The Roman emperor Caligula threatened to make his favorite horse, Incitatus, a consul. Historians agree he didn’t actually accomplish that, it was more of a demeaning joke against the aristocracy and a way to brag about his power, but still…that’s one of the many stupid, hateful things we remember him for. Caligula has not fared well in history. Historians can argue down to this day that Caligula was the worst Roman emperor of all time, for his capriciousness, his venality, his narcissism, his greed, his ineffectiveness as a leader.
Does that sound familiar?
At least Trump has actually done the thing he claimed he was going to do: he has signed an Executive Order declaring that Lake Ontario is to be renamed Lake America.
resident Donald Trump on Thursday signed an Executive Order instructing Interior Secretary Doug Burgum to rename Lake Ontario as “Lake America.”
The change is set to take effect immediately, he said. Trump earlier in the week had floated the idea of a new moniker for the lake, which borders the Canadian province of Ontario and the U.S. state of New York.
It is absurd. Not only is it not going to happen, but it also highlights the fact that Executive Orders as a tool for governing have been corrupted and are totally useless. No one except brain-dead MAGA clowns are going to call it “Lake America”.
“The name is more than 400 years old, pre-dating both the Confederation of Canada and the Declaration of Independence of the United States of America,” said Carney on Thursday. “We know that America is changing. Their trading relationships, their foreign policies, their national monuments, their hydronyms.”
Insisting that Canadians are aware of the “naming reality,” Carney rejected Trump’s directive for the lake, which borders the Canadian province of Ontario and the U.S. state of New York.
The governor of New York, Kathy Hochul, has also rejected the whole idea.
History and the world are going to be laughing at our idiot president for a long time to come. You might say that at least he hasn’t put a horse in the Senate, but I think a lot of the candidates he has endorsed, and all of the nitwits in his cabinet, would serve us better if they were horses. Put Burgum in harness and run him in the Kentucky Derby, he’d be more useful there than as Secretary of the Interior.
Well, tRUMP hasn’t put a horse in the senate, yet. But it’s obvious we have a Horses’ Ass for president! (literally and figuratively)
AND:
The name “Ontario” derives from an Iroquoian word, most likely “onti:á:io,” meaning “great lake” or “beautiful lake,”
https://www.mikegravel.org/why-is-ontario-called-ontario/
shermanji @ #2 — Per the government of Canada source here:
Who’s to say what’s right. It’s a translation issue. Perhaps we should take it up with James Joyce.
It’ll be interesting to see how quickly Apple and Google fold and change it in their respective maps like they did with the Gulf. They’re too afraid of retaliatory tariffs and regulations. So, even though, no logical person will ever call it that, it’ll still be right there in your face on pretty much every map and GPS in use.
Reminded of a South Park episode. The whole Easter Bunny thing turns out to be based in a secret society that believes the Pope is supposed to be a rabbit. The conspiracy succeeds and appoints a rabbit as Pope.
“He’s not telling us what to do!”
“Exactly!”
Recursive Rabbit @ 5
I recall another SP episode where the priest goes to Rome and discover the Pope is some kind of spider-like monster.
If it had been a really stupid spider-like monster that farted and made racist comments the parallels with today would have been more straightforward.
BTW, where is that “Death Note” protagonist when you need him?
(reference only for manga fans)
@shermanj:
I believe Carney actually commented on the source of the name in a speech recently, based on reporting. Though I’ve heard the name described as either Huron or Wendat depending on source, with roughly the same translation. (Could be all of the above, of course: it’s not like it’s unusual for multiple languages in the same region to share some words. It’s more the norm, really.)
The general consensus on this side of the Lake is that this all just shows how completely incurious and unoriginal Trump is. He’s like a dog pissing on things to mark them, except dogs can usually be trained to be a bit more discreet about it.
(One amusing thing I saw in one of the CBC articles about this is that apparently the first mention of the idea of renaming the lake came during an argument between Trump and Ontario Premier Doug Ford, in which Trump called Ford a ‘less charismatic, intelligent’ version of his late brother Rob, the infamous ‘crack-smoking mayor’ of Toronto. Less charismatic I could grant him, but Doug Ford is definitely not less intelligent than Rob. He’s a whole lot smarter, if no less mean-spirited, and that’s a good chunk of why he tends to be lower-key about shooting his mouth off.)
birgerjohansson @6: I remember that one, too. Tried to overturn church law to disallow pedophilia for priests. Every step of the way, the other priests were surprised he didn’t engage in that activity.
It is a race to see which tech mega-company caves first.
Another company, Mapquest has already said they aren’t going to change it.
Good for them.
I can’t even really care all that much.
Trump and the GOP have already done so many horrible and illegal things that one more doesn’t make that much difference.
