More Christmas Cheer with Roger Stone, E2
A Potomac Christmas Carol, with sincere apologies to Charles Dickens
A Potomac Christmas Carol, in five staves
to stave
transitive verb: to smash a hole in, to crush or break inward
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/stave
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to stave off
to ward off (something adverse), to stave off disaster
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/stave%20off
Stave 1: Prologue:
At first blush, Dickens’ ageless tale of hope for a broken world appears inapt to offer wisdom for our divisive body politic. After all, in a story of personal redemption, what role is there for Donald Trump? Scrooge, you say? Well, Trump is indeed old, bitter, resentful and claims to be a man of business, but Trump is no Scrooge.
Why? Because Trump is way beyond redemption, political or otherwise.
By the thoughtful standards of Dante, who admired worthy leaders, secular and religious, but cast the treacherous into perpetual hell, Trump is truly irredeemable. Guided by predatory instinct, Trump is tragically bereft of the human gifts of language, wisdom, hope, compassion and introspection, incapable of hearing the harmonic music of our revered Republic. Consequently, unrestrained, filled with rage and contempt, Trump & enablers will eviscerate our shared political life, transforming our beloved republic into a living hell.
Trump is not a great-souled man, only a tiny tyrant, one who drives followers to the deep end of a sea of hatred, fear and loathing of others. And to what end? All to appease his own unregulated soul, so deeply disordered by a deep-seated need for approval, achieved by dominance of others at any cost.
Trump is a one-man race bound headlong into a bonfire of vanities. And thrilled at the prospects of immolating a resistant republic which is, and has long been, the world’s greatest hope against tyranny. Ironic, right?
Dickens’ Scrooge saw the light, eventually, but tiny Donald embraces only raging darkness: “I am your revenge.”
Dickens’ charming tale is about the power of memory and community to heal long-festering wounds of heart, mind and soul. Afflictions so impactful they shred the human capacity for empathy and cooperation. Afflictions so consequential they upend societal order, crushing the aspirations of citizens and the body politic alike.
And Dickens’ love song to the Christmas season speaks directly to Trump’s disabling affliction, the one that prevents him from walking in another’s shoes. An affliction of seeing the other not as a human being, but a pair of binary choices - useful or disposable, now or later - made by narcissistic whim or malicious political calculation. His best interest is never your best interest.
Trump castigates and incites but never leads. Having no interest or experience in, or talent for, reconciliation, Trump is incapable of instilling hope and promoting mutual cooperation and common purpose. By nature and tweet, he is unfit to lead, unfit to inspire, unfit to share our joy and comfort our losses.
Let it be said: Donald Trump lacks every element of human empathy - courage, temperance, wisdom, justice, hope, love and faith. In short, Donald Trump lacks virtue. His world is Donald Trump. It is dark, fitful, spinning, wholly transactional and calculating, chained to the false goods to which he has anchored himself.
On the other hand, it seems we have found the perfect actor to play the Ghost of Marley, Scrooge’s seven-years’ deceased partner, an earth-roaming, ever-encircling shade, enchained to material objects symbolizing avarice, envy, anger and unseemly pride, eternally damned by blistering-bad, life-long behaviors that undermine civic life and the virtues that inform it.
Christmas Cheer host Roger Stone, on hearing this casting decision: What about me? Is there no room in this holiday-pageant-of-a-play for me?
Hmmm? A role for our stone-cold, spiritually dead-as-a-doornail, political trickster and Christmas Cheer host?
Stone, plaintively: But I am Trump’s kindred spirit!
Ever since we homeschooled together, at the knee of republic-crushing Roy Cohn. Since our days worshiping at the altar of Watergate’s Richard Nixon, delighting in Tricky Dick’s acquired taste for political revenge, served ice cold with the relish of his ever-expanding enemies list!
I, Roger Stone, Trump’s life-time pal and confidant, the very first to encourage attention-mad Donald to seek the presidency! Please, sir, I want a role.
In what role might we cast icy Stone, he who perversely vows life-long loyalty to a revengeful Boss so explosively contemptuous of all who deny his ridiculous call to total subservience?
Felon Stone, who received one, and requested two, presidential pardons - the first for “not giving Trump up” in all things Russian, the second for “insurrection-on-demand” services rendered at the U.S. Capitol, exhorting all whom Trump called with this treasonous call-to-arms: “F*ck the voting, let’s get right to the violence!”
Cast remorseless Stone as Scrooge? Is A Potomac Christmas Carol even possible without a repentant Scrooge? Is there a way to cast stooge Stone as Scrooge and somehow preserve Dickens’ happy ending - of personal and civic bliss restored? Otherwise, our writers advise, a new working title is required, something fearfully along the lines of “It’s [Not] a Wonderful Life.”
And that, depressingly, would be like a reprisal of The Nutcracker showcasing a victorious King Rat. Who does that?
Imagine mouse-like Stevie Bannon playing King Rat, stirring up havoc with an evil troupe of Trump-enabling mice and rats. (Ok, except for the victorious part, that image certainly fits, right?) But vanquishing the Nutcracker, a noble stand-in for our noble Republic, the one we endeavor daily to re-enact? No way, little Stevie, mon petite raton!
Like the uplifting spirit, music and dance of The Nutcracker, the spirit, music and movements of our Republic speak directly from the heart, to the higher civic good of hope, harmony and shared human empathy, the essential starting point for our daily journey as a republic worthy of the name.
If Stone sets foot on our stage, would we really allow Donald & disordered pals to have their way in this play? Absolutely not. But, as a holiday courtesy to our host of Christmas Cheer with Roger Stone, Scrooge he shall play to Trump’s ghostly Marley.
Not to worry, it will work out. How, you may ask? We don’t know, it’s a mystery, but it will. It always does.
Next up on Christmas Cheer with Roger Stone (E3):
A Potomac Christmas Carol, Stave 2:
“Stooge & Maralardo*”
Stay tuned.
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*/Our thanks to Not-a-Trump-Fan Stephen Colbert.
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More on staves and Dickens:
Noun: A stave is a set of five parallel lines on which a musical note is written.
By referring to the chapters of “A Christmas Carol” as staves Dickens' suggests that the novella will be a joyous, uplifting and moral tale.
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Here’s your morning shot of Blackjack,
https://www.defendyourvotingrights.org/play-card-game/
featuring a Card Deck of 54+ Trump Enablers (including, most recently, U.S. House Speaker Mike Johnson)
“Voter suppression and election manipulation are exactly like a rigged card game.”
https://www.defendyourvotingrights.org/54-enablers-of-voter-suppression/