NEW YORK — First, it was Ukraine, then China, and now, Israel.
Israel?
Yes, President Trump has now added Israel to the nations he wants to supply him with information about possible scandalous or illegal activity on the part of political rivals.
If Israel fails to do his bidding, he’s considering moving the U.S. embassy from Jerusalem back to Tel Aviv. And he threatens to withhold some aid packages, which, he said, “would have very much sweetened the deal.”
It was a similar request – and threat – involving Ukraine, in a telephone call reported by a whistleblower that has led to an impeachment inquiry against him by the U.S. House of Representatives.
Then last week, he publicly challenged China to provide the same type of negative information
His plan relating to Israel was leaked by staff members who overheard his musings, but who asked not to be identified.
Besides former U.S. Vice President Joe Biden (who, with his son, were the objects of Trump’s call to the president of Ukraine), there were now other possible targets of the negative information that the president hopes Israel will uncover
They include, in Trump’s words: “Pocahontas, who even the Dems on Wall Street fear would wreck the economy…and old socialist Bernie, who just had a heart episode, which I’m sure he faked to get sympathy and votes. And he won’t get either.
“There are some other palookas who want the Dim nomination, and, I can tell you, they’re ruthless liars. It’s not worth Israel’s time or energy to find dirt on them.
“I used to have great, very great, respect for Israel, we had a perfect relationship. Perfect. But now that Bibi is being asked to form a government with a guy whose pro-Trump credentials I don’t know that well, I’m a little leery. So Israel has to put up or…”
According to those who heard the president, he has other targets in mind, as well.
“I have many, many wonderful Jewish friends – Steve Miller, my Roy Cohn reincarnated…Steve Mnuchin, my great Treasury secretary…and, of course, my remarkable daughter Ivanka and her Jewish husband Jared and their three great kids…I have so much on my plate, I can’t come up with their names this second.
“But some Jewish people have disappointed me – bigly. Just look at the hoax-masters, the Three Blind Mice trying to impeach me: little Adam Schiff-less, who’s the one who really should be impeached; hopeless Jerry Nadler, and clueless Elijah Cummings. Three hoax-master Stooges”
(When Jared — very politely — corrected the president’s mistaken belief that Representative Cummings was Jewish…noting only that his first name was that of a great Hebrew prophet, Trump said, “That doesn’t change anything.”)
The president was told about a pre-Yom Kippur atonement ritual still performed by some Jews, which involves rotating a chicken around their head while praying for a transfer of their sins to the fowl. That gave him the idea of having effigies of his political rivals made for his allies to wave about their heads, with reference to the rivals’ sins. But Ivanka managed to dissuade him, with the suggestion to wait until next year “when it would be much more effective.”
After ranting about his political rivals, Trump noted that “my many Jewish friends — more than any president since Abraham Lincoln, and probably before him, certainly not Obama or crooked Hillary…my amazing number of Jewish friends are marking their new year right now.
“Whether Young Kipper and the rest of the new year is a truly happy one for them will depend mainly on what Israel does with what they’re being asked to do by a great friend — me.”
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Readers unfamiliar with Joel Cohen’s “Just Kidding” columns are assured that they are satire, and that nothing herein should be taken seriously.
Readers unfamiliar with Joel Cohen’s “Just Kidding” columns are assured that they are satire, and that nothing herein should be taken seriously.