REST IN PISSINGER
When reflecting on the crab rave breeding ground that is Henry Kissinger and his long list of “accomplishments”, it can be easy to forget how easily he himself could’ve been a genocide victim. Born to a Jewish family in Weimar Germany, the Kissingers fled to the United States in the late 1930s amidst increasing Nazi persecution, avoiding certain death in the Holocaust. Many of his extended family and childhood friends perished. You’d think anyone with that backstory would be conscious of the treatment of minorities, and, at the very minimum, not be responsible for any genocides of their own.
You’d think.
Henry Kissinger did not think so. One of the most influential statesmen of the 20th century as Nixon’s National Security Advisor and Secretary of State, he was a leading proponent of Realpolitik. Realpolitik promotes cold logic over ethics, getting what you want no matter what the human cost. It earned him much praise for opening up relations with China, and even a Nobel Peace Prize for winding down the Vietnam War he had previously ramped up. A ramping up that was done with the covert aim of getting Nixon, and especially Kissinger, in power. A prize that was so bullshit that co-laureate Lê Đức Thọ, the Vietnamese general who hammered out much of the peace talks with Kissinger, refused it, and the great Tom Lehrer (who outlives the bastard!) retired from satire in response.
Realpolitik also promoted treating the global stage as your sandbox, killing hundreds of thousands in the name of reiterating how awesome America is. His escalation of Vietnam included a covert, brutal bombing of Cambodia, turning a neutral country into a Pol Pot regime. Fearful of Salvador Allende bringing a popular, people-backed socialism to Chile, Kissinger orchestrated a coup that installed Pinochet. The rivers of many a country – Laos, Argentina, Uruguay, East Timor, Bangladesh, the list goes on – flow with Kissinger blood.
Anthony Bourdain summed it up best that Henry Kissinger was a man worthy of the Hague who instead got feted at galas. Even this year, he continued to hobnob with world leaders while his head gradually sunk into his body. He made 100. He outlived Bourdain. He outlived people who wrote his obits. In one instance, he outlived the guy who wrote the obit for the guy who wrote his obit. Besides dropping his glasses in the toilet one time, karma never struck.
That is, until now. Jimmy Carter, with no fucks left to give in a post-Rosalynn world, agreed to go on a suicide mission to take out the man the Grim Reaper was too afraid to touch. Carter offered a tea visit to Kissinger for them to discuss the state of the world, and Kissinger fatally agreed. Little did he know that Carter rigged Kissinger’s house with explosive peanuts. Within minutes, the house burst into flames, incinerating Kissinger as Carter dramatically hobbled away from the explosion. Unfortunately, Carter didn’t quite escape unscathed. He is currently in the ICU and not expected to survive, all the while clutching onto a fruit basket sent from Tom Lehrer.
Fittingly, a man known for his high body count sets another hit record for the DDP, marking #281 with enough time left that we’ll probably get to 300 too. Really, we’re all winners on this one, but a few among the 86 who see that reflected on the scoreboard are Pazuzu United, Stephen Hawking’s Football Points, Exu’s Exiteers, JoeRam, and, erm, See You In Heaven.
Henry Kissinger
23 May 1923 – 29 November 2023, aged 666
86 TEAMS (💀💀💀💀 + 40 = 7 POINTS, 🃏 (x5) 14 POINTS)