Zombie Apocalypse: Trump's Cabinet Picks

Be prepared for the coming sequel to the Trump Horror Show.

“Zombie Apocalypse” — I always thought it was a fictitious creation of Hollywood. But I am disproven once again by Donald Trump. With his colorful selection of cabinet picks announced this week, Trump reveals that rule by zombies is an actual thing! And if he gets his way, “apocalypse” will be the operative word for America.

Let’s start with one who truly looks and talks like he stepped straight out of Night of the Living Dead (1968) — Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., Trump’s pick to head the Department of Health and Human Services, an agency with a nearly $2 trillion budget whose services permeate U.S. society with the aim of keeping America healthy. HHS is traditionally helmed by persons who have spent their lives in the health or medical field or possess a wealth of experience managing large organizations — such past luminaries as Joseph Califano, Donna Shalala and Kathleen Sibelius. I worked briefly for HHS out of college and was impressed by the devotion and passion its employees apply to their mission.

RFK, Jr. possesses zero qualifications for the job. Worse, he is a long-time spewer of health conspiracy theories and just plain lunacy. The Kennedy clan has denounced him. He told a PBS interviewer in July, “There’s no vaccine that is, you know, safe and effective.” He denies HIV causes AIDS, asserts the debunked claim that vaccines cause autism, and says COVID is a bioengineered weapon “ethnically targeted” to avoid Ashkenazi Jews and Chinese people. He wants to ban fluoride in drinking water and advocates consumption of raw milk. (NB: my father contracted tuberculosis from consuming raw milk on the family farm. My misguided wife bought a half gallon of the stuff a couple of years ago, which I promptly dumped down the drain.)

In his defense, RFK, Jr. has a brain worm. In the 1985 flick Return of the Living Dead the zombies can feel themselves rotting, so eating the brains of the living helps relieve the pain of being dead.

Trump has chosen to be his defense secretary a tattooed Fox News host and former Army National Guard major, Pete Hegseth, who, judging by his body ink and hard-right views, appears to view himself as a latter-day Knight Templar, hell-bent on making America safe for White Christian nationalism. What apparently caught the eye of TV-addled Trump is Hegseth’s promoting the mass firing of “woke” generals and admirals. On the personal side, the thrice-married Fox host has a reputation as a womanizer. In 2017, he was accused by a woman of sexual assault — almost a prerequisite to become a top Trump team player — but the case didn’t go to trial.

The movies Aaah Zombies!! and Planet Terror feature lustful zombies, which more or less match Hegseth. Trouble is, in the movies the zombies’ genitalia fall off.

A 2002 British horror film, 28 Days Later, has a slightly different take on zombie apocalypse. The population becomes mass infected with a “rage virus” which renders them hyper-aggressive zombies. This aptly captures Matt Gaetz, Trump’s nominee to become attorney general. Loathed by all — as a zombie should be — Gaetz, who delights in performing as Trump’s dancing monkey, is the most vile of MAGA politicians, credibly accused of trafficking in underage females for sexual exploitation and a lifestyle so squalid as to put even Jeffrey Epstein to shame.

“I don’t care if it takes every second of our time and every ounce of our energy. We either get this government back on our side or we defund and get rid of — abolish the FBI, CDC, ATF, DOJ, every last one of ’em if they do not come to heel,” Gaetz said constructively. If confirmed, he would be Trump’s very own Vasily Ulrikh, Stalin’s judge who presided over the show trials of the Great Purges in the 1930s to eliminate the “enemies within.”

Is it me or does Tulsi Gabbard look like a classic horror film beauty? Trump’s candidate to become Director of National Intelligence has a problem. Actually two. Not only has she zero intelligence experience or background running any kind of organization, she also acts as a faithful propagandist for Vladimir Putin, leading some to wonder if she’s on his payroll. She has blamed the Russia-Ukraine conflict on the invadee rather than the invader, propagates the Russian intel lie that the U.S. has multiple chemical weapons labs in Ukraine and heaps praise on Russian client, Syrian strongman Bashar al-Assad, who has fatally gassed thousands of his own subjects.

I swear Tulsi starred in the 2009 Zombie Women of Satan. Maybe that’s why mass murderer al-Assad is so attracted to her.

Other Trump choices for the top positions in the land possess excellent qualifications for executing a Trump Apocalypse.

Marco Rubio, slotted to be Secretary of State, became zombified after his humiliating performance running for president in 2016 and now slavishly lurches to Trump’s tune.

Kristi Noem, the fiery, ultra-cosmeticized culture warrior governor of South Dakota and prospective DHS secretary, is probably best known for executing her puppy Sturmbannfuhrer-style, which is definitely grist for a horror movie. And her facile lies in her grating autobiography about meeting foreign leaders qualify her for helping preside over a Trump-orchestrated national apocalypse.

Elise Stefanik, to become ambassador to the UN, likewise forfeited her own soul, falling under the zombie spell as the MAGA virus turned millions of voters into the unthinking undead. Rest assured she will make an ass of herself and the nation as she hurls MAGA invective at the UN and other nations.

Land of the Dead is a 2005 post-apocalyptic horror film in which survivors are ruled by a government that divides the rich from the poor — a fitting theme for the upcoming sequel to the first Trump Horror Show.

Against vampires we have crucifixes, silver bullets and garlic to defend ourselves. I’m stumped as to what works against zombies. I’m open to suggestions.