Congressional Democrats and Republicans: the mother and father of a random shitty childhood. They fight each other for dominance in their toxic marriage, constantly ignoring their kids in the process. Tell them things like, “Go to your room!” and “Please, the adults are talking!”
Sure, they know a lot about lawmaking, which isn’t easy. But their knowledge doesn’t make them unique. Doesn’t make them a goddamn parent to the rest of us. Imagine if everyone who knew something you didn’t believed themselves to be better than you, and assumed the surrogate role of your shitty parent. 35% of the world consisting of educated people—or people who had a job—would be patronizing and ignoring you the exact same way.
I know what you’re saying. “35% of people at my work and at home already speak to me like that.”
But that just kind of makes my point.
In a society based on merit, which this is not, individuals as verifiably incompetent as, say, president Donald Trump—the biggest political moron of them all, just ahead of Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush—don’t hold positions of leadership like his. The screening process in any legitimate business prevents them. But this isn’t a meritocracy. It’s a plutocracy. How many presidents were wealthy people before they became president? All of them?
Donald Trump is the result of a cancer-infected system. Of that plutocracy—where the wealthy can thrive and grow at greater rates in their society, like cancer cells, feeding off the virtual life’s blood of those beneath them.
And the worst part? People who don’t have what they have put them there. Or, at least, don’t make a big fuss about their stupidity or ineptitude. Unless the plutocratic (read: powerful and in control of policy or swaying it quickly) do something that the rabble finds post-worthy on social media. Then it becomes a thing. For a day, maybe. Possibly week.
Then, nothing. Because social media will have moved on by then.
So how did it happen? Well, that goes back to the country’s founding, really. But Trump? Only in an epoch in which people are so fed up with their treatment or regard at the hands of the political establishment could a guy like Trump ever become president.
Donald Trump, by the things he says and doesn’t, shows he doesn’t belong where he is. If this were high school, his friends would be going, “Dude, you have no idea what you’re talking about. We saw you up there.” And only a sycophant, or somebody showing him pity, would give him support. Not because he deserved it. If the government of the United States were a high school—call it Plutocracy Vocational—and the individual personalities within the present administration were students, here’s how things would go…
Donald Trump is, of course, that biggest rich kid prick of them all. The loudest, the most sneering—the one who could never be wrong. And his dad was police chief or mayor or somebody, so it made it even worse that he could never get in trouble for it.
And, because context is important, we’ll go back to all the jerks and self-important dicks from his first term. They set the mold for the current wave, which, arguably, because the administration was “prepared” this time around, is so much worse.
This is where the Trump administration hivemind originated. From the first-termers (i.e. older kids) who actually had a mind of their own. Kind of.
Brett Kavanaugh, as the other, younger rich prick who lived almost tangentially from the other rich pricks, who everybody knew was a woman-and-self-loathing lothario who aced his classes without studying and once copped a feel on that passed out drunk girl but refused to cop to it. Also, at twelve, he was good at golf.
Betsy DeVos, as that rich, assholey cunt who threw all the big parties and never let any guy at her own high school come, and who also would periodically start unfounded rumors about guys she liked and girls she was jealous of, for fun. Because they had stable home lives, or moms who actually raised them, or dads who showed them affection. Which, of course, she didn’t.
Jeff Sessions, as the funny-talking guy from somewhere else in the country who transferred to your school who instantly fell in with the pricks by being their toady. And who may have come from money? But it was, like, Alabama money? So once he got to Plutocracy Vocational, he felt had to make up for the difference in value by being an even bigger prick than he really was.
Steve Bannon, as the creepy turd who collected lizards, rat skulls and moon rocks, who sneered at the jocks in the halls (without his existence being acknowledged) and started rumors about every girl in high school that he liked; who kissed the ass of all the guy teachers and, for some reason, hated every female teacher in his school, even the ones who treated him like a human being. Which most other people didn’t.
