The 2016 Presidential election has been nothing short of absurd, and absurd may even be on the humane side. For starters, the GOP nomination started out with 12 candidates at the beginning of the primaries—no, your eyes did not deceive you, I did say 12. The other thing, or shall I say person, that makes this year’s election even more bizarre is a man by the name of Donald Trump. All of this Trump-induced chaos has led to many comical incidents, and I am here to share with you, the lucky reader, my favorite “Trumpisms” thus far.
Trump said to his supporters during one of his rallies that he “could stand in the middle of 5th Avenue and shoot somebody and I wouldn’t lose voters.” Wait, what? Did he actually say that? Does he realize what he just said? Yes, yes and well, I’m not totally sure. The scary thing is, he’s right—he probably wouldn’t lose voters. I used to burst into laughter at the hilarity of these types of statements months ago because I thought eventually, people would wake up and recognize the fact that this guy is insane; but my loud laughs have shifted to very nervous halflaughs, like the kind of weird laughs you let out when your new girlfriend’s parents ask you a really uncomfortable question.
Any Republican running for president knows the importance of winning the majority of the evangelical vote. A poll that came out about a month ago on politico.com showed Trump having 37 percent of the white evangelical Republican vote, and he was leaps and bounds ahead of second place Ted Cruz, who garnered 20 percent.
This past January, in hopes of appealing to the evangelical populace, Trump spoke at Liberty University—the biggest Christian college in the U.S. At one point during his speech, he said this phrase: “Two Corinthians, 3:17, that’s the whole ballgame.” Two Corinthians. I repeat: Two Corinthians. Not Second Corinthians—Two Corinthians (last time, I apologize). Now, I am no Biblical scholar, but come on, man. Is it that hard to know how to pronounce one of the most widely recognized books in the Bible? Also, equally funny, the verse reads, “Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty.” Oh, what a handy verse to choose, sir. And what is the whole ballgame? I am so confused.
Finally, though not as recent and seemingly unrelated to his presidential run (but still definitely the most weird thing that he could possibly say), let us not forget that in 2006, Mr. Trump said in an interview with ABC talk show The View that “if Ivanka weren’t my daughter, perhaps, I would be dating her.” There are so many emojis I wish I could use right now. Maybe the straight-faced emoji, maybe the wide-mouth emoji or maybe even the emoji with no face, because I have no idea if I even have a face or expression to respond to that statement with. Like, why? Even though he was probably and hopefully joking (insert praying emoji), why would someone ever say that?
Though I would feel much more comfortable if I was watching him on a stage performing stand up comedy with this same material he has been using for the last year, I still hold some hope that the people of America will splash some water on their faces, brush their teeth, do some other normal morning stuff and wake up. And remember—we are gonna build a wall, and it’s gonna be a great wall.
Ethan is a junior english major from Crawfordsville, Indiana.