Thomas Holctoft: Squire Guzzle (1806)
from Henry Fielding's 1742 novel
The History of the Adventures of Joseph Andrews
and of his Friend Mr. Abraham Adams.

" … no jury in this universe fails to identify the guilty party."

Being a nation of laws, we highly value evidence. We insist upon more than mere rumor to indict and beyond-doubt evidence to convict. We respect habeas corpus. We prefer to freely cross-examine our witnesses, and we expect them to respond. We have been unaccustomed to moving based solely upon anybody's say-so. NextWorld, though, attempts to run on Innuendo. A mere slur might spur some serious response. Someone without a portfolio might insist that they've cut waste and abuse without producing evidence of either, as if they could replace two hundred and fifty years of disciplined engagement with whispers. Further, nobody seems interested in claiming responsibility. The Who Done It resolves to, at best, vague pronouns. When a federal judge asks who's in charge, the Justice Department defender can't respond, claiming they don't know, so the judge reminds the court of the penalties involved in lying to the court.

The usual sources of vetted information shut down, as if we didn't need to remain well-informed about our government's performance and the spread of the latest infectious diseases. Regular reportage on even economic performance grows spotty, and networks of academics and other interested parties struggle to supplement it. The new incumbent seems most interested in avoiding inconvenient comparisons between his performance and his predecessors'. Most assume he's doing worse, if only because he seems to put so much energy into obfuscating what should have been easily accessed information. The gatekeepers and reporters seem over-represented in early mass layoffs, as if information itself had suddenly become unnecessary, another in an increasingly expanding line of enemies of the people. Whenever a leader insists that people should trust him, that's when our suspicions blossom. We're used to counting cards.

We can only presume he's up to something crooked again. We've seen scant evidence that he's ever been capable of running a straight game. He's always engaged in insider trading and double-dealing. He personifies quid pro quo. He routinely violates the Logan Act. He proudly personally profits from his official actions. He weaponizes his administration after accusing his predecessor without ever producing an ounce of evidence he had. He wouldn't recognize straight and narrow if it sat on his face. His administration exclusively performs as a criminal conspiracy. The courts will eventually unravel the tangle, but he will personify villainy in the meantime. He will serve as the designated bad guy. The primary reason he refuses to write down anything isn't just because he's essentially preliterate but because he wants to avoid producing anything that might be turned into hard evidence. He has no defense except a perponderence of doubt, his only remaining defense, the one preferred by scoundrels.

He engages in egregious acts worse in most ways than those inflicted by King George III. He claims to be leading an American Revolution, though he appears only to be inciting a minor deviation. It requires almost nothing to degrade the quality of any democracy. They seem easily wounded, though they become damnedly difficult to kill. The persistent rumors of its impending demise will prove to have been deliberate lies intended to discourage. A month into his second term, the illusions that contributed to re-electing him rapidly evaporated. Some of his staunchest supporters were his earliest victims. He performed like an unguided missile and increasingly seemed separated from his own administration's operations. He fired and then attempted to rehire critical employees. He appeared to be evading responsibility, seemingly ceding his presidency to some Wunderkind clown. He continually contradicts himself. He insists he's already uncovered serious fraud, but he cannot produce an ounce of evidence to support his claims. Same old, same old, again.

Innuendo does not trump evidence, even in a presidential rock-paper-scissors game. It is the weakest sister in the presidential arsenal, and everyone recognises its presence. He tap-dances instead of standing tall. He's done nothing worthy of standing tall so far. No genuine leader ever needs to mumble in dark corners. Only the weakest mathematicians refuse to show their work. The evidence of no evidence becomes increasingly self-evident. That dog don't bark. It only growls, trying to scare away inquisitors and ordinary citizens. Asking him questions seems to incite him into rages. He almost always refuses to answer even the most otherwise innocent queries, sometimes even resorting to the mother of tells: He insults the questioner, insisting that he was disappointed in them. "I expected a better-quality question from you," he deflects before turning to refuse to answer another and then another query. NextWorld seems a vacuous place filled with Fundamentally Unanswerable Questions. There’s something obviously FUQed up about that. When the witness invokes the Fifth Amendment in response to every question, no jury in this universe fails to identify the guilty party.

©2025 by David A. Schmaltz - all rights reserved

Tags: #NextWorld, #PureSchmaltz