The Trumple with tribbles

by David Benjamin

“China has been working very hard to contain the Coronavirus. The United States greatly appreciates their efforts and transparency … I want to thank President Xi!” 

— Trump

MADISON, Wis. — 1) Let’s give the president an iota of credit. A popular perception is that he spends his days — save for this daily Rose Garden bodice-ripper with girl reporters — watching Fox News. This canard collapsed when Donald Trump dubbed his push for the discovery of a Covid-19 vaccine “Operation Warp Speed.”

There, y’see? He switched channels — to re-runs of the original “Star Trek.” This cute sci-fi allusion is easily the most whimsical note in an otherwise wretched moment in U.S. history. It’s so much more amusing than a stack of 100,000 corpses and the sacking of the Centers for Disease Control.

So let’s go with it.

Let’s just say the virus started in Wuhan, when Khan — who had hijacked the Starship Enterprise and zipped through a wormhole in time back to 2019 — beamed a thousand pregnant tribbles down to a wild animal market. Of course, everyone knows that the Chinese regard grilled tribbles as even more toothsome than rotisserie pangolin (although they prefer their suckling tribbles only slightly seared and drizzled with Hoisin sauce). Despite alerts issued by scientists in a Hubei animal lab, shoppers in Wuhan (literally and figuratively) gobbled up the windfall of tasty tribbles. Little could they suspect that the evil Khan had spiked the tribbles’ food (quadrotriticale grain, which the little fuzzballs just love!) with a virulent coronavirus previously confined to sand-burrowing arthropods on the barren planet Ceti Alpha V. 

As high-ranking Party members devoured braised, steamed and pit-roasted tribbles in Shanghai and Beijing’s best restaurants, the virus began its deadly march from Hubei to Singapore, New York, Sioux City and all the world beyond. 

The wrathful Khan stood triumphant, until…

Well, okay, a plot twist.

The U.S. president reveals that he’s actually Captain James T. Kirk. For America’s sake, he has decided to drop his disguise as a bloated, greedy voluptuary with a trophy wife and a heart of dry ice. Assuming his real identity, he puts the Resolute Desk into storage in a carport at Mar-a-Lago. In the Oval Office, he installs a captain’s chair, just like on the bridge of the Enterprise. He starts snapping out orders like, “Mr. Sulu, warp seven!” and “Lt. Uhura, plot a course for the Neutral Zone!” He dons a finely tailored Starfleet  uniform that “doesn’t make me look fat. I’m not fat! I’m just short for my height.” To protect himself from Covid-19, he eschews a facemask but assembles a West Wing Tribble Patrol, armed with butterfly nets and led by Starfleet medical officer Tony “Bones” Fauci. 

“Search the Lido Deck and stay off the bridge,” Kirk shouts. When Chekov notes that the Enterprise has no Lido Deck, Kirk confiscates Chekov’s butterfly net

Declaring that his son-in-law is a Vulcan who’s had cosmetic ear surgery, Kirk  changes the boy’s name to “Spock.” He orders a Starfleet peek-a-boo minidress for his official Enterprise consort, an exotic beauty from Omicron Ceti III who might have been smuggled illegally onto the starship. But the Omicronian hottie, a smart dresser, calls the outfit “tacky” and refuses to wear it. She hands it down to Kirk’s communications officer, a classic “Star Trek” blonde named K-Lee who will wear anything and do anything for her Captain.

Kirk begins to call his mobile phone a “communicator.” He refers to his daily torrent of tweets as “intergalactic intercourse.” He calls a press briefing to announce that he can kill Covid with his phaser. He asks for volunteers from ICUs in several prominent “Earth infirmaries.” When he gets no takers, he says, “Hey, don’t worry. I’ll just set it on ‘Stun.’”

Still, no volunteers. He says, “Maybe I’ll shoot myself. It’s harmless. There’s a very good chance that this has an impact. What’ve I got to lose?”

Okay, the story could go on. But let’s leave it here, with the cliffhanging mystery of Capt. Kirk’s ingenious “phaser cure.” Will he shoot himself?

2) Among questions that have dogged the White House during the pandemic was posed bluntly by Andrew Cuomo: “How much is a human life worth?” 

He asked because the coldblooded Social Darwinists of the GOP have openly questioned the cost-benefit balance of saving every possible life if the quality of mercy comes at the expense — in the words of Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick — of “shutting down society and people start losing their paychecks and businesses can’t open and governments aren’t getting revenues.”

Said Patrick, “There are more important things than living.”

Cuomo’s retort: ““My mother is not expendable. Your mother is not expendable. God forbid, if you can’t keep up, you are expendable.”

Dan Patrick has yet to calculate his own expendability. However, there are actual data. New York Times reporter Austin Frakt traced the statistical history of human valuation. His first recorded example harks back to the Nixon era when the Dept. of Transportation (DOT), assessing the human cost of a traffic fatality, pegged your life and mine at a modest $885,000. 

Since then, the number has risen, thank goodness. Today, the Consumer Products Safety Commission tallies a life at $8.7 million. However, the same life (actually, a death), gets only $7.4 million from the EPA, possibly because so many black and brown people live close to Superfund hazardous-waste sites. If you have thoughts of striking a Faustian deal for your bod, if not your soul, your best broker nowadays is the DOT, which will offer a cool $9.6 million to your beneficiaries.

3) Trump has rarely used the Defense Production Act, a post-Korean War measure to speed emergency aid in a national crisis. However, a month ago, he signed an order that meat-packers must stay open regardless of risks to their tightly crowded workers. Why this dramatic deviation from Trump’s policy of not doing anything about Covid-19, lest he be blamed for the whole mess? 

I know why. Every serious political maven is hip, because we know what the big lug likes to eat. We’re all just too polite to blurt it out. Two words: 

Cheeseburger panic.

4) Another shattered precedent has gone without comment by the media. Never before has America had a White House press secretary — not even Pierre Salinger — who wears false eyelashes.

5) This one seems to stump the talking heads. Why does Trump keep calling the Great Influenza of 1918 the “Great Influenza of 1917”? Come on, man! Until a few weeks ago, Trump had no clue there ever was a great influenza in any year. Then, he heard about it, forgot the year, took a stab and chose “1917,” probably because there was this movie (with no influenza in it) nominated for an Oscar. 

After that, the Great Influenza had to fall one year earlier than reality, in “1917” over and over, forever. Had to! Trump is a man’s man and real men never, ever admit a mistake. Has he ever? Will he ever? Come on, man! 

6) Finally, among Trump’s brainstorms was his demand — this week —  that cities and states re-open the schools. Right now!

Class! Quiet, please. Now, when there’s no pandemic to worry about, tell me. When does school normally let out for the summer?

Now, let’s not see all the same hands. Yes. Nancy?…

… Thank you, Nancy, that’s correct: Right now.