IT’S ALL MY FAULT
Let Them Eat Tariffs
By Duane Scott Cerny
Yes, for the average man it’s all too much to keep up with, absorb, accept, believe. Every day countless government agencies are dismantled by DOGE, thousands of government employees fired, then some re-hired, placing us all in a state of a perpetual mulligan.
The White House has twice asserted that Alexander Hamilton was a big fan of tariffs. Though a questionable claim at best, I’m certain Lin-Manuel Miranda could turn this into a quippy cipher rhyme slam. However, since he’s presently unavailable, I’ll give it a whirl…
“I can’t explain the U.S. not being its best. It’s a pistol, blindly fine with MAGA but a blur to all else, the pulse of America falling as markets falter, a helter-skelter hip hopping dream when Easter lays an egg, and its yellow-bellied yolk drops a joke. We dissed Kamala for a lame old dude, a guy so crude his oil buddies cringed, but hey, the money keeps pouring in, their pockets locking you out… And this is what happens when a somehow neglected, barely elected sheriff comes to town, the wrath of misguided tariffs taking us down to a bottom we saw coming if we’d only turned around.”
That the Trump administration quotes or misquotes the dead is troubling enough. Republicans may fear the voting dead, but they have no problem resurrecting their support, even if a tariff séance is required.
These passing days are a fast-moving river of lies, misinformation and perhaps even a massive Republican burp of insider trading troubles. And though Donald Trump never met a lie he couldn’t lie about, we still must cast our hook out and pull in the truth wherever possible. Here’s another catch.
On April 3, Trump posted on his Truth Social platform: “This is why Warren Buffet just said Trump is making the best economic moves he’s seen in over 50 years.” Ninety-four-year-old Buffett of Berkshire Hathaway fame quickly retorted: “All such reports are false.”
And that’s the problem with misquoting the living: They always have something to say.
It is now common knowledge that Jared Kushner hired tariff-addicted Peter Navarro only by seeing the title of his highly questionable Amazon book, Death by China. And no, it isn’t about dinnerware. Navarro’s tariff source was an individual by the name of Ron Vara who turned out to be both a fictional economist invented by Navarro and an anagram. So, $11 trillion evaporated by the fever dream of an aborted Wordle.
Yes, an anagram. I am reminded of Mia Farrow’s scene in Rosemary’s Baby when the scrabble letters “Steven Marcato” are rearranged to spell “Roman Castevet,” thus fulfilling the prophesy of yet another book, All of Them Witches. But I digress.
I’ve finally come to understand the Trump presidency by embracing the prophetic lyrics of Sam Cooke: “Don’t know much about history. Don’t know much biology. Don’t know much about science book. Don’t know much about the French I took.”
History. Biology. Science. Turns out Sam Cooke was a poetical Nostradamus, echoing the positions of the Trump administration like a seer with a catalog to all future tariffs. Or better still, an Amazon without a rainforest.
As for the French, much like a quatrain open to interpretation, the only French quotation most Americans know is “Let them eat cake.” I doubt Marie Antoinette consulted the palace baker before coining that phrase, and though half baked, the masses did not resist without a rising of the lower crust. Apropos of her near final words, most of the world knows what happened next. And it wasn’t a free pass day at The Louvre.
As we all struggle to balance the lies proffered from both the living and the dead, the president plays golf. Like a lot. While global markets collapsed, Trump played with the Saudis at Mar-a-Lago, moving into the finals of what may be the end of the world as we know it. Apparently, he’s very excited as he advances through his golfing challengers like falling Republican midterms. It’s a par none.
Perhaps sportswriter Rick Reilly summed up this situation best in his book: Commander in Cheat: How Golf Explains Trump. Apparently, Trump moves his balls so often, he doesn’t even need to turn his head and cough. Seriously. He is famous for lying about the lie he just claimed. He and his balls are a continually moving target to his competitors. And if Stormy Daniels received $130,000 to keep the Trump liaison private, I can only imagine how much his caddy is taking in.
There are few, if any, parallels to this histrionically historic moment in time, and even fewer phrases that have encapsulated what the F happened.
Let them eat tariffs? Let them eat golf balls? Nero fiddled whilst Donald golfed? Or perhaps, sadly: “The victor will never be asked if he told the truth.” Adolph Hitler, Letters and Notes.
Duane Scott Cerny takes the blame for most everything in his monthly satirical column, It’s All My Fault. Best-selling author of “Selling Dead People’s Things” and “Vintage Confidential,” he is the co-owner of Chicago’s Broadway Antique Market and is a guest favorite among fearless podcasters. Contact him at E-ThanklessGreetings@yahoo.com
