A Wall, A Wall! My Government for a Wall!

A Wall, A Wall! My Government for a Wall!

In Richard the Third, by William Shakespeare, King Richard, in a battle with soon-to-be Henry the VII, appeals for a new horse to pursue the battle.  Here is the familiar dialogue:

King Richard: 

A horse, a horse!  My kingdom for a horse!

Catesby:

Withdraw, my lord; I’ll help you to a horse.

King Richard:

Slave!  I have set my life upon a cast;

And I will stand the hazard of the die.

So, to update this often parodied quotation, we have President Trump furloughing an eighth of his government and forcing another eighth to work a month without being paid on time, offering up his desired reputation of an effective governor, and affecting his whole kingdom.  This, over a partial Wall costing $5.7 billion, out of a total discretionary budget of $1.31 trillion, and an overall budget in 2015 of $3.8 trillion.  That is a shutdown over 0.44% or 1/230th of the discretionary budget, or 0.29% of his $2 trillion tax cut for the wealthy.

So I guess the parody could have been scaled to Trump’s $3 billion wealth:  all of my wealth for a mere $13 million, or 1/10 the cost of my Inauguration.  How long would Trump have withstood a renter delaying such a payment, before he took him to court?

Even after the restart, Trump is continuing to follow the dialogue.  While the congress is working on a negotiated resolution, Trump has “set my life upon a cast” in dice, to shut down the government again in a week, on Feb. 15.  This is typical for a casino owner, knowing that the odds are always in his favor, but in this case, not the peoples’ House.  The “hazard of the die” cast, is not going to be in his favor if he shuts down the government again.

Note the way that Trump, er, I mean King Richard, denigrated his helper.

Let’s recall Trump’s business background.  When he ran for President I recall that he had 540 businesses that were using his name, over half of which he had no investment in, other than allowing his name to be used, usually in a large, gold-lettered “Trump” sign.

When asked what his net worth was, Trump replied that it varied, depending on how much he felt his name was worth when he got up in the morning.

How did we not see that Trump would gamble his whole government to get his name on some government structure, especially, one stretching a thousand miles, and three stories high, where he could put his sign on every visible mile?

In this case, Trump can’t put his name in gold letters on the wall, since it would be climbed in minutes, and taken down to be sold as a symbol of bad governing. 

Trump now wants to go down in history as the eradicator of AIDS, despite shutting down or stealing from every government AIDS program, so far.

Trump will also want a library, which won’t contain any books, but will have his comic book daily briefings.

Hopefully, in two years, Trump will fail to one of the army of a hundred Democratic challengers, or to Special Counsel Robert Mueller, a true American hero.