Slate "The Key to Understanding Don Jr." (SAD!)

[NRaleighLiberal]

http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/politics/2017/12/donald_trump_jr_just_wants_to_be_loved.html

The president’s eldest son is entitled, oafish, combative—and desperate for his dad’s approval.

By Katy Waldman

Donald Trump Jr. has all the obvious traits of his father: He’s belligerent, dim, and mired in everlasting childhood. But the president’s firstborn is a work of art in the age of mechanical reproduction. He is to Donald J. Trump as a postcard of the Mona Lisa is to the actual Mona Lisa—the image of the thing, absent its original aura. Don Jr. may be as privileged and petty as the president, but his indistinctness prevents him from commanding our gaze the way his dad does.

That hasn’t stopped the 39-year-old executive vice president of the Trump Organization from trying to make a strong impression. Consider:

I’m still trying to figure out how letting Americans keep more of THEIR money is looting... but you know logic and such is long gone with the libs. Also socialists likely shouldn’t talk about looting and history in the same sentence. #yourewelcome 🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸 https://t.co/DUrLQqeuyV

— Donald Trump Jr. (@DonaldJTrumpJr) December 2, 2017

In addition to tweeting about the libs and exchanging direct messages with Wikileaks, Don Jr. also takes the occasional in-person meeting. In June 2016, he reacted with smirking glee to an email promising dirt on Hillary Clinton, writing to the shady operatives with whom he subsequently confabbed: “If it’s what you say I love it.” Despite the presence of allegedly Kremlin-backed hackers in that Trump Tower tryst, the president’s eldest child testified before the Senate in September that “I did not collude with any foreign government and do not know of anyone who did.” The Washington Post described Don Jr.’s stance vis-à-vis the Russia meeting as “defiant.” Seth Meyers opted for plainer language. “He’s the dumbest member of a family in which there is stiff competition,” the NBC late-night host said. Declaring that the elevator inside Donald Trump Jr.’s skull doesn’t go all the way to the top feels like it lets him off the hook for his odiousness. It also feels true, most of the time. If the Trump administration colluded with the Russians, Don Jr. was clearly not the brains of the operation.


What is going on inside Donald Trump Jr.’s head? To scroll through Don Jr.’s social media feeds is to experience whiplash from the flapping of a lost soul. It’s clear the first son has something to prove; what’s less clear is exactly what that is. The younger Don’s Twitter and Instagram accounts conjure a struggle between all-American domestic contentment and restless, roaming pugnacity (or maybe between a sophisticated PR apparatus and an inveterate boor). He seems eager to project all the carefree trappings of a golden family man, yet he can’t quiet his hyperactive biliousness long enough to sell that curated narrative. Unlike conciliatory Ivanka or invisible Tiffany or robotic, fugue-state Melania, Don Jr. is provocative and confrontational, exuding a mix of toxic masculinity, smug entitlement, and self-owning oafishness.



snip - much more to read. And SAD (! )

[spiderpig]

1. What is with the Trumpettes? They all look like zombies.

Or aliens from the 90s movie Mars Attacks.

Jared looks like Don Jr who looks like Ivanka who looks like Erik. Pencil thin with dead eyes. It's creepy.

I'm leaving out Tiffany for now, and Barron since he's very young. But it creeps me out that whenever we see 11-year-old Barron he's in a suit and tie. Not his choice, poor thing. Can't he just be a kid in sneakers and a t-shirt?