Donald Trump launched a memecoin a few days before the inauguration of his second presidential term. Its sole purpose, to Trump, is unambiguous and unmistakable: It is a vehicle for him to become richer. Likewise, its only conceivable value to literally any other person or entity on the face of the earth is also quite clear: It is a way to buy favor from the president of the United States. Its very existence is an announcement: Here is how you pay President Donald Trump for stuff.
Mr. Trump announced last month that leading buyers of a digital coin his family is marketing would be rewarded with a private dinner with him at one of his golf courses and that the very top bidders would win a tour of the White House.
In a similar vein: The royal family of Qatar intends to give Donald Trump a luxury airliner, a Boeing 747-8 reportedly worth something in the neighborhood of $400 million. Strictly speaking the Qataris are [world's most exaggerated air-quotes] donating [/air-quotes] this plane to the Defense Department to serve as Air Force One, and then at the end of Trump's term the DoD will [air-quotes so theatrical that I audibly blow out all the ligaments in both of my arms] donate [/air-quotes] the plane to Trump's presidential library. The only and not even partially hidden reason for the state of Qatar to do this is as a way of purchasing favor from the president of the United States, a guy whose entire personality is a cheaply gilded "For Sale" sign.
Is this stuff corruption? You might consider that a silly question, since corruption is all it can be and since none of the participants in it seem all that interested in pretending it is anything else. Everybody everywhere understands this. Nobody anywhere has to pretend not to understand it, except perhaps for the people reporting on it for the New York Times.
Ah. OK. It's not corruption until one of the parties says to the other, on record, "Hey, how about doing some corruption together, illegally?" and the other one says, "Ah yes, the famous explicit quid pro quo, forbidden by law! Let's do one of those," and the first guy says, "I would like one official act, please, in direct exchange for the money in this burlap sack with a dollar sign on it," and the second guy draws him up an itemized receipt listing the official acts corruptly obtained and their individual prices plus sales tax. Got it.
