Doggone it! I have lost a lot of weight so my tuxedo fits well again, including my red vest and my red already-tied bowtie. I look dashing—tuxes have a tendency to do that to some people and I am one of them if I say so myself.
It’s been probably fifteen years since I wore it. The shoulders have a fine cover of closet dust. But I was all set to send it to the cleaners so I would really look spiffy and sharp. I had searched for and found the studs for my pleated shirt and French cuffs. The patent leather shoes were still in their soft cotton protective bags and still fit when I found them under a bunch of stuff in the far corner of my closet.
And then they cancelled it.
I hadn’t bought my ticket yet but I was seriously considering using the event to break out the new, thin, distinguished ME and mingle with some of the most important people in the country. That’s how they were promoted. And it was for such a worthy cause.
I really wanted to get that signed #1 music chart plaque. I don’t remember hearing the song played on the radio, the National Anthem sung by twenty peaceful tourists jailed after visiting the National Capitol on January 6, 2021 while their greatest supporter and benefactor intones the Pledge of Allegiance over their voices. It’s not something that plays very often on Top-40 stations or whatever they call that format now, or on NPR or Country-Western stations.
Billboard reported in March last year that, “Donald J. Trump and J6 Prison Choir’s “Justice for All” enters Billboard’s Digital Song Sales chart (dated March 25) at No. 1. The recording sold 33,000 downloads March 10-16, according to Luminate.” It also drew 442,000 “official U. S. Streams,” whatever those are.
That’s pretty impressive, I guess. The magazine has several charts of hit songs, one of which is the top 50 Streaming Songs that listed its number one as Morgan Wallen’s “Last Night,” with 38.9 million streams. The Top 50 Radio Songs survey was listing Miley Cyrus’ “Flowers,” with an airplay audience of 106.7 million. But number one is number one and even it is a relatively small number one it is still number one and all I had to do to qualify as a possible recipient of a plaque commemorating this achievement was to buy a $1500 general admission ticket.
I’ve listened to the recording a time or two. While it’s a long ways from the Mormon Tabernacle Choir, I can understand why some people might find a little charm in it.
But the general admission probably wouldn’t have let me get really close to the distinguished guests, one of whom is a co-founder of the sponsoring organization, Sarah McAbee. The New York Times says she has a vested interest in it because her husband, a former sheriff in Tennessee, is one of the peaceful tourists of January 6, 2021 who has had the misfortune of being sentenced to five years in prison for being involved in the “prolonged multi-assistant attack on police officers.”
For an extra thousand dollars I could have gotten my picture taken the speakers. That probably was the best I could do. Certainly it would have been exciting to have one of the speakers at my table but I couldn’t afford $50,000 for that and I don’t know eleven other people who have sacrificed so much to get into their tuxedos as I had sacrificed.
Mr. Trump was listed by the non-profit group planning the event—The Stand in the Gap Foundation—as an invited speaker but his campaign circulated word about ten days before the event that he wouldn’t be able to be there. But that’s okay. There were a dozen speakers confirmed and ninety minute or two hours of Mr. Trump after all of the other folks spoke would have taken me well beyond my bedtime anyway.
But some of the other folks would have been interesting although I’ve never heard of about nine of them. But there were three I either knew about or looked up—Rudi Giuliani, Peter Navarro, and Anthony Raimondi, identified by others as a “MAGA influencer.” A fourth was an actor whose name didn’t ring any bells, so I looked him up.
Actor Nick Searcy has appeared in 40 movies playing such memorable characters as Highway Patrol Officer, Man at Party, FBI man, Construction Worker, Stan, Repairman, Mr. Miller, County Sheriff, The Farmer, Herb, The Captain, and Head of FBI Field office. I’m not impressed but then again, he’s been in forty movies (and a lot of TV shows) and I haven’t, so there’s that.
I’m sure they comped Rudi’s ticket. That poor man has vigorously ridden the Trump bus—although I’m not sure whether he has a seat inside it or is hanging onto the frame under it—from fame to disgrace with all the dignity he can muster and so far has fended off lawsuit winners’ efforts to take everything but tomorrow’s underwear from him to pay judgements.
