According to my inspired compatriot Kathy Shaidle, Donald Trump is President Sinatra:
Here are two paradigmatic New Yorkers who brawled their way to the top; tabloid liaisons here, a trio of devoted children there; men of eye-watering generosity (you've heard the "we've paid off your mortgage" story by now) and spleen (the name of Sinatra's record company, Reprise, was pronounced with a long "i," as in "reprisal").
Note, too, the almost belligerent philo-Semitism: In 1948, as a favor to a stranger he met in a bar, Sinatra couriered a million dollars cash to a ship full of arms earmarked for Israel, docked at a New York pier; Trump, dead set on making Mar-a-Lago nonrestricted, taunted Palm Beach's town council by sending them copies of Guess Who's Coming to Dinner...
[Sinatra would] also recognize Trump as another swaggering, short-fused, thin-skinned alpha, worthy of his fealty, and who'd be more loyal than John F., too.
Sinatra's not around, alas.
Or is he?
Who needs a Sinatra to sing, spectacular as that would be, when we've got one taking the Oath of frickin' Office?
On the other hand, according to Bruce Bawer ...and, incidentally, Bruce and I once shared a stage with Frank's opening act, the great Tom Dreesen... anyway, according to Bruce Bawer, Barack Obama is President Dino:
That "cool" factor seduced a lot of voters in 2008. But over the years it has seemed increasingly clear that that "cool" factor was a function of his indifference. I was thinking about this the other day and it suddenly occurred to me whom he reminded me of : Dean Martin.
Yes, Dean Martin. Humor me here. Martin was cool, too. Audiences loved his laid-back style: he never seemed to be trying too hard. As Bob Greene wrote in 2012, "Frank Sinatra may have liked the image of being Chairman of the Board, but the core of Martin's enduring allure is that not only did he not want to be chairman, he didn't even want to serve on the board: It would mean that he would be cooped up in some boardroom for meetings when he'd rather be out playing golf." Hey, whom does that remind you of? Writing about Martin this year, jazz critic Ted Gioia noted that "There's a term in Italian for this kind of attitude: menefreghismo, a couldn't-care-less manner that brings with it overtones of extreme macho coolness and total disregard for all consequences." Ahem.
So Trump is Frank and Obama is Dean. I'm an old Fleet Street hand, and I'm fully aware it takes three to make a trend. So c'mon:
Bernie Sanders is Sammy Davis Jr? They're both Jews. Like Sam, Bernie is the Candy Man, luring millions of impressionable children with promises of a rainbow utopia:
Who can take tomorrow
Dip it in a dream
Separate the sorrow
And collect up all the cream?The Sandy Man
(The Sandy Man)
The Sandy Man can
'Cause he mixes it with love and makes the world taste good...
Er, okay. How about Ted Cruz is Peter Lawford? They're both British subjects who married into powerful American dynasties (Fitzgerald Kennedys, Goldman Sachs). They both had relatives involved in the Kennedy assassination...
No? Well, how about Marco Rubio is Joey Bishop? The lovable shnook with the great line in Vegas shtick: "Hey, have you seen Donald's hands? You know what they say: Small hands, small bird, pally..."
Okay. Hillary Clinton is Angie Dickinson. Like Angie, Hillary is a stand-up broad. Well, except for the standing-up part...
~Dispatches from Neverland: Eminent national-security Republicans, after declaring themselves #NeverTrump and denouncing him as "a danger to the nation", are apparently puzzled as to why they haven't been offered jobs in his administration. They're befuddled and bewildered. Why, it's almost like he took their principled stand seriously!
As Trump would say: Sad! You'd think "experts" on such internecine tribal sinkholes as Iraq, Afghanistan, Yemen, etc, would have a better understanding that, when it comes to switching sides, you never want to leave it too late.
~On last night's Mark Steyn Show, we discussed a small manifestation of our incremental surrender - the Tweet by a Canadian cabinet minister that she is "fascinated" by Sharia. But these days who isn't? At Indiana's New Albany-Floyd County school district, they're also fascinated:
Parents in Southern Indiana are upset by a middle school worksheet's portrayal of "Sharia law," which they say casts the Islamic code in a positive light while ignoring human rights violations and the oppression of women...
"I'm just not OK with my daughter – or any child that age – leaving class with the understanding that anything about Sharia law is OK..."
"That document by itself, it's almost propaganda," said Jon Baker, whose daughter also received the worksheet. "If you read that, you would think everything's wonderful in that world."
Of course. That's the purpose of it. Soon we'll have advanced to the next stage, which many European schools are already at: You can't teach the Crusades or the Holocaust, because they're too "controversial", but the joys of Sharia are something we can all agree on.
If you missed The Mark Steyn Show, you can catch it at your leisure here. Michele Bachmann previews the incoming Trump Administration, I take a look at who's who in the celeb-Dem boycotts, there's a stroll down memory lane with some inaugural disasters from the past couple of centuries, and, for Canuck and Commonwealth viewers, we play a round of "Know Your Ensigns". More details here.
