Its handle is golden-sheathed. Its cup is bronzed and monogrammed. It’s the Trump Flush America plunger.
“The plunger is my favorite tool,” says the golden pitchman. “I use it daily.”
“Make your toilet great again.”
OK, that’s a joke. I need to make that clear. Considering what else Donald Trump has hawked – parts of the jacket in which he was indicted in Georgia, for just one ignominious example – nothing, absolutely nothing, is beneath him.
Stay tuned for that golden toilet tool. Have your credit card ready. Rest assured it will be priced with patriotic, just-scraping-by Americans in mind.
In writing this piece, thinking of how this man debases everything he touches, I looked up synonyms for “cheapen.” To my surprise, I found “trumpery.”
No joke. Look it up.
Webster has three definitions for trumpery: “Worthless nonsense.” Check. “Trivial or useless articles.” Check. “Tawdry finery.” Check.
The dictionary calls the latter definition archaic. That was before Mr. Golden Sneakers brought “tawdry” back into regular rotation.
It all checks out for the man who has demonstrated there’s no “too low” for him to go.
Cheap cologne sold for a ransom. Moonshot-priced bottled water. Underarm deodorant. Specious wellness products.
Put concisely by Medium.com, the man has lent his image and brand to “a slew of crooked companies and poppycock products.”
Now comes The Donald’s “God Bless the USA Bible” ($59.99). What a stroke of genius. No one in human history ever considered putting these sacred passages before the masses. Until him! And at such a bargain-basement price!
“I’m proud to endorse and encourage you to get this Bible,” he says. His goal? To “make America pray again.”
Trump’s professed devotion to piety assuages any notion that his only interest is to harvest someone’s loose change to help him fight off 88 felony charges.
“All Americans need a Bible, and I have many,” he says on video. “It’s my favorite book.”
Some may call it impolite to challenge one’s public piety, so let’s turn to the Book of Matthew:
“Beware of false prophets who come in sheep’s clothing but are ravenous wolves.”
Donald Trump says he reads the Bible often. He says Bibles are all over his residence.
Impressive. Inspiring. And just so you know, every wall in my house has an original Rembrandt.
Trump says religion is “very important” to him.
Yes, and Shaquille O’Neal has size-4 sneakers.
Name every president in American history. Know just from what we can see – the criminal indictments, the impeachments, the sexual predation and adultery, the conning of taxpayers, the exploitation of laborers (including “illegals”) — Donald Trump is the least faithful of all presidents to the faith he professes. Last. Dead last. We know this because he talks about it the most.
All throughout Trump’s Bible are admonitions against lying, against cheating, against adultery, against obscene wealth.
Read it, Donald. You are no man of God. You are America’s foremost fraud.
Your former top aides and Cabinet officials will attest that you are not just a spiteful megalomaniac. You are unfit for office.
The Bible condemns murder. You wouldn’t even acknowledge officers who died and who carry grave injuries from having been pummeled at the hands of your ravenous wolves Jan. 6, 2021.
The MAGA crowd you incited wanted to neck-tie your second-in-command. Your response? Mike Pence should have gone along with your criminal scheme to subvert the people’s will.
“Religion is so important. It’s so missing,” pitchman Trump says on video, implying he’s found it. These things often happen in prison — rarely in advance of sentencing.
If there’s one message beyond “Love thy neighbor” woven throughout that Bible it is this: Saying you’re a man of God doesn’t make you one.
So let me assert these things:
If Donald Trump is a Christian, I am the Dalai Lama’s spiritual advisor.
If Donald Trump is a Christian, the Pope and I are yachting buddies.
If you believe Donald Trump is a Christian, you’ve been hoodwinked into a for-profit franchise. If Christ walked among us, He would be picketing right now.
John Young is a longtime Texas newspaperman who now lives in Fort Collins, Colo. Email jyoungcolumn@gmail.com. See johnyoungcolumn.com.
From The Progressive Populist, May 1, 2024
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