War Games

Well, the Fat-scist-In-Chief up and did it.  On an otherwise slow summer Saturday night the internet reverberated with the reaction to this proclamation of war.  No, it’s not quite up there in quotability as “Yesterday, December 7th, 1941, is a date that will live in infamy”.  But it’s patently obviously that anyone who uses the face-paint equivalent of Puddy at a Devils-Rangers playoff game as his avatar isn’t all that likely to throw out polysyllabic words all that often.

Not that you should have been all that surprised.  If you’ve been paying attention, he’s been keeping to a schedule that would make a soccer mom gush with approval.   He gave Iran a 60-day notice on March 19th and credible reports began to emerge on May 20th that plans for a U.S. response were under way.  And in a tad over a month, first strike.

And when one parses both tone and attitude in the brief self-comgratulatory speech he pompously delivered at the top of the 10 o’clock hour last night–providing a heck of a lead-out to a special Saturday night edition of HANNITY–it’s quite clear this was as orchestrated and as well-planned as are most scripted works–and certainly more so than a typical episode of THE APPRENTICE.  Were it not for the obvious age lines despite the persistent tangerine makeup, one could practically see the same sort of determination and being in over one’s head as one saw in Matthew Broderick and company in WAR GAMES.

OK, maybe that’s a tad harsh.  But I defy anyone to tell me that at least the plot line of WAG THE DOG isn’t being played out.  Think I’m exaggerating?  Heck, even Wikipedia’s entry on the idiom confirms this, and points to specific prior examples as proof:

It has been used multiple times for former President Donald Trump. First, in April 2017 when he conducted airstrikes against Syria during an investigation of Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections,^[3] and again in January 2020, after a U.S. airstrike assassination of Iran’s General Qasem Soleimani occurred during first impeachment trials of former President Trump.

Was anyone talking about the “riots” in Los Angeles, the Epstein files or the pathetic attempt at a military parade last night?  If they still were, how far buried down most timelines was it?

SALON’s Bill Curry delivered a brilliant dissection of the motivators for this particular timing in a piece dropped early this morning:

In the lead-up to last night’s airstrikes, which Trump immediately declared a “spectacular military success” in a hyperbolic 3½ minute speech from the White House, his behavior has been marked by manic outbursts and abrupt changes of course. His actions strongly suggest that his mental condition is driving his foreign policy, and that it has now drawn us into war, however limited he promises it will be, with Iran.

If you’re reluctant to label Trump, turn to page 760 of the manual — it’s available online — and ponder the listed criteria. The terms all apply to him: “pattern of grandiosity,” “fantasies of unlimited success, power, brilliance,” “lacks empathy,” “requires excessive admiration.” But they fail to capture the magnitude of his disorder. It’s what earns his narcissism the modifier “malignant.”

As a malignant narcissist, Trump experiences only two strong emotions: rage and embarrassment. Though immune to shame, he embarrasses easily. At his parade, you could tell from his face he felt humiliated, and was seething.   He’d already been having a rough few weeks: adverse reactions to his mass deportations and step-by-step imposition of martial law, the slow crumbling of his foolhardy tariff regime, growing opposition to his “big beautiful bill.” And now this. Anyone could see it was more than a man, especially a narcissist, could take.  

Having been around far less prominent malignant narcissists for decades, both professionally and legally–the symptoms are patently obvious to me.  Maybe you’ve been more fortunate than I.  In which case, you might have already known this was imminent had you been familiar with the works of one Dr. Robert Jeffress.

Jeffress is the author of the “best-selling” JESUS REVEALED IN THE END TIMES.  If you’re as proactive and as broke as I am to avoid dropping $29 for the privilage of reading his theories, THECLEARTRUTH.com essentially provides the narrative.  In a nutshell, it’s essential that we MUST be on the good side of who’s got control of Israel when Jesus returns as a lion.  And if one bothers to parse through the checklist to date, it’s evident that we’ve been heading toward that moment of truth for a while.  For those that chooses to believe this, this is a markedly different situation than Korea, Vietnam and even Iraq.  Even if the playbook on involvement and escalation may appear to be eerily similar.

And no, I don’t subscribe to a whit of what Jeffress and others have prophesized.  But I acknowledge that plenty of folks puppeting DJT literally swear on stacks of what they consider to be Bibles that it’s, well, the clear truth.

And if you’re too cynical to even acknowledge this philosophy, well perhaps you’re one who is inclined to follow the money.  If that’s the case, please note the track record of perhaps Mark Cuban’s least favorite business partner.  Wikipedia documents how her money has been spent lately:

Miriam Adelson (Hebrew: מרים אדלסון) is an Israeli-American physician, business woman, philanthropist, and conservative political donor…(S)ince 2016 she has been one of the most prominent financial supporters of Donald Trump. She and her husband provided the largest donation to his 2016 campaign, his presidential inauguration, his defense fund against the Mueller investigation into Russian interference, and the 2020 campaign.^[4] She was the third largest donor to Trump’s 2024 election bid, donating $106 million.^[5]

For a person as transactional and malleable as Trump, this is practically a mandate.  And please don’t try and try and tell me things would have necessarily been different had the election gone in favor of the cackling fountain of joy.  Considering how she and her party burn through money, a kosher pigeon like Adelson would be even more coveted were that matzo meal waved in their faces.

Add all of this onto his most recent obsessive x-eet/rant, dutifully regurgitated yesterday by THE DAILY BEAST’s Emell Derra Adolphus: