“Hold My Big Mac...”

Two weeks ago, in my state of Virginia, we suffered a political earthquake that had all three of our highest ranked elected officials embroiled in career threatening controversies, which had made us the laughing stock of the country. Our Governor and Attorney General were dealing with racist photographs from their college days, our Lt. Governor, credibly accused by two women of sexual harassment. The air was thick with talk of triple impeachment. At that time I wrote the following:

Ralph knows that the people of Virginia, like the rest of America, have an attention span of a toddler. Sure, the fire might be hot for the first 48 hours, but each day after that it cools. Ralph also knows that the Press also has a short attention span. They might be in high drugeon when the story breaks, but after a few days it’s like...squirrel!!!

Two weeks to the day that all this broke, this political earthquake has vanished from the newspapers. Welcome to America in 2019.

One of the most enduring legacies of the Trump Presidency will be the magnificent cover he has provided for all manner of political misbehavior throughout government. Each day’s headlines scream out the latest outrage that would have been enough to doom previous Presidents. But, just about the time that all the players have their talking points ready, Trump has moved on to the next outrage, leaving the commentariat gasping for air and back to scribbling out talking points. I have come to believe that this is the signature genius of Donald Trump. Flood the zone with outlandish, fact-free, anti-constitutional and boorish behavior, then watch with glee your enemies trying to keep up with it all. Its fiendishly clever, and provides lesser political lights valuable cover for what would have been career ending death sentences. So, there’s a governor in Virginia who posed in blackface in his medical school yearbook, you say? Psshht, that’s so two weeks ago, bro.

So, the President has declared a national emergency at the southern border to circumvent the will of Congress, and decided to divert funds earmarked for drug interdiction from the Defense Department to fund his border wall? And this has your knickers in a knot? Somewhere in the White House the President is turning to one of his aides and saying, Here, hold my Big Mac and hand me my cell...