An earlier Trump screwup is coming back to bite him. He may regret fucking with the BBC. “BBC Ordering Trump’s Family to Court”
.https://youtube.com/shorts/DpKZrqGAEP0
USA is bordering three oceans and Trump is choosing to rename a lake? Quick, a Dem governor should rename a quite small lake ‘Lake Trump’. Preferably a lake black with silt that no one wants to bathe in. Maybe Califirnia has some modest body of water that only exists during the rainy season?
Lassi Hippeläinen dug out this photo in a newspaper.
“Trump has been seen in Finland trying to get to the Heavens.”
.https://www.iltalehti.fi/kotimaa/a/7d772029-cf92-463c-b275-1a082341b944
(scroll down to the enlargement)
.
I am reminded of Sauron turning into a cloud after the ring was destroyed.
There’s an Ottawa neighbourhood called Central Park with a Manhattan theme, including a crescent called Trump Avenue. That didn’t age at all well, and the local city councillor is calling for it to be changed. Residents seem to be divided — yeah, Trump, but it’s a PITA changing your address. Still, I imagine it impacts property values on that street.
Ha ha, the latest from the Pudding-for-Brains Administration.
Also, “America”? You sure ’bout dat? As you very well know, that name comes from one of the early “discoverers”, Messer Amerigo Vespucci from Florence.
So all this time you have been Italians and did not even notice! Has the Orange-utan ever reflected on the origin of the name? Of course not. Fesso.
According to Wikipedia, Caligula was actually really into construction of infrastructure.
The Dump would be a lot more like Nero, except Nero can’t BEGIN to dream of the casualties global warming is going to produce (probably at least two billion and our civilisation).
birgerjohansson #12 Pig farms usually have a pond that stores the pigs predigested output.
also
https://foresttrekwoodwork.ca/product/outhouse – Makes fancy Trump hotels.
The big thing to remember about Caligula’s posthumous reputation is that he was assassinated. It was thus of vital importance for his successor Claudius, and the Praetorian Guard who committed the murder, that he be painted as a mad tyrant who deserved to be bumped off for the good of Rome. Claudius’s legitimacy as emperor hung very substantially on Caligula having been a monster. Indeed, the fact we habitually call him by the infantilising childhood nickname he hated – “Caligula” – rather than his actual name Gaius shows just how successful the character assassination has been. He was also in his mid twenties when he was emperor, which didn’t help given that Romans tended to mistrust rule by people who weren’t comfortably middle aged at least.
As for Trump… well, there’s still time. Though the historians aren’t going to have to do much name-blackening this time round.
Hmmm…what would the Latin for “Little Hands” be?
Ontario is not just a province in Canada. There is a town of Ontario, New York
As someone pointed out all of these name changes are costing millions of dollars
To all the commenters that added info on the origin of ‘Ontario’, thanks for the additional perspective.
However, the most important part of it all to me is it is of First Nations Tribal origins.
There are articles telling us ALL us shipping entering the great lakes goes through a Canadian canal. Many in Canada want to rename that the ‘Strait of Ourmoose’. I think that’s great. (see what I did there ‘great’ as in great lakes)
Gotta laugh sometimes to stop crying over the death spiral ride we are on.
I live in upstate NY, minutes from the SW corner of the Adirondack Park. We get regular visits from Lake Ontario in the form of lake effect snow (and rain). I can assure everyone here that no one but the most die-hard and brain-dead up here are going to call it anything other than Lake Ontario. It’s a non-starter. I have looked out across Lake Ontario more times than I can count, and took some great sunset photos from Oswego (east end of the lake) back in my college days.
@ 20, Reginald Selkirk,
Not only that, but there is also an Ontario County in upstate NY. Interestingly, it does not border the lake, but rather encompasses part of the Finger Lakes region further south of it. And for good measure, just south of Albany, the state capital, there is a small town called Selkirk. A friend of mine lives near there.
@22 shemanj
Not sure which one you are referring to, but there is the Welland Canal that connects Lakes Erie and Ontario. It goes through the Province of Ontario and is a rather important part of the Great Lakes Waterway. Without it, there is a little problem with a certain rough passage of water on the Niagara River that you might have heard of.
There is also an Ontario, Oregon, a small town on the border with Idaho. Population 12,000 which is huge for that area.
And an Ontario, California, part of the Los Angeles suburban sprawl, population 190,000.
They have an airport there and I’ve flown into it before.
Canada has decided to change the name of Canada Geese. They will be officially renamed “Donald Ducks”
Jenora Feuer @8
Wendat is the correct name for the people we used to call Huron. It is not 2 separate people or languages.
