The Donald Etiquette

My brother once remarked that when the medical profession could offer cures for the vast majority of diseases it treated, then he would stop wearing his white lab coat when he saw patients or represented the profession in formal settings.


Donald at a Cabinet Meeting: drawing by   Pia Guerra

What he was saying, of course, is doctors wear white lab coats to project an image, a mystique some might call it, for the sake of those who want them to be more than simple human beings.  For the same reason, judges wear robes, priests vestments and generals wear stars on their hats. 

People want you to perform a role when you are an authority figure. They need that.

In the case of the President of the United States, people like calling him "Mr. President." Staff members who knew him when, old friends call the man they knew before he was President, "Mr. President," much as, I imagine, people call the Pope "Your holiness" even if they knew him when he was just a humble priest in South America.


Pia Guerra took artist license: he's much fatter

What Donald Trump has done is to shred that practice, either intentionally or simply as a part of his oppositional  personality.  So Presidents are not suppose to say the word, "Shit" publicly. As George Carlin said, that is one of those forbidden words which is never, under any circumstances, acceptable in polite society. People use the word, all the time, but everyone understands, you are not supposed to.

When Trump addresses a crowd and says, "We gonna bomb the shit out of ISIS, when I'm President," the crowd reacts joyously, because, among other things, he has admitted them backstage--he is saying we are such good friends, we can say these things to one another. Additionally, he is sticking a thumb in the eye of all those up tight, rule obeying rule laying down types the members of his crowd despise.

The other night, Mark Shields, responding to a question about Donald Trump's tweets about Mika and Joe of the "Morning Joe" show shook his head and clucked and despaired about how low "we" have fallen.


Pia Guerra captures the essence 

You have a man in the White House who just isn't behaving "correctly." He is not obeying norms. He is indifferent to precedent. His fans love him for it, of course, but Mark Shields has spent decades playing a game of droll jibes at the powers that be, and now he is out of the game. He doesn't understand the rules. 

So what are the rules? We can only infer the rules. Observe.  Nobody is quite sure what Mika Brzeznyksi said to provoke Donald but here's a guess:

One segment that may have led to Trump’s tweets came when Morning Joe‘s panel was discussing the recent story that President Trump had put up fake TIME Magazine covers of himself at his golf clubs. Mika Brzezinski said, “Nothing makes a man feel better than making a fake cover of a magazine about himself, lying every day and destroying the country.”
(from the blog, "Heavy.")

So, Donald watches this derisive comment and follows his rule, as his Press Secretary explains, "When he is attacked, he hits back twice as hard," which in Donald's case is, "Oh, so you are really fat and ugly and you had a face lift and are still bleeding and nobody watches your program anyway, so there."
This behavior causes Mark Shields to despair. 
Not me. I think this is just swell. 

Oh, Pia! You got it.

We now know the rules. 
1. Call him "Donald"

This whole Mr. President thing is out the window. 
We no longer have to say, well you are the President and I respect the office, if not the person, so I will talk to you the way I talked to my third grade teachers, with "Ma'm" and "sir." 

In the military, you salute the rank, not the man. That is thought to be important to discipline. But in civilian life, we don't need that sort of discipline. Who are we trying to impress? Just call the guy, "Donald." Not "Mr. President," just Donald. And not Mr. Trump. You use that sort of formality as a signal of respect. But now we have doctors who go by their first names. They call you by your first name and you respond accordingly. Same for Donald.
 In Court, you call the judge, "Your honor" if you know what's good for you, but you can call Donald Donald because he doesn't have any real power over you, the way a judge would.
Actually, I like "Donald Snowflake."

2. Point to his personal characteristics:

He is not just chubby. The man is morbidly obese. Call him Fat Donald.
He is a comb over, bald guy. Call him Fat Comb Over Donald.
Hey, Donald, what is that dead yellow thing you're wearing on your head? Canary head-dress? 
He does not express himself cogently. He says he has all the best words and he claims to have a high IQ. Call him Dumb Donald. Donald Dimwit. 

Ouch, Pia.

3. Hammer away at his most obvious policy weaknesses.
--There is no such thing as "clean coal." There is no dark light, no tall midget, no immaculate stain, no fast sloth. There is just dirty coal, sometimes scrubbed and treated but never clean.
--Those factory jobs are not coming back.  The coal mining jobs are not coming back, not in any real numbers. The days of coal mining and assembly line work are going the way of icemen hauling ice on horse drawn carts, of coach men driving a team of horses, of outhouses, of lamp lighters on city streets. 

4. Refer to him without naming him, but unmistakably: 
The infant in the White House.
The thumbsucker who signs executive orders.
The phony tough guy who picks on immigrant kids and thinks he's beaten up a terrorist.

Who needs a White House Photographer when we've got Pia?

5. And do not react to his Tweets or taunts by expressing hurt or indignation. Do not claim to be offended on behalf of women or short people or any other group.
React by laughing. "Oh, that dimwit again. Donald Dimwit throwing his snowflake punches. The guy's got no class. He may be rich. He may be getting richer. But he's clearly got more money than brains."

And all like that. 
But most of all, read whatever Pia Guerra posts.