I have two confessions to make.
Confession #1:
I’m bored with Stormy Daniels.
However…
Confession #2:
I love irony.
So, let’s talk Stormy Daniels.
Stormy Daniels, in case you just emerged from a cave (and in which case, congratulations, you’ve missed a lot but haven’t missed anything), is an adult film star who alleges to an affair with then-civilian Donald J. Trump in 2006, just months after Trump’s wife, Melania, gave birth to son Barron.
Juicy stuff. But wait, there’s more!
As the story goes, Trump (or some affiliate of Trump, Inc.) paid Daniels $130,000 in hush money in the days leading up to the 2016 election.
Now, the second part, the part about the payoff, is potentially of more concern to the President, due to those pesky campaign finance laws, and whether there’s a criminal case here. But this is America, so we don’t care about that. What we care about is…
THE PRESIDENT AND THE PORN STAR!!!!!!!!!!!
How exciting! The President of the United States, back when he wasn’t the President of the United States, was unfaithful to his wife, and with a porn star! We loved it, and the news media (as always) was happy to continue to feed us just as long as we continue to consume it.
And a funny thing happened to Stormy Daniels…
I’m more in demand, and like I said in the “Rolling Stone” interview, if someone came up to you and said, “Hey, you know that job you’ve been doing forever, how bout next week I pay you quadruple, show me one person who is going to say no.
And then more funny things started to happen:
- Daniels’ camp alleged that the non-disclosure agreement (NDA) may be unenforceable, because Trump himself never signed it.
- Daniels offered to pay back the $130,000 in exchange for being let out of the NDA. (This really cracks me up. First of all, I guess you’re admitting that the NDA is, in fact, enforceable? Secondly, you think that, now that the election is over, the President is okay with you singing from the highest mountaintop? And making potentially millions?)
- Daniels claimed there are more women who have similar stories to tell.
- Daniels hinted that part of her story takes place after the election!
- Daniels announced crowdfunding venture to help pay legal fees in her attempt to get the NDA voided. (Now, okay, she’s really jumped the shark. Stormy Daniels is doing all right, folks.)
Have you noticed how these events have been spaced almost perfectly, every few days, as if to – I don’t know – intentionally keep Stormy Daniels in the news? And did you notice the name of the player who has dropped all these bits of chum into the water? And did you see the quote about the quadrupling salary?
Think about it. We know everything we need to know about Donald Trump’s character. We knew it well before we elected him President.* What could we possibly want to hear about the man from Stormy Freakin’ Daniels? Anatomical details? Fetishes? Um, I’ll pass, thanks.
And, yet, here we are, gobbling it up, drooling over the cleavage photos CNN is required to attach to its reporting, and paying Daniels’s legal fees to fight a battle that would make her rich.
America.
* I’m just assuming, for the sake of the essay, that this really happened. Electing him President, I mean.
There are so many things to see at a circus, it’s hard to keep up. It’s overwhelming in fact. SO overwhelming that you tend to only notice one or two things – and those are more than likely to be simple slight of hand distractions. And why is it a 3 ring circus if you can only watch one ring at a time?