Maybe there is a god after all

So many bon mots - couldn't find the Venetian equivalent - that spring to mind now that the Sanchez-Bezos nuptials have been celebrated and thoroughly publicized. 

       Hey, big spender!

       If you've got it, flaunt it.

One thing we're sure of, the rich get richer...

They were careless people, Tom and Daisy.

Okay, Jeff and Lauren may be publicity hounds and showoffs, but I don't know if they're Tom and Daisy Buchanan careless.  But I sure know they're big spenders. That they got it and they flaunt it. And that there's no getting around the stats that, the rich are getting richer while the poor are getting poorer.

Anyway, Jeff Bezos and Lauren Sanchez outdid themselves (which is hard to do) with a lavish multi-event celebration to mark their marriage.

All sorts of biggies were there. The lubricious Kardashians. The not-so-lubricious Jenner "girls." Oprah Winfrey and her sidekick, Gayle King. Mogul Barry Diller and wrap-dresser Diane von Furstenburg. Tom Brady (who used to be cute, but who's starting to look like a cadaver). Orlando Bloom (but not ex-Katie Perry, even though she was the one who rocketed into outer space with Lauren Sanchez earlier this year.) Leonard DiCaprio. Usher. Jewel. Ivanka and Jared. Dolce and Gabbana. Bill Gates and his attractive, accomplished but non-boobs-hanging-out girlfriend Paula Hurd. (Different strokes for different mega-billionaires, I guess. I'd a lot rather meet Bill Gates and Paula Hurd than Jeff Bezos and Lauren Sanchez.)

When the most "normie" folks on the invite list are Bill Gates and OpenAI's Sam Altman, you have to ask whether Jeff and Lauren have anyone to invite who are regular non-People people. Were their sibs there? Any cousins? BFFs from high school? College roommates? Next door neighbors? 

Anyway, the celebration was not without controversy.

Folks protested the big spending, the flaunting. The depredation visited upon the environment by the arrival and departure of so many private jets. (You think any of these guests flew commercial?) The general disgust at holding these events in the over-touristed, fragile city of Venice.  

The happy couple made up for the assault on Venice by asking guests to donate to local charities. After all, what can you possibly buy for the couple who has everything? They weren't exactly going to register on Crate and Barrel for a cocktail shaker now, were they? And, of course, there was all the money that floated into the local economy by the spending associated with a $50 million wedding (the swag bags included local sweets and Murano glass something or other), not to mention the hotel and water taxi spending by the guests. (Wonder whether the prices were jacked for the fabulously wealthy guests. Surely not in Italy...) 

It is, of course, their (his) money and they (he) can spend it how they want.

But I can't help but think about the Amazon workers who struggle with poor working conditions and crappy pay and benefits - all the while knowing that Bezos will replace every last one of them with AI and/or robots the nano-second he can. About how much more he could do if he devoted more of his wealth to the common good. (And spread more of his personal accumulation to those who work for him.)

Sure, Bezos has his philanthropic activities. But how odd that he would supposedly be committed to climate change initiatives while at the same time sucking up to a president committed to environmental destruction. (I read that Big Daddy Trump was invited to the wedding of the century but chose not to go. Maybe he wanted to golf. Or play warrior. Maybe he was afraid that Lauren would be the center of attention, not himself. In any case, Venice caught a break. Imagine the big old Air Force presidential chopper whirring its way onto Saint Mark's Plaza?)

And I can't help but think of the quiet life and amazing philanthropy of Bezos first wife, Mackenzie Scott. She's a billionaire in her own right - she helped Bezos build the Amazon business - but it's hard to imagine a novelist/philanthropist who studied under Toni Morrison at Princeton throwing a $50 million party for herself, let alone showing up at any event with her boobs hanging out. (One thing to show up showing all at your wedding celebration - Lauren Sanchez Bezos is an obvious adherent of the 'if you've got it, flaunt it' way of exhibitionism - but she also showed up showing all at Trump's second inauguration. How Eleanor Roosevelt of her.) 

My favorite part of the Bezos-Sanchez wedding event(s) was, meanie that I am, the violent thunderstorm that disrupted the welcoming party. The guests had to scatter - I was going to say, like rats, but that would be ultra-meanie; plus Venice has enough native four-legged rats as it is - when the skies opened. Just one of a series of "disasters" that attended the goings-on.

First came the anti-capitalist public protests. Then it turned out one of Bezos and Sánchez’s three chosen venues was covered by unsightly scaffolding. The next disaster to hit? A freak thunderstorm on Thursday night during a welcoming party at the Madonna dell’Orto cloisters. Heavy lightning and rain reportedly left many guests soaked, forcing the event to end early. Perhaps Bezos and Sánchez should have followed fashion week’s lead and hired a rain shaman. (Source: The Guardian)

You might not know it from reading Pink Slip, but I'm actually not a mean person. But I'd be lying if I said I didn't chuckle a bit at the thought of Jeff and Lauren, Tom Brady, Ivanka and Jared, et al. scurrying around to get out of the pouring rain. Maybe there is a god after all - a god with a sense of humor.  

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Image Source: Daily Mail on X.