The Tony’s and Donald Trump

Last night were the Tony Awards, the one night a year that I can revel in all things theater and satisfy my inner performing arts geek. Last night’s broadcast featured Sara Bareilles and Josh Groban as hosts. They were funny, relatable, and of course, their singing was phenomenal. Not that I’m a massive fan of them both or anything, so that opinion is strictly unbiased, lol. The night was magical, as most Tony Awards are, I love seeing performances from the nominated shows. It’s the only time I get to see the original Broadway casts of the popular shows. My favorite last night was from “Mean Girls,” I love the original movie and the show looks hilarious. My second favorite thing was the performance by members of the Drama Department from the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Florida. To see those students performing on the Tony stage so soon after surviving their horrific school shooting was so inspiring. As their teacher said those kids have found a safe haven and a way to express themselves through music and the performing arts. Overall the evening was a colorful display of inspiration, diversity, and just plain fun.

Then Robert De Niro came on the stage and said defiantly, “Fuck, Trump!” I cringed. The magic spell the evening had cast on me had been broken. The real world came storming back in and I didn’t want it to. Why did he have to choose that forum to say that? I wondered how many other people who were there and watching at home felt the same way. I feel like the standing ovation he received immediately after saying that was more of a knee-jerk reaction by the audience. That a few had stood up so others felt pressured to do the same. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not one of the people who feel like people in the entertainment industry shouldn’t speak out about politics and other issues. Everyone has a right to their opinion. I just wish Mr. De Niro hadn’t chosen that moment to steal the spotlight and the magic of the evening.

Political Insults of the Past

Reading and hearing about US President Donald Trump’s almost daily insults of others got me wondering his schoolyard bullying tactics were something new or if political insults have always leaned more towards the childish. Turns out, in the past, political insults could really be quite poetic and eloquent. Below are a few gems that I mined from the Internet.

 

“Garfield has shown that he is not possessed of the backbone of an angleworm.”
– Ulysses S. Grant (1822-85), 18th American president, on James A. Garfield   (1831-81), 20th American president

“He is a self-made man and worships his creator.”
– attorney John Bright on Benjamin Disraeli (1804-81)

He occasionally stumbled over the truth, but hastily picked himself up and hurried on as if nothing had happened.”
                          – Winston Churchill on Stanley Baldwin (1867-1947)

He slept more than any other president, whether by day or night. Nero fiddled, but Coolidge only snored.”
– H. L. Mencken (1880-1956) on Calvin Coolidge (1872-1933)

“[His ideas of popular sovereignty are] as thin as the homeopathic soup that was made by boiling the shadow of a pigeon that had starved to death.”

– Abraham Lincoln, on his political rival Senator Stephen Douglas.

“Take from him his sophisms, futilities, and incomprehesibilities and what remains? His foggy mind.”                                                                                                                                                                        -Thomas Jefferson, aiming high at Plato.

“McKinley has a chocolate eclair backbone.”

-Theodore Roosevelt on his predecessor William McKinley.

““That Washington is not a scholar is certain. That he is too illiterate, unlearned, unread for his station is equally beyond dispute.”

– John Adams on George Washington

“His soul is poisoned with ambition.”

– John Adams on Thomas Jefferson

 “He can’t help it. He was born with a silver foot in his mouth.”

– Former Texas Gov. Ann Richards on misstatements made by George Bush, Sr.

“A conservative is a man with two perfectly good legs who, however, has never learned how to walk forward.” 

-President Franklin D. Roosevelt

 

Ahhhh, the good old days.  I would love to see this kind of writing in today’s political environment, it would be hilarious.