I don’t get to say this often, but President Donald Trump has a great idea. He should rename the Strait of Hormuz after himself.
He floated the plan earlier this month, only to backtrack by saying “it was just thrown out there.” But he renewed the matter at last week’s Republican midterm convention. “We should call it the Trump Strait,” he said. “I should get something out of it.”
The strait is long overdue for a refresh, having had the same, boring name since the time of Alexander the Great, if not earlier. Maybe it can also be relined like the Reflecting Pool, or better yet, like the White House driveway, with the Highest Grade White Granite at a strength of 35,000 pounds per square inch and rated 1 Million Years, PLUS!
Formally, it might be better as the Donald J. Trump Strait of Hormuz, or the Strait of Donald J. Trump. But, for headline purposes, I like the sound of the shorthand:
Iran has stranglehold over Trump Strait
Oil hits $110 a barrel as Trump Strait shuts down
Trump Strait becomes choke point for world
The Strait of Hormuz is now a symbol — of high gas prices, international chaos, lost U.S. prestige and a botched war. In short, we’re in dire straits because of Trump’s Strait. So let’s call a spade a spade.
And let’s not stop there. During the Depression, people named shanty towns “Hoovervilles” in (dis)honor of Herbert Hoover. Now we’re all living in Trumptown — where prices are rising, health coverage is vanishing, government is failing and our president is alternating between wanton cruelty and self-enrichment.
The Donald J. Trump Iran War, and related Pentagon mismanagement, has left the mighty U.S. military depleted of weapons and its best officers — while millions of Americans are straining to afford groceries because of an inflationary spiral.
The Donald J. Trump Trade War has caused dairy, grain and livestock farmers to lose their Canadian market. Already reeling from the Trump Tariffs, farmers are expected to lose $31 billion this year and $32 billion next year.
Americans can’t get a mortgage for less than 7% on average — and it will likely be even higher if the Fed is forced to hike rates today. Let’s call it The Donald J. Trump Homeownership Crisis.
Are you among the more than 7 million Americans who lost health coverage over the last year? Or are you among the lucky ones who still have private coverage but are facing double-digit increases for it? Either way, enjoy your Trump Care.
Fifty-seven people have died in ICE detention centers — henceforth to be renamed the Donald J. Trump Gulags. The gutting of the CDC, the FDA and the USDA has contributed to the Trump Cyclospora Outbreak, the Trump Screwworm Outbreak and the Trump Measles Outbreak.
On Tuesday, the Senate Judiciary Committee questioned FBI Director Kash Patel about the lower standards the agency adopted to fill vacancies that the Trump administration caused by driving out talented agents. Turns out the FBI will no longer automatically disqualify applicants who stole from an employer, solicited sex or engaged in bestiality.
“Why would you even get into bestiality?” Sen. John Kennedy (R-Louisiana) wanted to know. “If Joe participated in bestiality, not as the animal but as the human, don’t you think he ought to be disqualified?”
We’ll call it the Donald J. Trump Bestiality Waiver.
Also this week, Trump repeatedly dismissed as a “hoax” the frantic warnings of AI executives that, without regulation, their products could launch biological or nuclear warfare. The Donald J. Trump Apocalypse promises to be a major, sold-out hit, far bigger, better and more important than anyone thought possible.
These would join an already impressive portfolio of places and things Trump has named, or caused to be named, for himself. Trump Accounts. TrumpRx. The Trump Gold Card. Trump-class battleships. $TRUMP cryptocurrency meme coins. The Trump ballroom. The Arc de Trump. The Donald J. Trump Institute of Peace. The Trump-Kennedy Center (Trump allies have threatened to force it into bankruptcy, and perhaps demolish it, if Trump’s name is removed).
There are also Trump $1 coins, Trump-branded passports, Trump National Park passes and currency signed by Trump. Last week he proposed a Trump Dividend — a $5,000 bribe to be paid to adult citizens if they vote in a GOP Congress.
He has generously refrained from inserting his own name into the Gulf of America, Lake America and New America, but there’s still the possibility that his plan to rename the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans will result in one or both being named Trump.
Republicans in the current Congress have introduced 53 pieces of legislation with Trump in the title. There’s a bill to put Trump on the $100 bill and a new $250 bill; to rename Dulles Airport for Trump; to have Trump carved into Mount Rushmore; to make his birthday a federal holiday; to commemorate the day of his assassination attempt; to nominate him for the Nobel Peace Prize; to award him the Congressional Gold Medal; and to rename D.C.’s Metrorail as the Trump Train.
There have been noticeably fewer such bills introduced as Trump’s approval has dropped to the 30s — and just 27% among independents and 18% among voters under 30, according to this week’s New York Times/Siena University poll.
Nobody has yet introduced legislation naming the proposed wall through Big Bend National Park after Trump, nor the section of Yosemite National Park his administration wants to sell to developers. (Maybe the Trump Tower Yosemite?) Now that some of the Jan. 6 offenders Trump pardoned have begun to commit new crimes, I don’t see any legislative calls to award him a medal for the Trump Felon Amnesty Program.
So it will have to be up to others to continue giving Trump his due credit for what he has done.
The federal debt has hit $40 trillion, and $11.6 of that was piled up so far during Trump’s two terms, more than under any other president. For being the BEST at increasing the debt, he deserves to have it renamed the Donald J. Trump Federal Debt.
The average American took a Trump Pay Cut over the last year, as real hourly earnings fell 0.3%. Americans are also paying a Trump Fuel Surcharge, of course — 36% higher prices for gas and 70% higher prices for diesel, which is at an all-time record of $6.27 a gallon.
It’s all part of the overall Trumpflation, which this week pushed yields on the 10-year Treasury note to a 19-year high, a sign of still higher borrowing costs to come. The University of Michigan’s Consumer Sentiment Index last month showed signs of a Trump Slump, coming within three points of May’s all-time low.
And his recent accomplishments go well beyond the economic. The United Nations reports that Trump’s elimination of George W. Bush’s HIV/AIDS program for Africa will result in an additional 4.2 million AIDS-related deaths by 2029 — including 300,000 children.
This, while Donald Trump Jr. gets $170,000 for his wedding celebration from a Russian oligarch close to Vladimir Putin, and the elder Trump continues to brag about his improvements to the White House: “Now, it is a Palace!”
This trademark blend of cruelty and turpitude is why I support legislation renaming Trump himself.
Too bad “Nero” is already taken.
Dana Milbank is a Washington Sun Perspectives columnist.
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