What that man would be doing for a living without the largesse his paterfamilias blessedly left in his lap, few would have the stomach to speculate. It would not be pretty. Dad in his heavenly pasture must be feeling prickly heat as he observes the legacy of his name indelibly associated now with the gaudiest, crassest, and cheesiest that America has to offer. If Dad were of a later generation he would have no such qualms or tinglings of shame, lolling proudly in his bathtub of greasy loot, be him the Hollywood producer of brain asphyxiating television and film products, the packager of shady derivatives, or the garden variety manufacturer of consumer trinkets (Known colloquially as: crap).

But dad’s good name aside, from disreputable landlord, to casino bankrupter, to star of bottom of the barrel television, The Donald has made his mark. Every so often he endeavors to run the profile of the Trump brand up the flagpole with one gamey stunt or another. Inevitably, during presidential election cycles for what seems like decades now, he hints he may be running for president, overlooking of course a vast citizenry clearly ready to jump at the chance to ignore his candidacy. This go-around, anticipating a public so habituated to the quadrennial stunt that the shtick was unlikely to wake-up even insomniacs, he had the bright idea, more Gump than Trump, to become an Obama Birther.

Donald of course had only an anemic, largely inconsequential conscience to wrestle to the floor in order to ignore the irresponsibility of adding any more fuel, in this case relatively high-profile fuel to this politically depraved, morally obscene, racist, McCarthy-ite and anti-American slander of a conspiracy theory. But in fairness to him, rejecting cynicism, cravenness and gross opportunism would be tantamount to the suckling turning up his nose at mother’s milk.

It makes you wonder if somewhere in his little pee-picking heart he hadn’t become jealous of those other Gargoyles of inherited wealth, the brothers David and Charles Koch.  Footing the bill for every scurrilous initiative from the nationwide Tea Party movement to the blast to the past in Wisconsin, to every anti-environmental, ultra-anti-government, anti-humane and anti-progressive initiative the American right could formulate, they are up to their elbows in political notoriety now, even if they had hoped to wield their considerable financial influence out of the public eye. Well, that phase is over boys.  

At least for the Koch brothers, Papa did them the favor of pre-soiling the family name before they got it. Freedom is just another word for “the kids can’t skunk up the family name any worse than daddy did.” Daddy, Fred Koch, built the nest egg for his American petroleum business by constructing and maintaining refineries for none other than Joseph Stalin. While achieving notoriety as a virulent, fire-breathing anti-communist he was at the same time walking around with pockets stuffed with Uncle Joe’s rubles. Indeed, Fred Koch was a founding member of the notorious, paranoiac, crackpot John Birch Society, so far to the kooky right (unfortunately, now mainstream Republicanism) the man generally considered the father of modern conservatism, William F. Buckley Jr. purged it from respectable conservatism by editorializing against it relentlessly in his flagship conservative magazine, National Review.

As for the case of Donald, it’s another one of those examples (by my unofficial count the examples are well into the six figures now) of how debauched our public sphere has become, when a very prominent American, one associated with a fair amount of creepiness and fungus, yes, but prominent nonetheless, would peddle such intellectually and morally bankrupt snake oil with so little shame,and lack of regard for future consequences, real or reputational, even by the lowly standards of traditional American hucksterism.

For the record, I mention that I am adding several links to the site providing handy and convenient access to source material debunking the birther bunk, particularly for those involved in heated discussion with a fellow citizen in danger of falling off the precipice into the deep chasm of birther dunderheadance.