Sorry, Jamie, but even by “businessman” standards—if they still exist—you’re a whore, and a pretty goddamn big one too. Here’s Jamie talking to CNBC about the state of the world, after meeting with Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy (Ukrainian spelling as per Wikipedia):
But, you know, my heart goes out to the guy. I mean, people forget that every day, he wakes up in the morning, there’s a 600-mile front, there’s a million soldiers fighting off, you know, a Russian – they’ve had 300,000 casualties so far. This may go on for longer. We have to help them. We have to teach the American public that this is about freedom and democracy for the free world, and that’s what the battle being fought. And so, I hope our government gets together and, you know, finally passes these new bills, et cetera. So, I just want to show my support for Ukraine.
That’s “good” of you, Jamie. So why do you say, ten or fifteen minutes later, regarding Donaldo
He’s kind of right about NATO. Kind of right about immigration. He grew the economy quite well.
“Kind of right about NATO?” Threatening to leave unless they spent “billions and billions”? What about Trump’s claim that he could settle the Russian/Ukrainian war “in a day” via negotiations with Vladimir Putin? Do you think your pal Volodymyr would be down with that? In your interview, you said that you felt that the thinking of people like Condoleezza Rice and former Secretary of Defense Robert Gates should guide our policy towards Russia. Do you think Condi and Bob are rooting for Trump to take over? Have you noticed how the “Trump wing” in Congress is voting these days?
Oh, and “Kind of right about immigration”? In the CNBC interview you said the following:
We have to control the borders. We need more merit-based immigration. We need more seasonal immigration. We need DACA to have a place here. We need a path to citizenship. If you do not control the borders, you’re going to destroy our country.
Control the borders, yeah, but more “merit-based immigration” and more “seasonal immigration?” Doesn’t that add up to “foreigners stealing our jobs so big businessmen get even richer”? Is that where the Trumpublican Party is coming from these days? As the CATO Institute points out in a “pointed” analysis, while in office Trump took advantage of the COVID epidemic to radically slash the number of legal immigrants to the U.S, something he had promised to do when running for president in 2016, entirely apart from his wildly racist demagoguing regarding illegal immigration. Stephen Miller, one of Trump’s top policy advisors for immigration, has a hideously racist record and a second Trump administration would make Miller’s dreams—the precise opposite of what Dimon says he desires—a reality, as the New York Times recently reported. As a starter, Trump told a crowd back in September that “Following the Eisenhower model, we will carry out the largest domestic deportation operation in American history.” Does that sound like a “path for citizenship”?
As for “running the economy quite well,” he did so by not doing what Jamie and his Wall Street pals were demanding that Barack Obama do when he was president. Remember when the country was going to go to Hell if we didn’t cut entitlements and balance the budget, Jamie? I guess that was then. I guess your only real priority is tax cuts for the rich, and devil take the hindmost.
Afterwords
The frequently estimable Bulwark has a nice take on Jamie’s descent in what could probably best be described as “open” whoredom, while the also frequently estimable Dan Drezner, aka Daniel Drezner, deftly dissects La Trahison des Milliardaires as a class.
