That post

How can seriousness ever be recovered?

Thanks for upgrading to a paid subscription. Writing is my job. Your support of that means everything to me. I understand that there are many people, places and things clamoring for your dollar, but if you feel that Precipice is an important voice in our public discourse, please consider making the upgrade.

I’m reluctant to use terms such as “aghast” or “horrified” to characterize my reaction to this:

“Tuesday will be Power Plant Day, and Bridge Day, all wrapped up in one, in Iran,” Trump wrote. “There will be nothing like it!!! Open the Fuckin’ Strait, you crazy bastards, or you’ll be living in Hell – JUST WATCH! Praise be to Allah.”

They imply a level of surprise, and nothing about this Easter post surprised me. In its vulgarity, it’s up there with the human-waste-dump-on-the-protesters video. It features the Very Stable Genius’s signature random capitalization, and knocks the “g” off “f—-ing” so you know he really means it. Except that the “Praise be to Allah” business is of a piece with previous stunts that have that ha-ha-am-I-trolling-kidding-on-the-square-or-completely-serious vibe, up to and including the Greenland antics that had Denmark preparing to defend its island militarily. If that’s the case, it undercuts what we must assume is his intent to be adamant. Except that he’s also on record as saying the US doesn’t need the strait. The post is also in keeping with a tradition of using sacred holidays to spew venom.

I’ve seen a few social-media exchanges today in which the viewpoint that we need to look past the stylistic considerations and discern the VSG’s logic and strategic thinking is prevalent.

To be candid, that viewpoint scares me. It is long past time to acknowledge what is plain: out president is not well.

He probably never has been. He grew up in a cold, calculating family where affection and warmth were in short supply. He cultivated the art of surrounding himself with yes-people early in his career as a developer. He’s devoid of the enjoyment of life’s simple pleasures, such as pets, hobbies, a hike in the woods, or driving a car, for heaven’s sake. Sex with beautiful women was readily available. He hasn’t had much grounding in the aspects of reality that define life for most of us.

Some other reaction I’ve come across that find his Easter post hilarious. That’s scary, too, but, again, not surprising. There is a base that reacts enthusiastically to pretty much anything the VSG does without running it through any kind of filter to see how it stacks up against standards of decency to which these people were once exposed to.

My grandchildren are grown, so I’m not faced with the question of how I’d explain this behavior to small children in whom I wished to inculcate a respect for the office of the presidency. But a lot of parents and grandparents are facing it. And what do you do? Then again, it’s been a vexing issue since the days of Clinton and Lewinsky. Which leads to larger questions of just when our standards unraveled, a subject longtime Precipice readers know is often explored here and gets beyond our present scope.

I wonder if there are any quarters within the White House or in national-security functions where panic has set in. It might be hard to determine, given the spate of firings in such circles, and the atmosphere of fear that surely pervades among those still holding their positions. But does, say, Susie Wiles sleep well these days?

This situation is why I can’t say enough about planting one’s feet squarely on the Narrow Sliver of Terrain. It’s the only vantage point from which we can fully see the ruin on all its levels. Along with the three fusionist pillars, conservatism, as it had developed by the third quarter of the twentieth century, set great store by such values as dignity, comportment and refinement of expression. Narrow Sliver inhabitants aren’t stuffy. They - we - enjoy raucous humor, but we temper it with a basic sense of what’s appropriate.

Along with being concerned about the economic ramifications of the war with Iran, and the collapse of NATO as Europe realizes it must see to its own security without US support, I am embarrassed. To the people of Ukraine, Israel, bombarded Gulf nations and the Pacific rim, I say, please know that there are inhabitants of post-America who most definitely do not endorse this kind of poison.

The matter of seriousness is at or certainly near the core of this situation. How is anyone expected to take the United States seriously?

And if nothing’s serious, all bets are off.