Pure Naked Corruption

 

by Pa Rock

Citizen Journalist

I took part in an evening tour of the White House once, in 1999 during the Clinton presidency.  I was with a group of social work graduate students from the University of Missouri who spent several days in DC lobbying Missouri congressmen on various issues.  We were in the Capitol offices on a Friday when most of the congressmen were gone, but we were able to meet with their basically useless aides.

One member of our group had a cousin who was an officer in the Air Force and whose duty was being one of the pilots for Air Force Two, the aircraft used by Vice President Al Gore.  Through the pilot we were able to get an evening tour of the White house conducted by a couple of young military aides whose duty station was the White House.  One of those young men, whose name I have long since forgotten, was a celebrity of sorts in that he was the person who normally introduced President Clinton when he made appearances in the pressroom.  At our insistence, the young man, who was in civilian attire for the evening, collected himself, stood at attention, and said in a loud, crisp, and clear voice:  "Ladies and Gentlemen, the President of the United States."  But Clinton did not appear.

(Clinton also did not appear later that evening when we again convinced the same young man to make the same announcement in a busy bar in downtown DC!)

Our tour, by virtue of being in the evening, let us visit places that are off limits to tourists during the daytime tours.  For instance, we stood in the doorway of the Oval Office (the room where it happens), and we visited the White House kitchen in the basement and saw old stone wall, the only part of the original White House that is still in existence after the building was burned to the ground by the British in the War of 1812.

So I have had my evening tour of the White House and I didn't have to buy something from the President or his family in order to do it.  But, that has been twenty-six years ago, and I would like to do it again.

Don Trump, the Big Kahuna himself, is offering an evening tour of the White House - as well as dinner at one of his fancy private golf clubs - to 220 people whose identities have yet to be determined.  But the group won't include me because there is a fluctuating and prohibitive buy-in for the privilege of being close to the President's elbow for an entire evening.   Only the 220 holders of the most $trump crypto currency (meme coins) will be invited.

Trump announced the day before he was sworn into his second term in office that he and his family were creating and selling a new crypto (digital) currency, a.k.a. "meme" coins, which are cleverly called $trump coins.  I am admittedly no crypto expert, but from what I understand there is no actual coin - one which a person could put in their pocket.   Rather, meme coins are digital (imaginary) coins much like his earlier hustle, the Trump trading cards, which were also digital (imaginary).

But, as PT Barnum famously said on many occasions, there's a sucker born every minute.

The value of digital currency (including meme coins) rises and falls every moment as people buy and sell that commodity, much like the stock market.  At the exact moment I am typing this sentence, a $trump meme coin is going for $14.66.  The price can fluctuate wildly if Trump suddenly gets on his own media platform, Truth Social, to promote it as he did one day recently.   Most of the $trump crypto is still owned by the Trump family, and when he publicly promotes it, Don is, in effect, shilling for his family business while serving as the President of the United States - using his position in government to make money for himself and his relatives.

But it's even worse than that.  By selling a publicly traded commodity, like meme coins, and then offering a classy reward for the 220 people who buy the most, Trump is selling access to himself, access to the President.  There are many people out there with money to invest who could benefit from access to the President.  For starters, anyone in need of a pardon or who has a relative or friend in need of a pardon for a federal crime would certainly have a reason to try and buy their way to the President's ear - the good one, not the one with the scratch.  Or anyone who had a business that creates a product or service they would like to sell to the government might also feel the need to rush out and buy their way into the top 220 investors in Trump's latest venture.  Foreign governments might also find that purchasing a large amount of $trump meme coins might make it easier to get into the Oval Office for a chat.

An elected official selling access to himself and his office - with the revenue from that sale going directly to himself or his family - smacks of corruption to this tired old typist.  But, then again, what do I know?

Hurry and get your $trump meme coins today before the Trump family dumps all of theirs and the market collapses.  There is a finite supply of just 999.99 million.  The price as of this very moment is:  $14.92.