Apparently Donald Trump did not have his pants on backward when he addressed North Carolina Republicans Saturday.
Photos made it on line after the event that purported to show Trump with his pants bunched weirdly in the front and without a visible zipper. The photos became so popular they trended on Twitter as #TrumpPants, and there were all sorts of different speculations ranging from dementia to adult diapers.
It turns out it was a faked photo. In the real one, Trump was his usual self.
His pants still don’t appear to be well-pressed, but they’re pretty clearly not backward.
That doesn’t rule out one possibility, such as when a reporter back in the ’90s asked Bob Dole whether he wore boxers or briefs and got back a one-word answer.
“Depends.”
Actually, the Dole quote above might be fantasy as well, but it does make a point that if you’re running for president or even if you are or have been president, once folks start laughing at you, you’re pretty well finished.
Once Chevy Chase was mocking President Ford on “SNL,” Ford was always going to be thought of as a bungler who didn’t control his own body. His successor Jimmy Carter didn’t have much better luck when he collapsed while jogging or when he said his rowboat was attacked by a killer rabbit.
Ronald Reagan did the best at sloughing off mistakes, at least in part because he had a self-deprecating sense of humor.
There have been two presidents in my lifetime who basically have had no sense of humor, self-deprecating or otherwise — Richard Nixon and the guy who wore his pants backward.
They weren’t backward, Mike.
Hey, when the legend becomes fact, print the legend.
No one takes himself more seriously than Donald Trump. And if those pants were bunched in such a way that a man who will be 75 next week felt he needed some protection, it’s certainly believable.
Maybe this is only the beginning.
When it comes to battling Trump and his Trumpanzees, laughter is definitely the best weapon.