April 29, 2019: Larvae of Misfortune, The Reality-Distortion Field, Any Damn Fool

“Jarvaka” as they are known, are the larvae of Brooklyn's two “great” real-estate fortunes running riot in tRUMP's White House. We are speaking, of course, of the infamous son-in-law and daughter of the current occupant of the Oval Office. There is a new book out probing “Kushner Family Secrets”, written by Vicky Ward entitled “Kushner, Inc.” which, according to The New York Times' Michelle Goldberg is “a scintillating investigation of Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump's White House Sojourn”. (1)

“According to 'Kushner Inc.,' Gary Cohn, former director of the National Economic Council, has told people that Ivanka Trump thinks she could someday be president. 'Her father's reign in Washington, D.C., is, she believes, the beginning of a great American Dynasty,” writes Ward.” (2)

Normally, Goldberg observes, people on the 'make' “suffer from impostor syndrome”. That is, that upon arriving to an exulted position of economic or political power or influence, those from more modest beginnings normally experience doubt as to their fitness for the position and occasionally exhibit some measure of fear that “They will soon be found out”. (3) Goldberg references Michelle Obama expressing such doubts even though the Gallup Poll last year ranked her as the most admired woman in America. Harry Truman once remarked to one of his aides that there were at least a hundred men in America more qualified than he to be President, “But they aren't sitting in this chair, I am”. Modesty tempered by realism. Not so with the Kushner's.

“As political actors, the couple are living exemplars of the Dunning-Kruger effect, a psychological phenomenon which leads incompetent people to overestimate their ability because they can't grasp how much they don't know.

“Partly, the Jared and Ivanka story is about the 'reality distortion field'--a term one of Ward's sources uses about Kushner—created by great family wealth. She quotes a member of Trump's legal team saying that the two 'have no idea how normal people perceive, understand, intuit.' Privilege, in them, has been raised to the level of near sociopathy.” (4)

The incompetence of the two is staggering. Kushner, famously put his family's fortune at risk buying 666 Fifth Avenue at nearly twice it's value just as the market was about to take. Any damn fool, in 2007, should have seen it coming. I remember construction in newly 'developed' sub-divisions advertising mortgage payments that, if you did the math, wouldn't cover the interest payments on the loan—so desperate were the banks and the contractors to unload the properties. It was widely reported at the time that the country was building homes and offices at a rate exceeding demand by 25% annually, meaning that a huge backlog of vacant properties were in the making. Any damn fool could discern the risk. But Kushner, needing to demonstrate his bona fides to his felonious father and impress his equally felonious father-in-law, demonstrated that he isn't just any damn fool.

Neither is his wife, who in the process of assuming national prominence and, therefore, national exposure has more than tarnished her 'brand'.

“(E)ven if you assume that the couple are amoral climbers”, writes Goldberg, “their behavior still doesn't quite make sense. Ward writes that Ivanka's chief concern is her personal brand, but that brand has been trashed. The book cites an October 2017 survey measuring consumer approval of more than 1,600 brands. Ivanka's fashion line was in the bottom 10.” (5)

Jared has likewise been tarnished by his close association with tRUMP.

“A leading real estate developer tells Ward that Kushner, now caught up in multiple state and federal investigations, has become radioactive: 'No one will do business with him'”. (6)

Except, perhaps, Qatar and other actors in the Middle East.

“'You'll notice that the U.S. position toward Qatar changes when the Qataris bail out 666 Fifth Avenue,' said Ward, adding 'We look like a banana republic'. (7)

Perhaps this is why our Caesar Disgustus gave Jared the Middle East portfolio begging questions as to what personal financial dealings are behind our abrupt alterations in our regional policies. As Goldberg notes, the Kushner's are, as public servants, way out of their depth. “But as self-dealing scions of a gaudy autocracy? They're naturals.” (8)

As the disgraced former Secretary of Homeland Security Kirstjen Nielsen has, to her eternal regret, learned association with Caesar Disgustus will ruin your life. No ones reputation, not even, apparently or especially, that of of his children, can withstand the exposure. Everyone within reach of our Caesar Disgustus gets slimed. If, in the end, we are saved from the likes of a tRUMP dynasty or, better still, destroys the ReSCUMlickan Party, then perhaps there will be some redeeming value to this national nightmare. The problem is that the republic itself hangs in the balance.

“An Br'er Putin, he jus' laugh and laugh”

Impeach and Imprison.

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1. Goldberg, Michelle. “Who Do Jared and Ivanka Think They Are?” The New York Times. Tuesday, March 19, 2019. Page A26.
2. Ibid
3. Ibid
4. Ibid
5. Ibid
6. Ibid
7. Ibid
8. Ibid