The featured image is a title-less poster for the second season of the excellent Britbox series Sherwood. In addition to being the center of the Robin Hood myth, Sherwood is in coal country. The first season focused on the long tail of the 1984 showdown between the miner’s union and the Thatcher government. Season two focuses on revenge, which turns out to satisfy nobody. I’ll have more to say about Sherwood on Saturday.
Repeat after me: Revenge is stupid.
I originally planned to frame this post with George Orwell’s brilliant post-war essay, Revenge Is Sour, so I might as well throw this quote at the wall and see if it sticks:
It is absurd to blame any German or Austrian Jew for getting his own back on the Nazis. Heaven knows what scores this particular man may have had to wipe out; very likely his whole family had been murdered; and after all, even a wanton kick to a prisoner is a very tiny thing compared with the outrages committed by the Hitler regime. But what this scene, and much else that I saw in Germany, brought home to me was that the whole idea of revenge and punishment is a childish daydream. Properly speaking, there is no such thing as revenge. Revenge is an act which you want to commit when you are powerless and because you are powerless: as soon as the sense of impotence is removed, the desire evaporates also.”
My better self has tried to live up to Orwell’s words since I first read them decades ago. I’m a grudge-holder who occasionally indulges in revenge fantasies. Payback seems sweet in the abstract but like revenge it’s sour and stupid in real life.
Trump seems determined to realize his revenge fantasies. The Kash Patel appointment is confirmation of that but the MSM insists on misreading and minimizing the power of Trump’s revenge fantasies. As I said last month:
The legacy media is shocked that Trump meant what he said on the stump about burning the government down. His radical views are escorted by what Churchill called a bodyguard of lies. He lies so often that it’s easy to disregard his more extreme statements. Here’s my Trump credibility test: His facts and stories are usually lies BUT his opinions should be taken seriously. When he said he wanted to let Bobby Junior run wild on our health care system, he meant it.”
That goes for Kash Patel and AG nominee Pam Bondi going after the Insult Comedian’s enemies as well. He means it. These MAGA revenge fantasies are a powerful thing since they’re conflated with a search for justice. This nifty diagram explains the difference:
Justice is sweet, revenge is sour and stupid.
I have no idea how far Team Trump is willing to go to exact punishment on its enemies, real and perceived but we should prepare for the worst. I do know, however, that Kash Patel has compiled an enemies list:
Here’s Kash Patel’s full Deep State enemies list, which by my count includes 17 Trump administration political appointees from his first term
— Eric Columbus (@ericcolumbus.bsky.social) 2024-12-02T19:34:57.536Z
How Nixonian is that? It’s infinitely more dangerous because Tricky Dick was intelligent and the Kaiser of Chaos is stupid. The people around Trump are as stupid and sour as he is. That’s a recipe for disaster.
Repeat after me: Revenge is stupid.
There will be no guardrails in the second Trump administration. He’s surrounding himself with what the MSM laughingly calls loyalists when in fact they’re sycophants, bootlickers, flunkies, and toadies who will enable and enact the Insult Comedian’s worst impulses.
I had fun looking at synonyms for sycophant. One I skipped was stooges because these guys were dedicated anti-Nazis.
Moronica was the name of the country in the Stooges’ Hitlerian satire.
That slogan also captures the MAGA cult’s state of mind after the election. What’s worse than a sore winner out for revenge?
Repeat after me: Revenge is stupid.
The last word goes to Waylon Jennings followed by Linda Ronstadt:
Is that a Trump family reunion graced by Linda’s presence? Discuss amongst yourselves,