be an American. There he first saw the man who years later on meeting him struck him dumb: Joe DiMaggio.
I like to imagine these guys telling Li'l Henry, "Remember Joe DiMaggio, and also that you're a white man, and only kill gooks, spades and spics!" [Patriotic music swells] Young Henry Kissinger never forgot. I tell ya, it's kind of a Cassandra curse to see the people you always knew were shit not only proving it over years but actually getting worse.