GEORGE CARLIN 4 PRESIDENT

Toxic Trump image by Mauricio Restrepo. Used by permission

Parental guidance advised

Presumptive President-elect Donald J. Trump rattled the media slats a few days ago by using a dubious Yiddishism to describe an election outcome in Hillary Clinton’s past (See schlonged in the OED).

Alarm bells were set off in the cornfields and caucus sites in Iowa. The scarecrows were saying, “The Yiddish are coming, the Yiddish are coming.”

Actually, schlonged is an Anglo-Saxon word, rarely used in political context. You may not know exactly what it means, except if you were ever schlonged you’re happy to be alive. (In a forthcoming monograph in the Journal of Irreproducible Results, I will have more to say about the etymology of the word).

It was not the first time that DJT has boldly gone where no man has gone before in a presidential nomination race. He broke the language barrier the previous week outlining in greater detail than usual his policy for dealing with the ISIS threat.

As he explained in Colorado and on cable network news channels, he would bomb the Carlin out of them.

The word he actually used was one of the seven dirty words listed by wordsmith and comedian George Carlin in his 1972 dictum on the seven words that cannot be used on TV and radio, whatever the first amendment proclaims.

For the record the other six are:

Carlin, carlin, carlin, carlin, carlin, and carlin-er.

I apologize for still not being able to describe the banned words in more descriptive language. For 35 years writing about TV and radio for Newsday— a newspaper so pure and mindful of offending the sensibility of its Long Island readers, who hear such words as rarely as Esperanto— I was not allowed to use the Carlins, staples of so-called mature programming. The questionable taste editor even banned the common industry term “T & A,” despite my explaining in the biz it meant “Talent & Artistry.”

As Trump was scaring the Carlin out of ISIS – one of the ISIS fighters immediately asked for asylum at the nearest U.S. embassy, I heard –-management at my favorite cable network of record (MSNBC) bleeped the word still deemed too offensive for cable viewers’ ears.

In the modern age, the bleep sound itself became an obscenity. Young minds growing up with the bleep considered it ipso facto a dirty word, varying from house to house in meaning, depending on words used at the dinner table or on the streets. It meant god knows what? After three quarters of a century as the lingua franca for (fill in your favorite obscenity), the bleep sound could turn a TV viewer into a sex maniac.

In my years of railing against the practice of bleeping, I advocated using a variety of other obfuscating sounds to make it more of a warning. Personally, I favored a locomotive whistle, because I am a train buff. Others might prefer a more spiritual sound such as the Mormon Tabernacle Choir singing “Nearer, My God, to Thee.”

But I digress. Not only is Space Commander Trump the most misogynist, xenophobic, racist, presidential candidate, but also as the pioneer language crusader— and not having been struck speechless using that first Carlin word by the great god Mammon who monitors the airwaves— DJT is now free to utilize other Carlinisms.

Unthinkable, you say? There is no Carlin reason why he can’t.

More likely he will boldly go where no man has gone before in using other lexographic freedoms to enrich his derogatory Hillary rants. His target accused him last week of “having a penchant for sexism.’

“Me a sexist? I can hear him being outraged. “I love woman. I’ve had three wives already. All nice people. I love them, even though I threw them out. I’m a good guy for giving them a chance of fulfilling themselves career- wise by using the Trump brand. And I didn’t even charge them for leasing the name.”

A member of the Clinton Royal household would make an inviting target. What could he possibly find to say about Prince Bill? A great president, foundation official, public speaker, he had one weakness. He suffers from an Achilles penis.

Given that DJT is a tower of rectitude and a patriot, he can be expected to invoke the names of the Molly Pitchers who served their potential president, the Gennifer Flowers, Paula Jones and others space limitation require they go unsung here.

We can expect the language-unimpaired candidate to relive the glory days of the first Clinton administrations, the thongs, cigars, the blue dress and other sacred iconic moments in governance.

If you’ve ever wondered about the meaning of “I didn’t have sex with that woman,” Space Commander Trump is now free to fill in the details on nation-wide TV.

And the man who is the only candidate who is obscenely asking us to vote for him because he is rich wont be hampered by the fact-barrier, the bane of political disputation, as practiced by Republican candidates like Doc Carson. As DJT proved during the birther crisis, true facts were no impediment. If anything, the presentation of true facts these days by fact-checkers is proof the media is out to get them.

By the time President-elect Trump, as the polls say, finishes addressing conduct in the Royal household, the public will be wondering what the First Husband will be doing in the corridors of power outside the Oval Office when the first women President is away at a climate-changing summit.

Trump’s remaining rivals can be expected to fight to demonstrate who can be more frank in the use of dirty, filthy, smutty language. Call me a prude, but the avant- garde cable network news should be required to post a PARENTAL DISCRETION ADVISED warning.

And a Merry New Year’s to all my readers.

30

--
Marvin Kitman
December 31, 2015