The cancer funds are being used for a greater purpose: My birthday parade
“The Army on Friday confirmed there will be a military parade on President Donald Trump’s birthday in June.” — PBS
“His own military advisers pushed back against the idea when estimates of the price soared close to $100 million. But Mr. Trump did not let go of the idea.” — NYT
Good morning,
Unfortunately, I need to address some despicable rumors. Erroneous claims have been leveled at me. People who I thought were friends, coworkers, even my mailman—they’ve all shamed me for my recent decisions to scrap vital research programs and defund critical aid. They say I’m cruel. They say I don’t have my priorities in order. They say I’ve been doing it all for no good reason. This is a lie. It’s a smear campaign. It’s an attempt to defame my character and make me a pariah. Here’s the truth:
The pediatric cancer research funds are being used for a greater, higher purpose—a really big parade for my birthday.
Let’s start with some background. It’s been a while since my last birthday. Nearly a year, in fact. In that time, I’ve given a lot of my attention to everyone else—but (beyond every newspaper, blog, app, and media channel), barely anyone seems to be paying attention to me. Now, you all know that I’m not one to celebrate myself beyond the occasional few million hats, posters, and flags with my name and face on them. But once in a while, I think I deserve a little bit of a party. That’s why I’m redirecting about $100 million in school lunches toward a big fun parade with beautiful big tanks.
Some people have asked, “Wouldn’t, like, a cake be enough?” That’s a great idea. We’ll have cake at the parade. So everybody lining up to watch can eat cake. We’ll let them eat cake while I drive a panzer down Pennsylvania Avenue.
Other people have asked, “Don’t you think throwing a giant expensive military parade on your birthday is the kind of thing an evil dictator does?” Those people are now on their way to prison.
Let me ask you this: You celebrate your birthday, don’t you? And do I come around asking why you’ve reallocated critical healthcare funding to pay for a city-wide shutdown that’s all about stroking your own ego? No, because you don’t have the power to do that, because you’re not a rogue president. So stop pretending you know what it feels like.
But I forgive you. In fact, I will forgive all of you—my dear friends around the country and also (especially) my enemies—if you attend my first-annual, soon-to-be-monthly-or-maybe-even-weekly military birthday parade. Children invited, just not any who are gonna complain about being hungry or whatever.
You’re reading Here’s Something, the satirical newsletter critics call “Extremely funny,” and “Wait, you were asking about the newsletter?” and “Oh, I thought you were asking about something else.”
Behind the writing
As regular readers know, I often write from an ersatz Trump point of view without attempting to mimic Trump’s speaking patterns—and certainly not his writing patterns. We get enough of his bizarre, fascistic lexicon on a day-to-day, even minute-to-minute basis. It’s nauseating. The way he speaks to encourage populist mob violence, autocracy, and genocide will be studied for decades by linguists, for however long studying is allowed. But the meaning and the message are evil and inhumane no matter the phrasing. Translating his thought process to other syntaxes feels, to me, like a way of unraveling his long and winding vitriol (and making fun of it, to boot).
There’s something else I think about, as it relates to his ilk’s constant attacks on learning—whether that’s research, higher ed, or killing public schools in favor of voucher programs that benefit only the most wealthy:
There are dozens of twenty dollar words in the above paragraphs, and that probably makes them seem intentionally inaccessible or “trying to be smarter.” That’s the whole point, though. These oligarchs want us to hate curiosity and assume that language has no power, because that’s the kind of citizenry that won’t speak out and act against totalitarianism.
Don’t let ‘em.
Brilliant