Donald Trump has been playing the long con with his MAGA cult for over a decade now.
When he descended that tacky gold escalator in June 2015 to declare his candidacy, he essentially set up a traveling game of Three Card Monte that’s never ended. Trump first learned how to grift from his con artist father, then polished his people skills under the close tutelage of Roy Cohn. But he really learned the art of patiently setting up his marks from Vladimir Putin, who immediately capitalized on Trump’s neediness and Daddy Issues when they met soon after Cohn’s death. Daddy Vladdy shrewdly played Trump by complimenting him, then trapping him with blackmail.
Trump acted as a subhuman bridge for Putin to compromise the Republican Party ahead of the 2016 election. What began as a slow process sped up significantly after the Russians hacked the RNC and DNC servers. I’d still love to know what could be so bad that it would make someone turn against the United States of America. No, seriously, we all deserve to know what was found, because a lot of it is probably in the Epstein Files.
And that’s how Trump, who was seen as a buffoon of a joke candidate, was able to get the party to legitimize him while funneling Russian propaganda on social media, which helped convince the MAGA cult that it was okay to bring their worst qualities out into the open. He talks just like me, they proudly tweeted along with their other grammatical errors. What it really meant was: Finally, someone who hates all the same people I do.
Donny Three Card Monte then went full PT Barnum, promising them the world for just a few dollars. But the problem with Trump is that once you give him a dollar, he takes a billion more.
Over the last 10 years, Trump has sold MAGA a lot of crappy merch made in China, from his dumb red hats to everything else he puts his name on. The allegedly devout God-fearing Christians of the MAGA cult happily ignore all of the Commandments when it comes to Donald Jesus Trump, forking over their very hard-earned money for a Bible with his stupid EKG of a signature stamped on the title page.
They bought his ugly gold Trump sneakers. They bought a gold Trump credit card, because why not let him ruin their credit ratings while he’s ruining everything else?
They prepaid for a Trump iPhone that still hasn’t materialized. The grift is literally endless, but there’s no bigger grift than Trump’s ballroom.
I’m still trying to understand how a ballroom at the White House makes anyone in America safer. Is every school in the country getting one to prevent mass shootings? Because Trump made a beeline from yet another “assassination attempt” straight to a press conference that raised more questions than it answered.
Before we get to the shady funding sources for what pundits have dubbed the “Epstein Ballroom,” I’d like to take this opportunity to point out that no one has asked anyone at the White House what happened to the historical artifacts in the East Wing before Trump bulldozed it like the ingrate he is. I can’t imagine anyone on Trump’s staff taking the time to carefully pack away and log every last thing the former First Ladies left for future generations, but NO ONE HAS ASKED THEM about it. So, maybe someone who still has a White House Press pass could take one for the country and ask.
Anyway, Trump first said the money for the ballroom that no one needed came from private donors. Also, any sentence that begins with “Trump said” is immediately followed by a lie. Then he did what he always does: he started slowly increasing the amount the ballroom would cost, without giving any real explanations. But all along, he insisted it was never going to cost the American taxpayers a dime.
Watch him shuffle those cards, my friends! Just as long as you’re not talking about the Epstein Files, Trump wins every time.
CNN actually did its job on Tuesday by releasing a supercut of Trump changing the price of the ballroom, as well as the source of its funding. (It’s also serving as a proper legacy for Ted Turner, who died on Wednesday. If Turner hadn’t been suffering from Lewy Body Dementia, I feel certain he would’ve been more outspoken about politics).
ONE. BILLION. DOLLARS.
For a ballroom.
WHY?
Is there actually going to be one of those awesome tricked-out Doomsday Preppers-type bunkers underneath it, like in all the end-of-the-world movies where the rich people get to keep living in luxury after all the have-nots have been wiped from the face of the Earth?
And what’s the endgame here? What are they planning for? If Trump is going to set off a bunch of nukes because he’s in the Epstein Files, who ends up down there with him? Because it won’t be “MAGAPatriot32570275” or anyone who still shows up for him at his ego rallies.
Seriously, I don’t get all of this Bond villain stuff. What are they going to do if they kill everybody else? Sit in the bunker and watch each other count their useless money?
You can show that CNN supercut to MAGA, but it won’t help change their minds. If they’re still supporting Trump despite all of the evidence in the Epstein Files, it means they’re going to keep clinging to his lies until they stop serving them and start hurting them personally. Maybe it’ll be the record-high grocery, prescription drug, and gas prices, rocketing healthcare premiums, and rent hikes that finally make them realize that Trump has never once cared about them.
I don’t care if people want to be in a cult, but I care very much when it comes with an unspeakable body count and takes a toll on democracy and humanity. I just wish MAGA cared about that too.