And the next wave:
J.D. Vance, as the guy who tries the loudest and hardest to emulate the group’s leader, always at his heels, and in the process, to everyone outside that singular clique of rich assholes and their ass-kissers and taint-lickers, looks like the biggest, cringiest wiener with the least sense of identity you’ve ever seen (which is probably why he’s trying so hard to be someone else). Who started out kind of quiet and shy, and even smiled some when he was a freshman, but now all he does is have the meanest, bulliest, nastiest responses to anything anyone says that makes him or the leader look bad, and all you can say, watching him scowl at everything and laugh at the most inappropriate times, is, “What the fuck happened to that dude? He used to be…well, not cool. Or decent. Or likable. Or open-minded. Or not a turd. But at least he didn’t obviously try to be exactly like that Trump dude.”
Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., as yet another random, rich kid prick you went to high school with somewhere. The one who thinks he’s an expert on immunology, oncology and all medicine in general because his mom’s a nutritionist and his dad runs the bank that owns the building his mom works in. Plus he (the dad) is on the board at the private school his son keeps getting suspended from, which is why he’s now at Plutocracy Vocational.
Matt Gaetz, as the guy with one of the most punchable faces you’ve ever passed in a hallway and were like, “Man, someone’s gonna punch that guy in the face before the term is over, and I really hope it isn’t me.” Unfortunately for him, the faces that were ranked higher than his on the list have already graduated: 1.) Jared Kushner, 2.) Corey Lewandowski, 3.) Steve Mnuchin (except Lewandowski’s back working as a crossing guard or bus driver, because he lies and says it helps with his ROTC training or whatever, but really it’s because his parents disowned him for being spoiled and stupid, and didn’t like him spending so much time around that Trump boy).
(And now Gaetz has transferred to an even bigger school for dicks, so it’s not an issue anymore.)
Stephen Miller, as the dude you don’t want anything to do with. You don’t even feel comfortable passing him in the hallway. Especially alone. Every time you see him, you cut down the side stairs or through the library. He’s the scrawny, big-headed, sickly weird dude who didn’t do any extracurricular activities, never smiles, never talks to anyone but people in the clique (not even his own teachers), and every time you see him whispering to someone in the corner it sends a chill down your spine, like you get the feeling someone’s door’s gonna get kicked in at 4 am the next morning, with his dad the Gruppenführer and other Brownshirts standing there, handing someone (on the opposite end of their SMGs) a one-way ticket to the Bergen Belsen. Even though this is 21st century America and you live in the far-out, rich kid suburbs.
Scott Bessent, as the superrich, openly gay dude of the group who made you question what you thought you knew about high school stereotypes. He’s a prick, a cunt, an asshole, a bitch, a dick, a pussy, all of which made him this weirdly amorphous entity you just couldn’t pin down, and therefore found impossible to hate. And you hated yourself for that. Because he was this height of nasty that the others, even the girls, couldn’t reach. And despite being so publicly femme, he seemed to have no element of femininity about him, except when he would corner some freshman boy, and in this frighteningly seductive way start talking about how, because he was so rich and the freshman’s family was so poor, he could basically own the kid and make him his slave. He would also give back all the male ball-busting in the group as much as take it (and he seemed to love to take it), and it was always this flirty, smiley, erotic two-way street that, if one of those two dudes were a girl, you’d be like, “Ugh, get a room and get out of the way. My locker is over there.” And then you’d be like, “Are all those dudes gay?” And you’d catch yourself thinking about it during class and after, before realizing he’d been floating around your head all day, and then, right in that moment, you’d understand just how sinister the guy really was.
Kristi Noem, as that nasty cunt who’s done all the drugs, slept with all the guys, gets wasted every time and spreads rumors about everyone (including her own cousin, who you always thought was really nice). Who was kind of pretty once, but has had enough plastic surgery by 18 for you to start saying, “Yeah, she’s kind of hot, but I seriously don’t want to see her naked. Or with her hair pulled back. Or in the full light of day.” You’re pretty sure she’s had a kid, too. Though the ‘dad’ already graduated years before because she was, like, fourteen when it happened. Though no one talks about it. Because the last kid who tried to got an official cease-and-desist letter sent to his house, and now everyone’s scared to death of her.
