I take my title from Anthony Trollope’s great 1875 novel chronicling the activities of the rapacious swindler Augustus Melmotte and his coterie of grasping climbers and brittle ingenues. Trollope saw deep into the cynical engine room of his society, where a deadly brutishness panted just beneath the painted surface of propriety. In our story, the star is now less grasping than Melmotte, but he has been crossed with Chauncey Gardiner from the movie “Being There,” the confused puppet who, serving the interests of the dominant party’s power brokers, finds himself president of the United States. This is a story with patches of light as well as expanses of shadow, so in addition to the exploits of a gibbering Joe Biden we are introduced to a number of sub plots, some cheering, at least in part. So when we read that Lt. Col. Matthew Lohmeier was relieved of his duties in Space …