Step Down, En Masse

The map says three hours to go.  It looks like we’re right up above the Russian, Chinese border where we were chugging along not so many month’s ago.  Perhaps the same mother-son pair who ran the dining car and served up beers and stroganoff are down their now on the route they must do two or three times a month.  Kabarovsk is close to the area where the Jewish Oblast is located.  I had been so interested in seeing that.  But, like Lake Baikal, we passed the sight by, without getting off the train and made our way straight Moscow that trip.

Pinching the map in closer I can see we’re actually, further up near Magadan, which is I believe n the port city near Kolyma.  No man’s land.  Gulag gold mines where Varlam Shalamov was imprisoned.  He and the other prisoners were right.  They were much closer to Alaska than they were to Moscow. 

Driving around the Bay Area, seeing old friends, meeting new people for business can all feel strikingly normal.  Seeing signs, remembering short cuts, having familiar food.  Everything is easy to use.  So many of the little China hassles are nonexistent.  But I suspect one gets soft with all that convenience.  I went into one meeting and the top fella asked me point blank if I lived in China.  I answered affirmatively and it was clear I’d thereby legitimized myself. 

Everyone wanted to discuss Trump.  How can we help ourselves?   Driving up from Santa Clara I called my sister.  “Have you seen the anonymous op-ed?”  I had not.  As soon as I got home I did and like everyone else, didn’t know quite how to process.  We learn the obvious: Trump is unfit for office and is handled by those around him.  But who is the person that brags about how they are doing the country a favor by manipulating him?   I don’t know how long that person’s going to be able to keep their cover, but they and all the other people from Woodward’s book who don’t respect Trump enough to follow his orders, you should step down, en masse and clarify publicly what you saw.  But none of these individual tales of cowardice or bravery really matter. 

How does the end come about?  This is what’s most critical at this juncture.  If some group of aides try to remove him, because incompetence, it will be seen as a coup d’etat.  Then you have some forty percent of the population livid and feeling disenfranchised.  Far better would be if he’s shown to have committed a crime.   That’s a world where, depending on what it is, the number of supporters drops precipitously, so the vast majority of the people throw in the towell as happened with Milhous.  The best of all, for the strength of the nation, I suppose is he finishes out his term, is resoundingly defeated and then, he can be tried for this or that crime as a citizen.   But this is still only the second act or so of this remarkable Shakespearean tragedy.  It will certainly get more unprecedented and bizarre as the walls close in around him and he is left with no one he can trust. 

Sunday, 9/9/18