Dear President-Elect Trump
There. I typed that. I had some doubts about whether I could, but I did.
Let me start with this: As a human soul (and it is an article of my faith that there's one in there, somewhere,) I wish you well. That is, I wish you the profound experiences of self-awareness, pain and growth, connection to other humans, and other aspects of learning that transcend the many distortions and sorrows the flesh is heir to, and enable us to become the best possible human beings.
I have, and do, hold you in my prayers. Probably not for the reasons your fragile, desperate ego would like to assume, but I do pray for you.
That's about as far as I can go with high-minded, compassionate, trying-to-be-the-best-of-myself stuff, though.
Still, I don't hate you, personally.
There's an aspirational reason for that: I don't want to hate, period. I don't like what it does to me.
And a selfish reason for that: Hating is what your followers do. They're better at it than I could ever be. I'd rather not even try to compete.
And a pragmatic reason for that: We've never met. While I know a fair amount about you from watching what you do in video clips, from reading your tweets and your reported utterances, and a certain amount from second hand sources, I don't know you. In some ways, it's harder for me to hate someone I don't know than to love someone I don't know.
I hate many of the things you've said. I hate many of the "promises" you've made and opinions you've expressed. I hate that the Electoral College looks poised to install you in the office of President.
But-- and here's where you luck out-- you and I have some enemies in common. The old "enemy of my enemy is my friend" thing applies.
So, by and large, this letter is friendly. I'm looking at the common ground we can both probably agree upon, for different reasons.
And something's worrying me, on your behalf. Here it is:
You've brought a knife to a bunfight.
Now, you may *think* that makes you the baddest-ass winner in all history. And knives certainly cut buns. But you're one guy, with one knife, and the arena you've stepped into? There are thousands of bun-throwers with thousands of buns, each, and a good many of those buns have rocks baked into them. Big ones.
::aside, whispering... 'What? He won't...? Oh... you're probably right...'::
Sorry about that. Someone just reminded me you don't do metaphor. Never mind about the buns and the knife.
You, sir, pride yourself on being the quintessential wheeler-dealer, the man with the leverage, the sharpest in the room at figuring out what someone else wants and what they'll part with to get it, and how you can turn that to your advantage.
And you've certainly demonstrated quite amazing skill in that area, I have to concede. You can size up the mark better than a midway flat-joint operator.
And you have a potent, if unreliable, ally behind you. The KGB is no slouch when it comes to playing the deep, nasty game.
I'm sure that on some level, you know that your good buddy Vlad is playing the same game by the same rules as you, and one of those rules is that either one of you will throw the other one under the bus as soon as your liability cost exceeds your asset value. And you keep an eye on how that balance is calculated.
Also, you have your family around you, which you can trust exactly as far as your common interests reach. But for that distance, it's strong trust because, hey, none of you has anyone else you can trust at all, beyond what the money or the deal will buy. And some of them are pretty smart weasels, they know which side is buttered and they're sharp at grabbing everything that can be grabbed. That's worth something.
And finally, of course, you have the mob. The ones who cheer. The ones who'll do anything for you. The ones with no inhibitions and no scruples about doing whatever is required to make white guys great again. I'll grant you this, they are one scary-ass bunch, for sure.
But, here's the deal. Two things: First, that's ALL you got. That short list-- your own weasel skills, the scratch mine/yours detente with the Kremlin, your family organization, and the mob. Period. Those are your assets. In this arena, your money doesn't count, not at all. Even if you actually had all the money you claim you have, it would be a squirtgunfull of water compared to the fire hoses... oh, sorry. Metaphor again. Anyway, your money isn't gonna help you.
Second: You may think that the sleazy Wall Street weasels, Eastern potentates, and Eurotrash you've 'done business with' over the years have given you the chops to take on just about any level of enemy, and win. You may think that because you've successfully conned no end of wishful-thinking marks out of "Trump U" fees or golf course investments or contracts for services or whatever, you can 'negotiate' your way into the center of any maze to grab the brass ring and engrave it with a big ol' "T" for Trump. And those sterling skills will get you through any amount of Washington flapdoodle from pantywaist bureaucrats, spineless elected officials, and pencil-neck policy geeks. But you are seriously, maybe even fatally, in the exact, literal sense, wrong about that.
Mr. Trump, I'm sure you know the long knives are out for you. In the GOP establishment. In the Federal bureaucracy where every budget line item represents blood, sweat, tears, and the imperial triumphs of egos that may not match yours individually, but will overwhelm by sheer weight of numbers and skin in the game. In the basement levels of "initials" intell agencies you may not even have heard of yet. In the back offices on K street where the fragile coalition between plutocrats and would-be theocrats is already crumbling, and suspicion of applecarts to be overturned by the mobs baited by your demagoguery runs rampant.
But I'm fairly sure you have NO idea how MANY knives there are, how long and sharp they are, how well concealed they are, and how smart, unprincipled, experienced, and inhumanly ruthless are the hands that will be wielding them.
So.
Hire a food taster. Wear the Kevlar.
Get rid of Pence, ASAP, and replace him with someone they'll hate even worse than they hate you.
Live in the goddamn White House where those poor bastards in the Secret Service will be able to do their jobs, no matter what, to protect your sorry, sleazy ass from things that go bump and bang and ping and thud and all kinds of other fatal noises in the night.
Let them "advise" you into a slew of insider Cabinet appointments that will buy you some time, while you go ahead and set up your own 'kitchen' cabinet of shadow advisers. Then solemnly nod to all the things your 'official' Cabinet advises, but sign and implement NOTHING, stall on EVERYTHING, and blame everything unpopular on them, while running PR cover with your kitchen cabinet. You know how to play that game.
Leave the damn' Supreme Court seat vacant. It's your leverage. It'll help keep you alive. It's a high-value chip, as long as you never play it.
Stall, stall, stall. Make speeches. Soothe the mob, don't inflame them, because all that's needed to provide the final excuse for an untraceable cerebral accident or myocardial infarct is a major domestic terrorism incident that puts the domestic security apparatus in the saddle. You may think they're your buds. They're not. They hate the Kremlin worse than you can ever imagine.
Which reminds me- another high-value, high-risk chip? What you know about Vlad and his operations, which frankly is probably not much and nothing of any real value to the initials, but no one is sure about that. So make sure no one ever is. And give Vlad the kiss-off, no matter what the dollar cost, and be sure that the American public is well aware of how shaky your relationship with the KGB is-- enough so that any assassination attempt would almost certainly be attributed thereunto, which would mess up their careful propaganda campaign, big time. If they think you'll keep shtumm to the initials about everything you know about them, while at the same time setting them up if something untoward happens to you, you're way more likely to live to 2020.
The next four years are not going to be fun, sorry. You might learn some things that could be monetized big-league after you turn it over to whoever, in January of 2021. In fact, that's quite likely. So think ahead, and in the meantime, protect your own ass, and be King Log. Let the GOP establishment take the rap for everything (and believe me, there WILL be 'everything'... all hell's already loose.) Yeah, that'll mean admitting you can't just make anybody do anything, you over-promised on the whole 'swamp-draining' thing (although I'm sure there's a few wetlands you can devastate, just to cover your outsize butt on that one.)
But remember, you can re-write the narrative after January, 2021, assuming you're still around. Tough it out.
That's the best I can do for ya.
Let's never meet, okay?
Not ever.
helpfully,
Bright
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