Project yourself two hundred years into the future and
imagine a novelist preparing to write a quintessential novel that will reflect
life as authentically as possible of the period that spanned from the late
twentieth century to the early twenty-first century.
To achieve a work of high quality, the novelist doing the
research aims to create the right kind of story for which he must find the
right kind of characters and put them in the right kind of situations. After a
preliminary survey of the documents available to him, he settles on having two
opposite characters forced to interact with each other. He reckons that the
contrast between the two will highlight the complexities of the period.
The novelist imagines a middle-class skilled blue-collar
worker employed in a successful company where he has accumulated twenty years
of seniority, and where he contemplates being promoted to a supervisory
position. His neighbor in the district where he lives is an upper middle-class
hustler who runs a financial services operation that handles everything from
income tax returns to real estate brokerage.
Our novelist makes the skilled worker a relaxed character
secure in the knowledge that he and his accountant wife earned everything they
own. He does not worry about the future, therefore has no anxiety preventing
him from enjoying the quiet life he leads with his family. As to the hustler,
our novelist makes him a nervous and insecure character that's never certain if
tomorrow will be like today, or if it will run him into the ground or lift him
up to cloud nine. He can never stay long doing one thing, but keeps jumping
from one situation to another as if to simultaneously run away from something
he doesn't know what, chasing after something he doesn't know what.
At this point, we take a pause to let our writer develop the
plot of his story, and return to our time. We wonder if, at the macro level, we
live in a situation approaching what future researchers will discover about us.
Of course, we are leaving behind a prodigious pile of paper trail that will
delight those researchers. In fact, one of the papers they might encounter will
be that which came under the title: “It's Come Undone” and the subtitle:
“President Trump cancels the Iran
deal. Now comes the hard part.” It was written by Reuel Marc Gerecht, and
published on May 12, 2018 in the Weekly Standard.
The passage in the Gerecht article that will hit future
researchers in the face like the dagger in the back of the princes who try to
bring peace to the Jews – is this: “Trump's decision is condign punishment for
Obama, who cut out the Senate from rendering judgment on what was obviously a
treaty.” Gerecht used the word “condign” instead of “deserved” because to say “Trump's
decision is deserved punishment for Obama,” would have sounded like another
Jewish animal puking the virulent venom of rage because he didn't get what he
wanted when he wanted it, and had to wait three years before getting it.
That aside, to think that one president of the United States
of America would commit the momentous act of pulling out of an agreement
affecting the entire human race to punish a previous president, is so
distressing, our novelist decides to make one of the characters a Jew, describing
him as a nervous hustler; one that's insecure and never certain if tomorrow
will be like today, or if it will run him into the ground or lift him to cloud
nine. That Jew never stays long with one thing, but keeps jumping from one
situation to another as if to simultaneously run away from something he doesn't
know what, chasing after something he doesn't know what.
Satisfied that he found a model yielding the desired
description for one of the characters, our novelist looks for a model that will
help him fashion the other character. He finds it in this passage: “The deal
was a respite from the regime's atomic ambitions at the price of transferring [Tehran 's] billions of dollars to Tehran . This is the point––the surcease to
our nuclear anxiety in exchange for our blind eye––that former Obama officials
ignore. The deal strategically makes sense when you adopt Obama's realist
approach to the Middle East ”.
Again, Gerecht has employed the rarely used word “surcease”
instead of “cessation” because to cease anxiety is the move you make when
you're setting the stage for cooler heads to move in and design a plan of
action that can deal with a complex situation. And so, our novelist decides to
model his second character after cool-hand Barack Obama that doesn't worry
about the future, and has not the anxiety that would prevent him from enjoying
the quiet life he leads with his family.
After working out a plot-line for the development of the
story, our novelist looks for a way to have a happy ending. He finds inspiration
in this passage: “John Bolton will intercede to try and stop a compromise. Any
deal that would allow sanctions relief to Iran would take the Trump
administration right back to where the Obama administration left off.
Logically, this is where the White House is headed”.
And so, our novelist decides to introduce a third character
near the end of the story. This one befriends the Jewish hustler, and conspires
with him to acquire the worker's house at a cheap price. To pull off the
scheme, the two charlatans put out rumors to the effect that underground radon
gas is seeping into the basement of homes in the area, and that properties are
losing value.
As it happens, the company where the skilled worker is
employed makes the instruments that detect gases, and he knows how to use them.
He runs all kinds of tests in the area, and finds no gas seeping from the
ground. Still, the people around him keep selling their houses at fire sale
prices.
Unable to convince them they are making a mistake, having a respectable
nest egg he has been saving for retirement and having a good credit, he buys a
number of the neighbor's properties. As soon as the scare about radon gas is
over, new buyers move into the area and snap the properties at their original
values and then some.