Beefcakes and Cheesecakes: Two Reasons to Vote Today

This midterm is one for political scientists and historians to decipher and analyze for decades to come.  Weird is good start point.

Never could I imagine a sitting president talking about men assess in such detail and length at election campaign rallies. Never.  Especially, at populist conservative political rallies where testosterone laden tropes of male heterosexual virility reigns supreme, where homosexuality is mocked and derided.  But then there was Trump giving point-by-point descriptions of men’s assess and fixating, no pixelating, on athletic men’s physical attributes at multiple rallies.  It’s Trump’s buttocks paradox.

Trump and the Republican’s final pitch to the voters was a jumbled message of beefcake politics and raw racism and bigotry, mostly because they failed to govern; failed to tame inflation; failed to make America more affordable; and failed to not start a forever war.

Then there were Trump’s gaffes, word mash ups, and spontaneous uncontrolled utterances of non-purposeful sounds while giving speeches at these same rallies.  Unlike media coverage of President Biden’s obvious cognitive decline, which was brutal and continuous, especially by right wing outlets like Fox News, Trump’s observable cognitive deterioration was largely elided in coverage by major news outlets.  Trump’s cognitive debility is far worse than Biden’s in my opinion, yet, out of fear of lawsuits or FCC harassment, I think the major TV networks, chose to omit serious coverage of Trump’s mental health.

Then there was the Cheesecake factory incident when President Obama joked that Trump’s gold centric renovations of the White House was like “Saddam Hussein opened a Cheesecake Factory.” I have been to some of Hussein’s palaces in Baghdad, and I can tell you Obama was spot on.

The White House was never meant to be the crib of a playboy dictator, pretentiously decked out in golden trim and wall ornaments, more King Louis and Ottoman Sultan, than quotidian Americana.   Of course, Trump and the White House had no objection to the Trump-Hussein autocrat dictator comparison, choosing instead to turn Obama’s insightful and hilarious joke into a culture war issue.

Trump’s rebuttal to Obama’s joke showed how just how much it got under his skin.  Trump did his racist interior decorator shtick, claiming that Obama ‘was not a smart guy’ and saying that “Guys like Obama don’t see it.  You don’t see the dirt. He doesn’t see filth.  He doesn’t see broken ornaments on a building.”  It is hardly surprising that Trump choose to juxtapose Obama to dirt and filth.  Racism, misogyny, and bullying are his go to retorts to people of color and women.

Enough of men’s asses, beefcakes, and cheesecakes. The polls close in several hours.  There is still time to get out and vote.  Make your voice heard.  Don’t get sucked into the buttock paradox vortex and sit this one out.  Go out and vote.  This election is for America’s posterity (or is that posterior).