It’s that time of year again, time for me to give out the Golden Turkeys. As usual, I wait until the Nobels are done so the Turkeys can get the attention that they deserve. I’ve been in consultation with my editorial team, Hagrid and Hedwig, who are amazingly intuitive observers of the American experience, albeit they can be distracted by such questions as when’s dinner and is that large gray cat in the backyard? (they’re scared of the cat).
But we’ve been beavering away on this, looking at the dozens, nay hundreds, of worthy candidates. I really do appreciate the authors of all weird, silly, and irrational behavior who makes the Turkeys an important cultural milestone. As usual, it’s tough to pick among so many worthy candidates. (Just think, this is just the stuff that they do on television or say out loud; I fear the tip of the iceberg of stupid).
So, here we go.
The first award is the If I’m Cute Enough, They’ll Vote For Me Award. This award clearly goes to the new mayor of New York, Mr. Mamdani, who in an extraordinary performance, just charmed the hell out of the New York City voters whilst promising free goodies for all. They could make a plush toy out of this guy. While grinning ferociously, he demonstrates a level of Teflon impenetrability on divisive cultural issues which has driven so many other politicians to the jaws of Scylla and the doom of Charybdis (think Mr. McAuliffe and those pesky parents and. I guess, Congressman Weiner and his penchant for photography bears mention). Hey, if magical thinking on free stuff actually works in the City That Never Sleeps, many will follow. On the other hand, you can’t fix stupid and you can’t eat charm. If it doesn’t work out, he’s a natural for Dancing With the Stars.
The next award is Those Who Forget the Past are Condemned to Repeat It Award. This goes to Cracker Barrel Old Country Stores which, after an undoubtedly expensive and quite obviously wrong-headed rebrand, almost immediately rebranded back to where they started. Was it the rabid crowd outside their corporate headquarters in Lebanon, Tennessee (one must truly be rabid and committed to even find Lebanon, Tennessee) that powered this turnaround? Did the pitchforks and tar-soaked torches carrying populace, shouting, “Y’all suck!” make the case? I wonder how the marketing execs looking for new jobs will spin this on their resumes. If Santa Claus had hired these morons, Christmas would be doomed.
The Loki Award for Chaos goes to, no surprise here, Donald J. Trump, the President of the United States. Loki was the embodiment of chaos. He actualized chaos, reveled in chaos and chortled over the distress that chaos caused everyone else. Now, I really can’t imagine Mr. Trump in that nifty costume from the Marvel movies with the sharp pecks and those golden horns (Mr. Trump does like gold, but regrettably likes cheeseburgers as well), but he’s the guy! Whether you think Mr. Trump has done more good than bad or more bad than good, or all bad or all good, he has caused more change, more disruption, more disorder and disarray in the world order than any President in memory. A piker, of course, compared to the real A-Team of disorder and calamity: Alexander/Genghis/Napoleon/Mao/Hitler/Stalin and their ilk, but he’s competitive, particularly given the handicap of only being President…at least for now.
The Hey, Who Stole My Windmill Award? goes to all those politicians who are now figuring out that the wind doesn’t blow all the time and that a lot of very wealthy liberals, who might love them conceptually, don’t want to see them hideously disfiguring the horizon around their expensive beach houses. Windmills, batteries, solar panels, the superstars of the Net Zero fascination, are in retreat. It has been said about the South before the Civil War that they lost their minds collectively and only recovered one by one. Sort of feels right, doesn’t it? The Net Zero passion doesn’t stand a chance against even the slightest risk that the folk might catch wise to the fact that a reliable source of electricity is sort of essential. When the electorate figures that out, they’re likely to toss the Net Zero zealots out of their cushy sinecures as elected officials in the next election. Shocking, our pols would have to find real jobs! Not fair, but it does focus the mind most wonderfully.
It’s Not 1929, But It Could Rhyme Award. This goes to all talking heads on the Street and throughout academia who are so certain, so pontifically resolute, that good times are here to stay. Maybe if they read Andrew Ross Sorkin’s new book, 1929, they’d pause, if only for a moment’s reflection. That no one saw that one coming should make one think. Not to get technical, but the PE at the time was just 15 and it’s way more than that today. Hmmm. Jamie Dimon, the chairman of JP Morgan told us to look for cockroaches. I, for one, am not willing to ignore his advice. In the Roaring Twenties, the villain was largely margin excess. Any possible candidates today? If you enjoy the frisson of fear and looking for something new to doom scroll, take a look at the options and derivatives market where 40 million contracts trade daily and notional values are in excess of $1 quadrillion (I’m not sure what that is, but it’s really big.). What could go wrong?
The Don’t Let Them See Fear Award goes to Senator Chuck Schumer. There’s a nature trail in my town where there’s a warning sign that says if you confront a coyote, wave your arms, yell and throw things at it. Apparently, if you run away, cower or show fear, you might end up getting bitten. AOC is looking at Senator Schumer as a food group these days. Perhaps the Senator should adopt the same approach with AOC? Our couturier-wearing, private jet hopping, Democrat centralist chiving, left-wing darling, is clearly a predator and one not to be propitiated by nice. Kisses aren’t working. Maybe stone throwing should be given a shot.
