News with a Twist
Around the Block reveals where little Donald learned his flimflammery
Satire from Ted Block
As we head deeper and deeper into a full-fledged Constitutional crisis, a crisis in which democracy as we know it is on the precipice, a crisis of which Paul Krugman opined today, “…if democracy survives — which is by no means certain — it will largely be thanks to one unpredictable piece of good luck: Donald Trump’s mental deficiency,” I started thinking, who is this man, Donald Trump? The man Krugman characterizes as not stupid because “a stupid man couldn’t have managed to defraud so many people over so many years.”
The answer is well-known and easy: Donald Trump is a con man, a “lazy, utterly incurious, insecure” one, according to Krugman, but a con man.
But, is this just his nature, or was there an event, a happening, an experience that formed Trump’s character?
And then it hit me. Donald Trump became the hustler he is today on Saturday, November 3, 1956 when he, along with millions of other kids, watched as CBS reintroduced the 1939 film, The Wizard of Oz, to the American public. Little Donald watched in amazement as the film went from the black and white of Kansas to the technicolor Land of Oz (most of us watched in amazement as well but for one thing: we couldn’t see the transition to color because unlike the Trumps we didn’t have a color TV), he knew instantly who he wanted to be – the greatest con man of all time: the Great and Powerful Oz!
Well as luck would have it, little Donald became president of the United States, a president who, in just the last few days has uttered the most incredible and amazing statements ever attributed to an American president (I could go back further than the last few days but even I have space limitations):
“As I have stated strongly before, and just to reiterate, if Turkey does anything that I, in my great and unmatched wisdom, consider to be off limits, I will totally destroy and obliterate the Economy of Turkey (I’ve done before!).”
“They (the Kurds) are fighting for their land. And as somebody wrote in a very, very powerful article today, they didn’t help us in the Second World War. They didn’t help us with Normandy, as an example.”
“Well they (ISIS fighters) are going to be escaping to Europe, that’s where they want to go.”
Regarding former Vice President Biden: “He was only a good vice president because he knew how to kiss Barack Obama’s ass.”
Regarding Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi: “She’s either really stupid or she’s really lost it — or maybe there’s a certain dishonesty in there.”
(Note: Last two statements were made at a campaign rally in Minneapolis which drew “roars of approval.”)
If only, as in the “real” The Wizard of Oz, there was little Toto to pull the curtain (or at least flush these statements down the, well, Toto) and reveal the true man. Someone, anyone who could finally tell us to “Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain!”
Someone, perhaps a Lindsey Graham, or a Mitch McConnell, or a Kevin McCarthy who could finally, finally tell us:
“If he only had a brain!”
“If he only had a heart!”
“If he only had some courage.”
“But he doesn’t So, until he does, Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain!”
Around the Block 