I don’t know what the physical temperature was in the National Cathedral but the psychic temperature was enough to make popsicles. The Trumps strolled in where they were not wanted but merely tolerated. The invitations to passing heads of state’s funerals are complicated in this Era of Trump. Whereas before the president’s club was a bi-partisan and exclusive conclave, it was fundamentally inclusive, where all tribalism was laid to rest and mutual respect and support dominated. To that happy norm the brutally crass Donald Trump has created a schism.
Trump was pointedly not invited to Barbara Bush’s funeral nor John McCain’s. He was tolerated at H.W.’s funeral and he was tolerated at today’s memorial for Jimmy Carter. Melania, of course, couldn’t just blend respectfully into the background and let all attention be on the bereaved. No, she had to do her Bizarro World collar on top of what look like priest’s robes because when you’re totally insecure you have to send up a flare of some sort that you’re there and all eyes should be upon you. At least she was persuaded to wear black, unlike her rebellion against the norm at Rosalynn Carter’s service. Be glad for small favors.
— Rob (@scruffer) January 9, 2025
Melania always has to draw eyeballs to herself even when protocol is to fit into the background. So she merits the scorn she receives. I don’t feel sorry for her. If there is one thing you can predict where Melania is concerned it is that she always will wear some loud color or some strange sleeve, or something asymetrical — or now a weird collar — because she simply cannot be in public unless she’s doing something to grab eyeballs. The woman is living clickbait.
And Melania’s otherwordly pope costume was the least of it. Hubby got slammed right and left by people who wanted nothing to do with him. These are memorable moments, because it’s not the Democrats telling him to phuque off, it’s the old guard Republicans, notably Karen Pence and George W. Bush.
LOTS OF MATERIAL SO FAR AT JIMMY CARTER'S FUNERAL:
– Trump shakes hands with Mike Pence.
– Obama does not shake Trump or Melania's hand – but shakes everyone else's hands.
– Bush walks right past the Trump's, then slaps Obama in the stomach and shakes hands with everyone else.
-… pic.twitter.com/Nx5vZ77Hqb— Breaking911 (@Breaking911) January 9, 2025
Once again America is embarrassed. Donald and Melania are a reality TV boor and a porn model, respectively, and they don’t even bother to attempt to blend in with decent people on solemn occasions. Being clashing iconoclasts is the essence of who they are.
The old school Republicans have clearly had enough. I give all credit to Mother Pence, to be honest. At least she wasn’t hypocrite to even pretend that she wanted anything to do with Trump after he put her husband, herself and one of their daughters in peril for their very lives four years and three days ago during the Capitol Riot.
But it was impossible to forget for a moment that the solemn event that brought this disparate audience together was occurring just 11 days before the re-inauguration of Donald Trump. The incoming president differs in so many respects from Jimmy Carter, and his return to power is a living repudiation of so much of what Carter believed in.
In his own view, Carter’s inveterate truthfulness was his most important personal virtue; “I’ll never lie to you,” he often said when running for president in a country anguished by Tricky Dick Nixon’s administration. Whether or not Carter was able to live up to this lofty commitment to honesty, it contrasts dramatically with Trump’s extremely flexible attitude toward facts and refusal to take personal responsibility for the consequences of his sins (on one infamous occasion, he could not come up with a single thing he had ever done that required divine forgiveness).
This is how far we have fallen in the world. Carter’s funeral reflected many of our strengths and core values as a nation and it also shined a spotlight on how horribly divided and at each other’s throats that we are. And most of all, tragically, the funeral underscored the gross inferiority of the man who was the 45th president and will soon be the 47th president. America is in for a horror show.
no class.
Melanoma looks like they yanked her out of the spa in her bathrobe. I’ve never seen her hair look so limp. Or maybe she couldn’t be bothered to glam up for this occasion. No class is putting it mildly!
Natasha looks rode hard and put up wet. She also looks like she rather be kidnapped by the Hells Angels than be dragging around a 300 lb bag of shit, and being scorned by even the Republicans. I wonder if anyone has checked her internet searches under: How to rid oneself of a husband without going to jail? Also maybe which countries would welcome her with open arms and not send her back. Hey Natasha…you have your choice of cold weather,(Canada), or warm weather,(Mexico). I hear antifreeze in mountain dew works quite nicely.
Melania absolutely does not want to be there, if for no other reason than it’s the year’s anniversary of her mother’s death. She may have wanted to observe that occasion as some people do. But she couldn’t get out of the funeral so she decided to make a circus side show out of it.
Any lip readers about?
Demonstrates what a spineless worm Mike Pence is.
Dude, the guy wanted you killed.
At least we know who has the balls in the Pence family.
Mike’s are probably in Mother’s purse.
I have no doubt that Karen Pence is the strength and the moral compass in that family.