A Guide to TrumpSpeak: Decoding the Mysterious Language of the President Elect
In a post-truth world, the English language itself has inverted in upon its own meaning, and is now capable of performing spectacular feats of gymnastics. What an amazing time to be alive eh? Yeah, 2016 was a great year…haha, just kidding.
Those of us Americans educated in the old linguistic system of English, in which words were taken at their literal meaning and facts were information-based (this will be a majority of us, to the tune of at least, ahem, 65 million) may have a difficult time understanding the new form of language that is emerging in our country, of which our President Elect is the forbear, an enigmatic language affectionately known as “Trumpspeak.”
For those who find themselves stupefied by the strange utterances of President Elect Donald J. Trump, here is a handy informative guide to Trumpspeak. And by informative I mean…well…let’s just say this article is rife with “truthiness.”
Trumpspeak has its linguistic roots in old forms of language that are still heavily in use today throughout the world, most notably in countries such as China, Russia, North Korea and Iran; the common term for this kind of ur-language has always been “Propaganda.” Yet the particular nuances of Trumpspeak appear to be of largely Russian/Soviet derivation. It is rumored that Trump was actually tutored in public speaking at a Kremlin academy in Moscow by their star pupil, former KGB agent and current Russian president Vladimir Putin. Or was it McCarthyist Roy Cohn who tutored him? Anyway, I think you can almost discern in Trump’s written communications and tweets a vague Russian dictator-accent. Or is it the accent of a 1940s German dictator?
Thematically, Trumpspeak bares some relation to the Orwellian concept of “doublethink” from the book ‘1984,’ in the sense that the entire language is structured around confounding contradictions. The essential key to breaking the code of Trumpspeak is this:
~*Whatever is said can be taken to mean its opposite.*~
Back before we entered a post-truth world (just a few years ago as I recall…), the things that Trump says were commonly known as “outright lies.” But now, in an odd twist of fate, they “feel ‘true.’”
Let’s look at some of Trump’s statements for examples of how Trumpspeak works.
On December 3, 2016, Trump tweeted: “Just tried watching Saturday Night Live — unwatchable! Totally biased, not funny, and the Baldwin impression can’t get any worse. Sad.”
If we correctly parse this bit of Trumpspeak, with the clear understanding that everything that he says means it’s opposite, we get:
“Trump, (most likely lounging on a gold-plated sofa at midnight, by a bowl of circus peanuts mirroring the color of his hair, Blackberry clutched tightly in his tiny hand) EFFECTIVELY watched (not tried) Saturday Night Live which he found RIVETING (not unwatchable).
The artful skit about his pathetic obsession with tweeting https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=tI3g_laToxE was INCISIVE, strongly reflected the fucked up reality of the situation, and was drop dead FUNNY AF. Alec Baldwin’s impression of Trump BRILLIANTLY CAPTURES Trump’s moronic mugging and childish pettiness.
This bit of political theater of the resistance brought HAPPINESS and HOPE to millions of Americans who want to see Donald Trump called out on his innapropriate, unpresidential behavior, many of whom cannot sleep at night because they’re so worried about how dangerous his presidency will be to our world (not “sad.”)”
Here’s another perfect example:
On December 9, 2016, The Trump Transition Team said, in response to the CIA’s reported revelations of Russian interference in the US election which benefitted Trump’s campaign https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.washingtonpost.com/amphtml/world/national-security/obama-orders-review-of-russian-hacking-during-presidential-campaign/2016/12/09/31d6b300-be2a-11e6-94ac-3d324840106c_story.html?client=safari:
“These are the same people who said Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction. The election ended a long time ago in one of the biggest Electoral College victories in history. It’s now time to move on and Make America Great Again.”
Ummm ok let’s break this down. What the Trump Transition Team is really saying, translated from the original Trumpspeak:
“(Presumably speaking from Death Star Galactica Headquarters):
The CIA is a HIGHLY RESPECTED agency that knows what the fuck they’re talking about (not mislead us about weapons of mass destruction), and it’s TRUE Russia helped swing the election for Trump.
The election was SO RECENT (just a few weeks ago) that the legitimacy of Trump’s presidency is still TENUOUS. Trump’s Electoral College margin of victory was THIN and his popular vote a HUGE LOSS (not “one of the biggest Electoral College victories in history”). It’s STILL POSSIBLE to change the results of the election, either through an Electoral College mutiny, a Jill Stein recount miracle, intrepid lawsuits that challenge the verdict, or some other kind of amazing Deus Ex Machina that we cannot even now imagine (not “it’s now time to move on.”).
The Trump Team would like to move fast on DESTROYING American Democracy, PLUNDERING and RAVAGING the Earth, STRIPPING social programs of their funding, PROFITING from Trump’s presidency, PROVOKING other countries into wars, and potentially creating the NUCLEAR ANNIHILATION of all life on Earth (not “Making America Great Again”).”
You see how easy it is de-code Trumpspeak?! You do not have to be an Ivy-league educated coastal elite intellectual to get it; it’s pretty simple.
As more Americans learn to understand Trumpspeak for what it really is, media news outlets could begin publishing translations beneath each line of Trump’s communications, like CNN did with fact checking blurbs below their headlines during the campaign. That would make things easier for everyone, instead of pretending that anything that Trump says ought to be taken at face value or that it has any validity as a statement on its own.
