Seussical: The Presidency
If you want to know why people in America shoot so much heroin, re-watch Pres.
Donald J. Trump’s State of the
Union address.
Oh, sure, we had a drug problem long before Trump became president, but Trump is the only president whose public mutterings make me think about catching a heroin habit just to turn down the sound a little.
Bear in mind, I have no history of drug abuse, and I went to high school in the ‘70s. Only Trump could make my veins itch for the needle.
Heroin addicts of often say the drug makes them feel like they’re drowsy, wrapped in a warm blanket, past all care, living in that beautiful moment just before you fall asleep after a hard day’s work.
Of course, many of them haven’t worked in a while, don’t own a blanket and are sleeping on the floor of a drug house. But you get the point.
I don’t listen to the State of the Union address, no matter whose turn it is to be president. I wait until I can get a copy of the damn thing, and then I read it to myself. I did that with Trump’s most recent verbal evacuation. Judging from what I read, if I’d watched it live, I would have overdosed by now.
“If there is going to be peace and legislation, there cannot be war and investigation,” said the nation’s chief reason to shoot smack.
And I came away with that, just the way I still remember the lyrics to bad disco songs from my high school years. I keep getting older, but the lyrics to “Ring My Bell” aren’t leaving me anytime soon.
It’s an amazing phrase, containing all the wisdom of a tweet, and it rhymes.
It’s the politics of Dr. Seuss (although Seuss was kind of a lefty.) Even the name “Trump” sounds a little Seuss-ical, although most of the word that rhyme with “Trump” are unfortunate, particularly in a children’s book.
No matter! Let other national leaders content themselves with the alliterative sentence, the sonorous call to action, the memorable phrase. This guy rhymes.
Still, there’s something to agree with in this bit of poetic wisdom. You cannot have peace when you’re at war, because war is not peaceful, and peace is not warlike. Completely opposite things, war and peace. If they weren’t two completely different things, that Russian guy would have called his novel, “War and Peace, Like There’s a Difference.”
Lotta wisdom in those Russians. Ask Trump. They can put things in a nutshell, the Russians. “War and Peace.” It’s short and it says it all, but it doesn’t rhyme. If the guy who wrote it couldn’t make it rhyme, maybe he wasn’t such a good writer. So sad.
I’m less sure about legislation and investigation. The last president to believe that was Richard Nixon, who vanished into the smoke of history, and who was so universally reviled that he had to be pardoned so we could forget about him faster.
Not so Trump. No one will pardon him at the end, and they may not be able to if he becomes president for life, hickory dickory dock, just like Papa Doc.
I’m going to go lie down on the couch now, maybe fold my hands over my stomach and wait for that good, drowsy, not-caring feeling that comes just before sleep.
To find out more about Marc Munroe Dion, and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit www.creators.com. Dion’s latest book, a creation of non-rhyming, yet lyrical columns about the presidency of Donald J. Trump, is available in paperback from Amazon.com, and for Kindle, Nook, ibooks and Googleplay.