A Late Night Story About Naming Names
Now that we’re all in the living room, past Christmas and looking at the New Year coming, I’ll tell you a little story. I could have told it on Halloween. It’s been that kind of year.
Our President believes his name should be on almost everything. So he embarked on a programme to establish his legacy. You know, to honour him. He renamed the Gulf of Mexico to our nation’s name. That was the start. He appointed himself head of our National Theatre, which had been named after an assassinated President, and renamed it after himself. (The usual process was to name after death, as an honour.) Our President saw no value in posthumous naming. Why wait? There were protests from many artists about renaming the Theatre. The official response was: sue them for disrespect.
I thought that funny irony.
Our new President wants respect. Naming his hotels and casinos after himself. He was on a roll. He announced a new battleship, to be named after him. And he named official Centres and Departments after him. Drones covered the skies, spelling out his name among the stars. It was not enough. He then hit on his ultimate idea: put in every citizen’s home a gold toilet, named after him. He always used gold toilets and he thought, by golly, now every citizen would think of him.
On the one hand, the citizens did not give a crap.
On the other hand, as he’d hoped, when they sat on the gold toilets they did think of him. Most folks sold the gold toilets for cash.
I hope this story doesn’t bother you when you go to the potty or catch the latest news.