Another day, another outrage.
Yesterday, Trump announced he had “requested” FIFA overturn a ‘red card’ ruling against Folarin Balogun of the U.S. World Cup Soccer Team, enabling him to play in today’s game against Belgium.
Balogun had been ejected in the last game against Bosnia and Herzrgovina (B/H) for what the referee ruled was a serious foul against a B/H player. While the TV commentators expressed surprise and some disbelief at the actions, that was the referees ruling. A red-card ejection means a player is also ineligible to play in at least one succeeding game – depending on FIFA review.
By that one action, Trump has destroyed all the goodwill that had been built up around the World Cup games played in the U.S., tainting at least the U.S./Belgium game – and perhaps all those remaining – with the stain of self interest and brutish arrogance.
But no one should have been surprised – even before Trump made his glorious descent on the golden escalator in 2015 to announce his Presidential run.
The rich like him have long existed in the cultural and financial landscape of the country.
F. Scott Fitzgerald experienced them first-hand when he achieved literary success and some temporary acceptance into their class while married to his wealthy wife, Zelda. He summed them up perfectly in “The Great Gatsby” (1925):
“They were careless people, Tom and Daisy – they smashed up things and creatures and then retreated back into their money or their vast carelessness or whatever it was that kept them together, and let other people clean up the mess they had made.”
He was writing about the fictional Tom and Daisy Buchanan. The same could be said of Don and Melania Trump – or the many other super rich who live in splendid isolation from all the damages and destruction they cause in what could be called a modern Gilded Age.
Of course intervening in a soccer game is trivial when compared to the destructive behavior of the Trump regime in places like Gaza, Iran, and Lebanon, but it offers yet another example of how much Trump disdains any standard of behavior that conflicts with his own ego, and who will use any and all power he has to advance his interests.
Many speak hopefully of the ‘midterms’ and end of the Trump regime in 2028.
But I believe that misses the point. Trump, the Buchanans, and the rest did not create the society they lived in – they reflected it.
They grew to power in a system that failed, and fails, to provide economic justice for all – a system in civic, cultural, and moral decay.
An election or two is not going to change that. And Don and Melania Buchanan will never know, or care, what they – and their successors of either party – have wrought.
