In today's essay, Dana Milbank took this blogger back to his sophomore year in high school in separate caves for each class and Latin III (third-semester Latin). All of the Latin phrases thrown around are provided, tongue in cheek.(lingua in maxillam) at the expropriation of Latin expressions by The LK (Lyin' King) and his minions. We lurch from collusion and obstruction to quid pro whatever. This is an original version of Latin for Dummies. It this is a (fair & balanced) tale of the would-be emperor who -wore no clothes- had no brain, so be it.
[x WaPo — DC Fishwrap]
Welcome To The Quid Pro Show
By Dana Milbank
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Et tu, Mulvaney?
Three weeks ago, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi unveiled the impeachment inquiry with a Latin phrase spoken by Julius Caesar when he crossed the Rubicon. “Alea iacta est,” she said. The die is cast.
Since then, President Trump has absolved himself by repeating — ad infinitum — some Latin of his own: “There was no quid pro quo.” No this for that (translation to English).
Enter Mick Mulvaney, deus ex machina, to destroy Trump’s defense. The president’s (still) acting chief of staff briefed reporters Thursday and, in flagrante delicto, admitted Trump committed the sine qua non of a quid pro quo.
Mulvaney said there was “no question” that one of the reasons Trump withheld military aid to Ukraine was to force Ukraine to investigate “corruption” related to the Democratic Party. “And that is absolutely appropriate,” Mulvaney argued. “We do that all the time with foreign policy.”
Thus did the White House admit — ipso facto — to the exact crime Trump is accused of in the impeachment inquiry. “No quid pro quo” became “quid pro quo — so?” aka quid apropos).
Mulvaney’s modus operandi is clear enough: The White House must be in extremis realizing that depositions to Congress by administration officials are proving a de facto quid pro quo. Trump needs a new defense.
To be fair, Mulvaney didn’t admit a quid pro Joe (trading military aid for dirt on the Democratic front-runner) but a quid pro down-low (trading military aid for dirt supporting a conspiracy theory about Democrats). Still, the transcript of Trump’s call with the Ukrainian president makes clear it was a quid pro combo.
In a sense, Mulvaney is correct when he says “we do that all the time.” Trump’s tenure has been one big quid pro. He decreed Thursday that next year’s Group of Seven gathering of world leaders must be at the Doral resort he owns in a clear quid pro cash flow for the Trump Organization. His funneling of government business to Mar-a-Lago has been a quid pro chateau. Having the US military patronize his Scotland property is a quid pro Glasgow, and Vice President Pence’s hawking of Trump’s Ireland property is a blatant quid pro brogue. Trump’s Washington hotel rakes in lobbyists’ and foreign governments’ cash in a quid pro dough, and government funds paid to his New York and New Jersey properties complete the quid pro portfolio.
This benefits not only Trump but his sons, in what might be called a quid pro slow (or a quid pro I dunno). Donald Trump Jr.’s protests about Biden family nepotism this week, while ignoring his own, can only be termed a quid pro bozo. Trump’s national security adviser, Robert O’Brien, last week, floated a quid pro whistleblow: He’s clearing out career professionals (prospective whistleblowers) by slashing the NSC staff. The administration also tried to block cooperation with the inquiry, in a quid pro Pompeo. And then there’s Trump’s decision to let Rudy Giuliani take over US foreign policy: a quid pro schmoe.
Mulvaney, in his appearance Thursday, attempted a quid pro John Doe, pretending that he didn’t know the names of the officials testifying to Congress. The attorney general, William Barr, has trashed his principles to give Trump a quid pro ego.
Trump has been doing this sort of thing since a quid pro big toe [sic heel spur], kept him out of Vietnam. He abandoned gun-safety plans after meeting with the NRA, a quid pro ammo. His voter-suppression efforts are a quid pro Jim Crow. In a quid pro Kudlow, he convinced free-market conservatives to embrace a trade war. His tax cut, a quid pro CEO, ballooned the debt in a quid pro borrow. Evangelical Christians tolerate his immorality in exchange for his judicial nominees, a quid pro Roe . He paid hush money to Stormy Daniels, a quid pro lie low. Much of his presidency has been a quid pro Moscow.
He trades in false claims (quid pro Pinocchio) and plugs for friendly Fox News hosts (quid pro puppet show). And his requiring of constant flattery from underlings (quid pro braggadocio) has turned the West Wing into a quid pro freak show.
Because impeachment has made us all Latin speakers, I asked my longtime classics consultant, Vanessa, to translate into genuine Latin some of Trump’s trade-offs:
Quid pro impendio (this for payment).
Quid pro deverticulo (this for a resort).
Quid pro luto (this for dirt).
Quid pro vitio (this for a crime).
Quid pro reo (this for a sinner).
Quid pro imperio (this for power).
Giving Giuliani responsibility for anything? A blatant quid pro asino (this for a fool). But that’s pro forma for a president who sold his soul (quid pro animo) and made his office a quid pro mimo: this for a farce. ###
[Dana Milbank is a nationally syndicated op-ed columnist. He also provides political commentary for various TV outlets, and he is the author of three books on politics, including the national bestseller Homo Politicus (2007). Milbank joined The Post in 2000 as a Style political writer, then covered the presidency of George W. Bush as a White House correspondent before starting the column in 2005. Before joining The Post, Milbank spent two years as a senior editor at The New Republic, where he covered the Clinton White House, and eight years as a reporter with the Wall Street Journal, where he covered Congress and was a London-based correspondent. He received a BA cum laude (political science) from Yale University (CT).]
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