Trashy novel — it’s sad and bad
This is an article about stories you might find in a trashy novel. You may find much of it is gleaned from the daily papers, or you may wrongly assume it’s just fake news. Let me assure you that I couldn’t make this stuff up. It’s trash, all right — but it’s up to you to decide if you believe it’s fiction or fact.
Current American political reports appear to be as incredible and tasteless as, well, trashy novels. They are simply almost impossible to believe, comprising much of what makes trashy novels so successful — sex, smut, and crooked dealings. Lots of it! Living in an age where secrets are often less than secretive and crime arising from the favored segment is often reported but unpunished, it’s amazing how much perps get away with. Accusations and facts are often dispensed with. Legal technicalities are abundant. A rigged Supreme Court is totally beyond belief. Right? But of course when things do get to that Supreme Court, we can always trust the justices for their honor. We know that if they are compromised, they know they can recuse themselves. As an example, if a justice has a spouse who has been actively taking an overtly political stance on a subject that will appear before the court, there is that overwhelming confidence that the justice will recuse himself or herself. That’s our final protection! Right, Clarence? Right?
Can we believe that in 2024 a candidate for president of these very United States can be leading the pack with 91 indictments for criminality? Does that make sense to anyone? Would you really like that guy’s portrait hanging on the wall in your kid’s classroom? Is your hope and dream that the kids aspire to be just like him. If you say yes, I simply do not believe you!
We all witnessed the previous president’s phone call to the Secretary of State in Georgia to try to change the honest and verified results of the last presidential election. Could he be any more guilty than that, even before the jury trial that he is most likely going to weasel out of? Remember you and I saw and heard every word. If that was a chapter in the trashy novel, the editor would strike it out, indicating that it’s not possible. A criminal with tens of millions of witnesses cannot get off scot-free. Maybe?
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And was it not this same former president (in itself an unbelievable fact!) who fomented an uprising against the nation he was previously elected to lead. The question mark is not missing, dear reader. It’s not really a question at all! Did we not, each and every one of us, witness, live, the sordid and violent actions of the mobs who attempted to destroy our Capitol building, at the urging of that outgoing president, the election’s loser, in order to overthrow the results? Five people are dead as a result of this event, and the belief in the sanctity of the presidential oath is shattered. Let’s be clear here. The election was not stolen. The attack was promulgated, in a phrase known by every third-grader, by a sore loser, the former president!
See. I told you this was a trashy novel. You might believe the story is junk fiction but do you really believe it in adult American politics? And do you believe that that president may be elected again? Can you believe that? No. It’s simply impossible! Maybe?
And do you sometimes wonder what he, that same ex-president, has done with his present wife, the third of three? Is something sinister going on there? I cannot say, but if I were writing the trashy novel, I might at least investigate. Where is she? Maybe she’s on your TV screen but she hasn’t been on ours for a very long time now. Like years! It’s pretty clear that she wasn’t a happy camper when she was first lady. That prenup must be really stunning. Where?
With so many stories, we’d need to write that trashy novel. And it might be as long as Gone With The Wind (1036 pages in my well-eared copy).
One of the trashy stories that’s really somewhat bizarre, and tragic as well, is the tale of Fani Willis. It too is related to that former president and the infamous Georgia phone call. Fani Willis is the district attorney in Georgia’s Fulton County. There is no doubt that this case against Trump will forever be the biggest and most sensational case that will ever come her way. Suddenly, an unknown woman becomes a regular on our TV screens and newspapers. It’s a really big deal, and you would think, if you were a writer putting together somewhat realistic characters for a trashy novel, that you would stop here. Nope, she or he would say of the character being described. No reasonably intelligent person, someone who finished law school and passed the bar exam and worked as an attorney, would be so foolish as to blatantly engage in a romantic liaison exactly at the time that she was lining up her docs for this most significant trial of her life. A trial that would be internationally broadcast until its ultimate resolution. The judge ruled that the case could continue as long as either Mr. Wade or Ms. Willis quit it, and Mr. Wade already is gone.
But that’s not the relevant point. The real point is that Ms. Willis went on to travel and romance with Mr. Wade, knowing that it could be a deal-breaker in the monumental case she was prosecuting. Rather than put the love affair on hold, she was undeterred. Passionate, maybe, but stupid undoubtedly!
Let’s not think we’re above the fray right here in Jersey. This is for all those who may think I practice partisan politics. We’ve got a candidate for the United States Senate, Jewish no less, who’s running strictly on the coattails of her husband — not Jewish, by the way — who’s our governor. Shouldn’t there be some kind of experience, besides wifery, to becoming our next senator? I would think so. It may not be criminal but it certainly meets the trashy novel requirements.
And to all those few, very few, who may falsely criticize me for being too staunch a Democrat, Ms. Murphy is running on the Democratic ticket line, to replace long-term sleaze Senator Menendez, who is probably going to wind up in a jail cell, maybe shared with his bride. I know he’s innocent until proven guilty. That shouldn’t take very long. He has passed GO numerous times already, but this time it looks like he’s been snagged.
Surely there must be some people in our government who are idealists, running for the good of the country and the sake of us all. Or maybe not!
Crazy stuff and, believe me, this is not even close to the tip of the iceberg. Some folks just think impunity is not a word applicable to them. Unlike most of us, who panic over an overdue library book or, horror of horrors, an unpaid parking ticket, these people, conspicuous, if not distinguished, by the lack of any standards, seem to fear nothing at all. That’s an apt description of many American politicians today. Sad and bad.
Rosanne Skopp of West Orange is a wife, mother of four, grandmother of 14, and great-grandmother of five. She is a graduate of Rutgers University and a dual citizen of the United States and Israel. She is a lifelong blogger, writing blogs before anyone knew what a blog was! She welcomes email at rosanne.skopp@gmail.com
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