After 4th of July Stunt, Trump Deserves a True Leader's Name

AROUND THE BLOCK

I learned today...Croatian Special Edition

I learned today, courtesy of the Washington Post, that President Trump has taken charge of the nation’s premier Fourth of July celebration in Washington, Fireworks on the Mall, intending to take a “starring role” in the event by addressing the nation from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial.

According to the Post, Trump’s role has the potential to turn what has long been a nonpartisan celebration of the nation’s founding into another version of a Trump campaign rally. 

The Post goes on to say “the revised Independence Day celebration is the culmination of two years of attempts by Trump to create a major patriotic event centered on him and his supporters, including failed efforts to mount a military parade modeled on the Bastille Day celebration in France.”

I’m writing today’s Around the Block while on a trip to Croatia; I haven’t heard a lot of “Trump love” from the folks I’ve been meeting here. This latest stunt will most probably harden the local opinions of our “leader.” (On a side note, I did take a one-day trip across the border to Slovenia, the native home of Melania Trump. I asked our tour guide if the Slovenian people would like to take Melania back. “Maybe, but only if he doesn’t come with her.”

I had a wonderful lunch in Zadar, a beautiful Dalmatian Coast city once run by Mussolini and his Italian fascists. Because of its strategic importance, Zadar was so heavily bombed by the allies, it’s known as the “Dresden of the Adriatic..” 

The restaurant had a charming “Art Deco” vibe and a TV over the bar screening Charles Chaplin movies. During lunch the Great Dictator was playing – Chaplin’s bitingly satirical condemnation of Hitler, Mussolini, fascism, antisemitism, and the Nazis.

History, satire and current events converged for me at this lovely restaurant. Watching Chaplin skewering Hitler in what once was Mussolini’s Croatia, reading about our self-described “favorite president’s” latest self-aggrandizing excess, I couldn’t help but think, what was missing? 

An appropriate dictator’s “honorific.” 

If Hitler was “der Führer” and Mussolini was Il Duce, what is Trump? What would be the best, most telegraphic description of our own not-so-great leader?

Given the lip pursing, the arm folding body language, the over-the-top gesticulations, the ridiculous self-importance, there really is only one choice:

IL DOUCHEBAG

Let's hope a latter-day Chaplin will be bringing Il Douchebag the Movie to a theater near you this fall.