Donald Trump must have forgiven me. Considering how badly our relationship started — and I’ll get to that in a moment — I don’t know how else to explain being on his mailing lists.
All four of them.
Save America; Donald J. Trump; Donald Trump Jr.; and because this really is the silly season in America, Kimberly Guilfoyle.
Why there are four I’m unable to say, as they are all designed, with a shout-out to Sacha Baron Cohen, to Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Trump.
Thing is, I can’t bring myself to unsubscribe from any of them, because, as we know, you keep your friends close, but your wanna-be despots, their sons, and their sons’ girlfriends closer.
The emails, and they come multiple times a day, especially, it seems, when the Big Guy can’t sleep, are an interchangeable mix of shameless fundraising, warmed-over demagoguery, and breathless neediness and chutzpah — everything from arbitrary fundraising targets, to assertions that hydroxychloroquine works, to designating COVID-19 as the “China Virus” that came from a Chinese lab. Back in December, Jr. asked me to sign an Official Trump Christmas card … for Donald Trump. Because he, Jr., thought it would be a touching gesture for his father’s followers to show his father how much his father was loved by those same followers.
Jr. was going to surprise him with the card and “knew” I wanted to be on it. It was the same month the old man wrote and said that for a $45 contribution — get it? — I could receive an Official Trump Membership Card, which is like a secret decoder ring, only not as valuable.
Just because this (and those who treat these missives as gospel) are easily mockable doesn’t mean it and they shouldn’t be mocked. If the nation is crumbling — and convince me I’m wrong — let’s go out with a sneer. Reading these emails, and thinking about those to whom they’re actually directed, makes me conclude nobody respects the intelligence and discernment of Trump followers less than Donald Trump himself. Four, five times a day he badgers them, seeking contributions and offering in exchange highball glasses, ornaments, hats, chances to win admission (to free campaign events), and possible photo-ops, as well as early notifications of his future BIG announcements.
There are also testimonials from and endorsements of sycophants, OAN links, and reminders that Joe Biden is a sleepy socialist who raised a crooked son, stole the election, and destroyed the America that Trump single-handedly built in four years.
The comical chumminess used to solicit these contributions would embarrass mere mortals.
But not those in the Trump Machine.
On Jan. 13, I received the following:
Claim the only official 10X-Impact from President Trump
Barry,
WHY haven’t you claimed your TRUMP CASH BLITZ DAY 10X-IMPACT from President Trump? YOU have always been a TOP supporter, and with his FIRST RALLY of the year just right around the corner, we thought we could count on you. Were we wrong?
In a word: yep.
In 2013, when Donald Trump was toying with the idea of running for president — and when wasn’t that the case? — I wrote an online guest blog for Esquire titled “Would God Be So Good?” in which I opined how fortunate Democrats would be if the GOP actually lost its collective marbles (and souls) and handed Trump the nomination.
Can I call ’em or what?
In the column, I quoted verbatim a few of Trump’s policy positions.
ON OPEC: “We have nobody in Washington that sits back and said, ‘You’re not going to raise that f***ing price.’ “
ON TAXING CHINESE GOODS: “Listen, you motherf***ers, we’re going to tax you 25 percent.”
ON IRAQ: “We build a school, we build a road, they blow up the school, we build another school, we build another road, they blow them up, we build again, in the meantime we can’t get a f***ing school in Brooklyn.”
Man has a f***ing way with words, doesn’t he?
Seventy-four million voters, though, can’t be wrong.
Or maybe they can.
Anyway, the day after the column came out, the blog’s editor wrote to me to say that Trump had called Esquire’s then-executive editor, David Granger, and told him to fire me. Why would a silly little online column bother a man like Donald Trump? Did Trump really have people on staff who put his name in a Google search every morning to see what came up?
You have to ask?
“What did Granger say?” I asked
“Tell Barry,” my editor said that Granger told him, “it was a 45-minute call I will enjoy forever.”
Getting Trump’s emails isn’t nearly as enjoyable.
Barry Friedman is a satirist in Tulsa, Okla., and a lot of people are saying he is doing some very good work there. He is author of at least four books, including “Road Comic,” “Funny You Should Mention It,” “Four Days and a Year Later” and “The Joke Was On Me: A Comedian’s Memoir.” See barrysfriedman.com.
From The Progressive Populist, February 15, 2022
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