The Who Are You Going to Believe, Me or Your Lying Eyes? Award goes to our politicians who are now portentously embracing Affordability. It’s the issue du jour. Now they tell us they’ve always worried about Affordability, but apparently kept it to themselves. We’re supposed to appreciate, however, that they’ve always been on our side (is there actually another side?). This really is all about the fact that so much costs 20% more today than it did 5 years ago. Pretty simple. That’s how inflation works. There’s a solution, of course…a rip snorting recession. No one is dumb enough to propose that as a solution, right…right? The hope, of course, throughout the both left and right wings of those inhabiting the Heights is that if we talk enough, if there’s enough breathless outrage and tub-thumping claims that they are fighting for us, the folks will be so baffled that they won’t notice that nothing actually is happening.
The Golden Palace Award goes to Mr. Trump (since he didn’t get the Peace Prize, we’re going to give him two Turkeys here). He is building a vast ballroom to be attached to the White House. In Trump speak, the biggest, the best, the most beautiful, ever. While more sober observers might actually say that the White House needs a big old ballroom, it’s a really bad visual, isn’t it? Rather brings to mind Nero’s Golden Palance, the Domus Aurea. It was an enormous and extravagant pleasure palace built by the Roman Emperor Nero after he burnt the joint down in 64 CE. (Just for perspective, the Coliseum was the pool.) Lots and lots of gold. You can see the attraction. But Nero was suicided with an extraordinary measure of help from his Praetorian Guard soon after the place was built. The next Emperor bulldozed it down to erase his memory. Not a parallel that I suspect would appeal to Mr. Trump.
The award for the Thank God There’s Someplace Else Worse Than Here Award goes to our friends across the pond in Britain. Reading the British press is instructive and a bit of a relief. Between ongoing culture wars and economic magical thinking, they are far ahead of us in the race to ruination. It was recently reported that one quarter of the working age population receives a living wage stipend from the government because they are disabled and can’t work. Really? I suspect the definition of disabled now includes “I can’t go to work because my cat will miss me.” And the police have not given up chasing people for Non-Criminal Hate Incidents (NHCI in Met parlance). Not long ago, the Met recently bravely arrested a comedian, for his nasty posts, coming off a flight from California with five armed officers! These guys don’t send armed officers to arrest terrorists. Good to know the nation is fully protected from comedians saying things in bad taste. Perhaps the only good news for Britain is that their politicians are infected with PACO…Politicians Always Chicken Out (inspired by Mr. Trump’s TACO). In this administration, the British government appears only to propose things in order to apologize and rapidly reverse course. Just a hint of a little bit of reform of the welfare state drove half the Labor MPs into apoplectic panic and outrage. The proposal to increase taxes drove the rest of the populace to the barricades. The government is embracing its inner Monty Python with Run Away, Run Away! PACO is generally a bad thing, but if it kills off really stupid ideas and maybe we should embrace it. However, let’s agree that in general the absence of courage amongst our political set is troubling.
The Edgar Allan Poe Award posthumously to Mr. Epstein. He gets it, of course, for being enormously more famous and consequential after he cooled to room temperature (as we say in the law). Mr. Poe had relatively little success writing his wonderful horror stories in his time, but is now an honored part of the western canon (for those very few who actually pay attention to the western canon). As opposed to talent, Mr. Epstein achieved fame by just being a creepy pedophile. Now, all our politicians seem to want to do is to crawl over the midden heap of his life and thousands of emails, letters and other communications to find any mentions of prominent folks from the other tribe and weaponize it for political gain. I understand that it’s good fun, but might they actually spend a little time trying to make the country work? Nah.
The Self-Inflicted Award this year goes to the Democratic Party. They won last year for one of the greatest electoral smackdowns in recent history. While I couldn’t quite bring myself to read Ms. Harris’ new book, 107 Days, I did read the Cliff Notes and if that’s the face of the party, the Democrats might have a lock on this award for years to come. Having spent a hundred days and a billion dollars convincing the American people that Donald Trump was exactly what the American people knew Donald Trump was, she lost miserably. They had a good November 2025, but can’t seem to figure out whether this validates the doctrinal views of those on the left, or the practical views of the few moderates in the middle. Both are celebrating; one is wrong. The Dems are in an interregnum of internecine warfare inside that famous big tent. Will they really rename it the Democratic Socialists of America? That would probably entitle them get this award so often, we’d have to retire it.
Not to be left out, the Circular Firing Squad Award goes once again to the Republican Party. As some wag recently said, “They never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity.” They have all the levers of power and can’t do…anything, except eviscerate each other. The government was been closed for 43 days and somehow the Republicans managed to get the blame, as well as being tarred as the Simon Legree of the American healthcare system. They screwed up gerrymandering, they’ll surely screw up the Epstein disclosure lollapalooza and they’ll probably get blamed when the government shuts down again at the end of January. There is, I guess, a certain sense of brilliance in breathtaking incompetence.
So, there you go, the 2025 Golden Turkeys. I’m sure I could go on, but I do need something to complain about next week so I’ll stop here. Let me conclude by wishing everyone a Happy Turkey Day. Stay tuned for more CrunchedCredit.