Pam Bondi, as another rich cunt, but blonde, who’s constantly trying to screw more guys, do more drugs, get more wasted and call more people insulting names behind their backs than the other rich girls (particularly that Kristi Numb, whose mom she’s pretty sure was an immigrant). Because even though they’re all on the same side, she sees them as competition. Because that’s what girls like her are taught from birth by their mothers. (Their fathers don’t teach them anything, because they don’t give a shit about them, because they’re girls.) “Flatter and fawn over men and do whatever they tell you, honey, even when it hurts—and believe me, it will—and destroy all the women you can, because life is a constant battle to be on top. Of a man. That’s how I achieved my rhinoplasty, face-lifted, makeup-plastered, benzo-popping, opioid-downing, blow-snorting, $10,000-a-bottle wine-chugging, vacuously insignificant trophy wife lifestyle. And you can, too. Now where’s that swarthy, 16-year-old muscular immigrant poolboy? Mommy needs to borrow his skimmer.”
Pete Hegseth, another punchable face. Good thing he’s around, you find yourself thinking, because having all these dicks and cunts here really makes you want to punch someone. Or have someone you know do it, because you’re too much of a coward. And since Matt Gaetz, Jared Kushner or that other guy whose name you could never pronounce aren’t here, and Corey Lewandowski is out driving a bus or walking kids through a crosswalk, this guy is probably gonna have to do. Because he totally deserves it.
Kash Patel, as the Indian dude who despises himself and his culture so much that all he can do to make up for it is (literally) look up to the most chauvinistic, jingoist, fight-starting, gun-loving bros in the clique. All of whom are white and Catholic, of course.
And the rest: all those dicks and chodes who were a couple grades down when Trump became a senior, but who now are seniors themselves (Trump being the guy who, I don’t know, keeps flunking his final grade and is still in his senior year, even though he can now legally drink alcohol.)
The Democrats assuredly have similarly turdy, out-of-touch kids as part of their cliques, it’s true. But they were all the harmless, nerdy kids who were in band or A/V club or theater who didn’t have the same pay-a-bully-to-rub-your-face-in-a-pile-of-dirty-gym-clothes motives as the others. They were just aloof and ditzy and, sure, probably had too much money. Or at least enough to be so out of touch that they were like, “You got a low tire and can’t go out and see your grandma this weekend? Take my car if you need it.”
And you’re like, “Dude, you drive a Bentley. That your parents got you for your birthday.”
And they’re like, “So? Take it. Why not? You can bring her to the villa.”
And you’re like, “What’s a villa?”
And they’re like, “The summer house. I’ll leave the keys in it. And I’ll tell the guard at the gate you’re coming.”
And you’re like, “Did you ask your parents?” Or aunts and uncles, who maybe share the summer house? Or grandparents? At least (you’re thinking) that’s what poor people like you would have going on. Some kind of family timeshare thing.
And they’re like, “No. But it’s fine.”
And you’re thinking, this guy is out of his mind if he thinks he can lend a $100,000 car to his friend he doesn’t know all that well and let him drive his grandma to the family summer house, because he’s not necessarily nice and caring—which he kind of is—but so removed from how regular people actually live that he doesn’t realize he’s going to get you into trouble.
In the end, basically, he’s just doing it because he thinks that’s what cool kids do. And he wants to be your friend, for you to think he’s cool. And this is the only way he knows how: by doing nice things with his money. But only to a degree and with caveats, of course. Which will likely reveal themselves in time.
Like when his parents find out you took their kid’s $100,000 Bentley to the villa. And call the cops on you for grand theft auto, trespassing, breaking and entering, or likely all three.
But this wasn’t about those dudes. It’s about the other ones: those absolute chodes you went to high school with, or likenesses thereof, who now riddle the upper echelons of the U.S. government like maggots on a corpse chucked in an open grave.
You remember those people, right? Well, they’re back. And always will be.
Because in a world like theirs, high school never really ends. Life is a perpetual race of that same kind of stupid childhood bullshit.