I imagine Peter Navarro could buy his own ticket. I’d like to sit as his table and hear him tell about the fun of the four months he spent in prison for contempt of Congress because he refused to turn over documents to the House January 6th Committee and also to learn how much he looks forward to going back on a Contempt of Court charge for refusing to turn over 200-250 documents to the National Archives.
The third face promoted on the invitation was completely unfamiliar. So I looked him up on the internet—and now I wonder what I should think about the other people I might meet there because if the Anthony Raimondi on the flyer is the Anthony Raimondi on the internet—-
Well, get this:
It’s Anthony LUCIANO Raimondi, who claims the notorious mobster Lucky Luciano is his uncle and says he was an enforcer for the Colombo mafia family in New York. A New York Post article in 2019 says Raimondi claims he went to Rome in 1978 and helped to poison Pope John Paul I with cyanide, that he was among those recruited to do the deed by his cousin, Archbishop Paul Marcinkus, then the head of the Vatican Bank who wanted to keep the Pope from exposing a massive stock fraud “run by Vatican insiders.” He also claims he was recruited to kill Pope John Paul II until the Pope, fearful for his life, decided not to continue the investigation.
Another website says Raimondi claims to have killed 300 people as a teenaged sniper in Vietnam, winding up there in a plea deal that let hm escape a New York murder charge at age 16 if he joined the Army. .
If that’s the guy invited to be a speaker at this event, I’m not sure I want to cross paths with him. He does have his critics who accuse him of being a huge liar and a major conspiracy theorist. I don’t think I could have a casual conversation with while nibbling on bacon-wrapped pineapple slices or toothpicked wienies dipped in barbecue sauce because I would worry that cement would damage my patent leather shoes. Just my luck, he’d be the speaker at my table though, if I could afford to sit at one of the big bucks tables.*
I would have been interested, just from general curiosity, how much of this money actually reaches any of the families of the peaceful tourists. I’m sure that the costs of the event at Mr. Trump’s New Jersey golf club will be quite high and some might find its way into his own legal fund or campaign fund, something that seems proper given that it is HIS club.
But the whole thing is moot now (I have a friend who refers to things as being a “moo issue—not even the cows care about it.”). It’s been cancelled without explanation on the website. One organizer has told a reporter it’s because of “scheduling conflicts of invited guest speakers.”
One of the conflicts is that U. S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan will be deciding that day how to go forward with the election subversion case against Mr. Trump in the wake of the Supreme Court’s ruling on immunity from prosecution for presidential acts.
Well, truth be told, my invitation must have gotten lost in the mail, but I’m sure they would have taken my money if I wanted to buy a ticket anyway. If they do reschedule this event for some time when Mr. Trump isn’t in court or creating his own conspiracy theories on the stump, I might think about the event again. I’ll need to know about it far enough in advance to get a haircut.
And I hope it is on a day that is not the one where I give my pet fish his weekly shampoo. That’s something I never miss.
*I have entertained myself, if no one else, by writing about this event and the “distinguished” list of speakers but this Raimondi guy deserves some additional observation and it’s serious, assuming he’s the person mentioned in numerous internet entries and videos. First of all, I cannot for the life of me understand why any presidential candidate or any group of his supporters would want to associate with a proclaimed mob enforcer and Pope-killer. Second, Raimondi has critics who claim he is a complete fraud. Third, an internet search turns up several reports that I find more credible than his claims about his sniper work in Vietnam including a 2023 article on Historynet (originally in Vietnam magazine) about Staff Sgt. Adelbert F. Waldron III being the highest-scoring sniper in Vietnam with 109 confirmed kills, for which he earned two Distinguished Service Crosses, a Silver Star, and three Bronze Star Medals. A directory listing all winners of these three awards during the Vietnam War does not list Raimondi receiving any of them. I will leave it to you to judge what kind of presidential candidate would allow himself to be pictured prominently with someone like this.