There is a specific, sulfurous scent that permeates the Swiss Alps this time of year, distinguishable even above the crisp mountain air and the overbearing fragrance of handcrafted chocolates. It is the scent of existential dread masked by five-thousand-dollar cologne. The World Economic Forum is underway in Davos, that annual pilgrimage where the architects of global misery gather to congratulate themselves on their philanthropy while sipping champagne that costs more than the average human earns in a decade. But this year, the self-congratulatory back-slapping has been replaced by a nervous twitch. The masters of the universe are trembling in their bespoke snow boots. Why? Because the circus is coming to town, and the ringmaster is Donald J. Trump.

The anticipation of the American President’s arrival on Wednesday has turned the usual technocratic smugness of the forum into a panicked huddle of confused billionaires. It is a delicious irony to witness. Here we have the so-called 'Davos Man'—that mythical creature of globalism, rational markets, and borderless trade—cowering before the erratic whims of a reality television host who treats international diplomacy like a hostile takeover of a failing Atlantic City casino. The clash of cultures is absolute. On one side, you have the tedious, grey-faced bureaucrats of the EU and the slick hedge fund managers who believe the world can be solved with a spreadsheet and a carbon tax credit. On the other, you have the chaotic id of American populism, a force that doesn't care about your climate pledges or your delicate supply chains.

Let us dissect the current menu of anxieties plaguing these mountaintop elitists. First, there is the matter of Greenland. Yes, Greenland. In a timeline that has clearly been written by a hallucinogenic satirist, the discussion at the world’s most serious economic summit includes the American President’s desire to purchase the world’s largest island as if it were a distressed property on the Florida coast. To the Davos crowd, land is something you acquire through subtle corporate mergers or colonial debt traps, not by shouting 'I’ll buy it!' at the Prime Minister of Denmark. The sheer vulgarity of it offends them more than the imperialism. It is a reminder that for all their pretenses of sophistication, the global order is currently being held hostage by a man whose understanding of geography is likely limited to the locations of his own golf courses.

Then, of course, there are the tariffs. If there is one thing a Davos attendee hates more than paying taxes, it is uncertainty. The threat of trade wars hangs over the chalets like an avalanche waiting to drop. The markets are wobbling, we are told. The headline screams of 'wobbling markets' as if we should care. Oh, the tragedy of it all. The line on the graph might go down. The algorithmic trading bots might get confused. The sheer narcissism required to view a global trade war solely through the lens of one's stock portfolio is the defining characteristic of this gathering. They are not worried that tariffs will raise the price of goods for the working poor; they are worried that it will interrupt the seamless flow of capital that allows them to summer in the Hamptons and winter in Gstaad.

What makes this spectacle truly nauseating is the performative morality on display. The Davos set loathes Trump not because he is a symptom of a broken system, but because he is a mirror. He is the grotesque reflection of their own greed, stripped of the polite euphemisms and academic jargon they use to justify their hoarding of wealth. They hate him because he says the quiet parts out loud. When Trump threatens to upend the table, the Davos elite doesn't fear for the people; they fear for the table. They are desperate to appease him, desperate to flatter him, desperate to keep the game rigged in their favor, all while sneering at him behind their hands.

So, as Wednesday approaches, watch closely. Watch the sycophancy. Watch the captains of industry bend the knee to the very populism they claim to despise, hoping that if they smile wide enough, the tariffs won't hit their sector. It is a theater of the absurd where everyone is the villain. The Right brings its boorish incompetence and nationalistic fervor; the Center and the Left bring their feckless hypocrisy and elitist disdain. And the rest of us? We are just the spectators, freezing in the valley below, waiting for the avalanche caused by their shouting match to bury us all.