The Most Pathetic Men in America

[brooklynite]

The Atlantic

Consider again the doormat duo—McCarthy and Graham. I’ve known both men for years, at least in the weird sense that political reporters and pols “know” each other. They are a classically Washington type: fun to be around, starstruck, and desperate to keep their jobs or get better ones—to maximize their place in the all-important mix. On various occasions I have asked them, in so many words, how they could sidle up to Trump like they have. The answer, basically, is that they did it because it was the savviest course; because it was best for them. If Trump had one well-developed intuition, it was his ability to sniff out weakness in people—and, I suppose, in major political parties. Nearly all elected Republicans in Washington needed Trump’s blessing, and voters, to remain there. People like McCarthy and Graham benefited a great deal from making it work with Trump, or “managing the relationship,” as they say.

McCarthy knew that alienating Trump would blow up any chance he had of becoming speaker, which had become the singular objective of his “public service,” such as it was. He cultivated Trump from the start. The president came to refer to McCarthy as “my Kevin,” a term of ownership as much as affection. But “managing the relationship” was often a daily struggle, McCarthy conceded, when I interviewed him for The New York Times in his Bakersfield, California, district in April 2021. “He goes up and down with his anger,” McCarthy said of Trump. “He’s mad at everybody one day. He’s mad at me one day … This is the tightest tightrope anyone has to walk.”

Once, early in 2019, I asked Graham a version of the question that so many of his judgy old Washington friends had been asking him. How could he swing from being one of Trump’s most merciless critics in 2016 to such a sycophant thereafter? I didn’t use those exact words, but Graham got the idea. “Well, okay, from my point of view, if you know anything about me, it’d be odd not to do this,” he told me. “‘This,’” Graham specified, “is to try to be relevant.” Relevance: It casts one hell of a spell.

“I could get Trump on the phone faster than any staff person who worked for him could get him on the phone,” McCarthy bragged to me. There was always a breathless, racing quality to both men’s voices when they talked about the thrill ride of being one of Trump’s “guys.”

[no_hypocrisy]

1. Graham chose Trump over his BFF John McCain.

That says enough for me.

[Ocelot II]

2. Excellent article, also very funny.

Trump said and did obviously awful and dangerous things—racist and cruel and achingly dumb and downright evil things. But on top of that, he is a uniquely tiresome individual, easily the sorest loser, the most prodigious liar, and the most interminable victim ever to occupy the White House. He is, quite possibly, the biggest crybaby ever to toddle across history’s stage, from his inaugural-crowd hemorrhage on day one right down to his bitter, ketchup-flinging end. Seriously, what public figure in the history of the world comes close? I’m genuinely asking.

Bottom line, Trump is an extremely tedious dude to have had in our face for seven years and running. My former New York Times colleague David Brooks wrote it best: “We’ve got this perverse situation in which the vast analytic powers of the entire world are being spent trying to understand a guy whose thoughts are often just six fireflies beeping randomly in a jar.”

and

Watching the procession of GOP genuflectors, I was reminded of Susan Glasser’s 2019 profile of Secretary of State Mike Pompeo in The New Yorker, in which she quoted a former American ambassador describing Pompeo as “a heat-seeking missile for Trump’s ass.” This image stuck with me (unfortunately) and also remained a pertinent descriptor for much of the Republican Party long after said ass had been re-homed to Florida.

[empedocles]

3. TY

[Cracklin Charlie]

6. That's good stuff.

[thucythucy]

4. I'm reminded of a scene from "Inside the Third Reich"

a made for TV movie from decades back, based on Albert Speer's book of the same name.

Speer and Milch, a German field marshal, have just emerged from a meeting with Hitler during which the tyrant rants about "total war" and how he'll exact revenge on all his enemies. This is after Stalingrad, after the German loss of North Africa. As they walk along Milch unloads on how much he hates Hitler, how this "guttersnipe of an amateur general" is leading Germany to total destruction, how Hitler hasn't even asked about the number of Germans killed in his war thus far.

"Herr Field Marshal," Speer asks, "Do you know to whom you're talking?"

To which Milch responds, "Herr Reich Minister, do you know for whom you're working?"

Whether this exchange really happened I have no idea. Both men had highly unreliable memories when it came to their own actions.

But that scene has always stuck with me as an example of how some people are perfectly willing to sell their souls, providing there's enough in it for them.

[Samrob]

5. All that to worship the most despicable individuals on earth.

Do they not realize that the only power Trump really has is what they and others give him? WTF is wrong with people.

Giving you a knife to cut my throat does not make you a fearless warrior.

[Cracklin Charlie]

7. Weaklings and cowards.

A whole party of them.

[Ocelot II]

8. Must-read: Tim Miller's book, "Why We Did It."

He writes about why so many GOP remoras attached themselves to TFG's vast orange buttocks - some great insights about how and why political hangers-on are so easily corruptible and will abase themselves just to be able to smell the rancid farts of power. And it's also very funny.