@25
Especially confusing if you abbreviate it ‘Ontario, CA’
Cicely, #19
“maniculae” should do the trick.
I always thought Caligula was an internet troll 2000ish years before the internet, and Trump is basically an internet troll as president, so there ya go.
My favorite Caligula story was when a group visited him to plead for some special privilege, he took them on a grand tour of his palace, never let them get a word in edgewise, then saw them out and shut the door in their faces. Trumps not smart enough to do that.
Canada should rename it Lake Canada. I bet they could get numerous countries to sign on.
You know Carney only used “hydronyms” because he knew Trump would need someone to explain it to him.
First thing that occurred to me (along with the Gulf of Mexico renaming) was to lean into it : Gulf of/Lake Fuck Yeah!
No, we won’t. Not only is there nothing funny about this but we know he’s only a symptom and not the cause of U.S belligerence.
The U.S is represented by it’s choice of leaders, it chooses to harm itself and is careless about the consequences of it’s stupidity. The world should no longer accept U.S interests in the established order of business and I hope it’s easy ride on the back of markets and trade organised in it’s interests ends. I sincerely hope, and think there’s an increasing chance commodities will cease being traded in USD, and the country bears the full weight of it’s debt.
Trump has absolutely done permanent and irreparable damage to US international trade in many sectors. Previous trading relations built up a lot of US control mechanisms which everyone else took as the price of doing business with the world’s biggest economy (e.g. miltech where the US could unilaterally brick the software). By a combination of tariffs and demonstrating the same attitude to the terms of international agreements as Darth Vader, Trump has reduced the benefits of trading with the US so much that everyone else is just building up partnerships that exclude them (such as Canada and the EU), and once those are established, nobody is going back to those shitty one-sided deals, especially whilst there is still a possibility of another Trump being elected. Those trade agreements are gone for the foreseeable future, which will be a lasting blow to the US economy.
As I noted in a previous thread here; “Lake America” is what we should call the post-Trump reno Washington reflecting pool – broken, full of algae and peeling facade needless wrecked and now dry and gone.
I did see a meme suggesting Canadians are now renaming the USA South Canada altho’ obvs a slight issue given the geography of Alaska and its location relative to the Maple leaf nation!
PS. Pharyngula & FTB has a search bar whence you get all the blog posts listed under certain topics eg :
https://freethoughtblogs.com/pharyngula/?s=Milo+Yiannopoulos
You know that yeah? It does come in handy sometimes.
Think those are arranged chronologically and, if so, the most recent time Milo Y was discussed here (by PZ at least) was the 17th February 2021. So, yeah , quite a long time ago.
Nope, StevoR. I posted a search elsethread. I know you read that post, since you commented on it.
freethoughtblogs.com/pharyngula/2015/06/23/the-hopeless-arrogance-of-milo-yiannopoulos/ is much more recent.
(Bots are better at it, obs)
[argh, copypaste error]
Wrong link; this one: freethoughtblogs.com/pharyngula/2022/12/05/if-it-werent-so-dizzying-it-might-be-entertaining/
@22 shermanj, @24 jimf: not just the canal round Niagara, but the whole St Lawrence River beyond Cornwall Island too. Let’s rename the Atlantic Ocean Galway Bay. Galway actually exists, much of the time, whereas Atlantis never did.
Oh, and Lake America isn’t mentioned in any of the treaties that govern navigation on the Lakes and the St Lawrence… so presumably those treaties are now void?
It’s a game anybody can play!
https://gulfof.mapquest.com/lakeontario
Go nuts, y’all….
If (when?) there’s a (renewed?) Civil War between the Trump states and the rational Blue ones I wonder who will get which name(s) and who will keep the old name of “United States of America” (clear misnomer there huh?) if anyone does?
Will they call themselves the Confederacy 2.0 or Trumpland or the Dead Heart (yoiking form Oz there..) or what?
@18 Manicula
I hope to never live to see it. But sure, paint that hellscape for me. Tell me what my tiny state will do up against a gigantic-ass “Trump” state other than get crushed into dust.
Your “rational Blue” states don’t all enjoy the geographical advantage of contiguity, which they would need to support each other (especially the smaller states!) in your hypothetical civil war.
Here’s a renaming I could support:
Tennessee moves to rename Nashville International Airport in Dolly Parton’s honor
cartomancer @ # 18 – I hadn’t looked at it that way before – thanks!
… infantilising childhood nickname he hated – “Caligula” – rather than his actual name Gaius …
Did he actually go by “Emperor Gaius” during his reign? I get the impression half the guys in Rome were named “Gaius”.
Can you shed any light on the veracity or lack thereof of the story of Emperor Whoever commandeering all available boats to rig up a horse-gallopable bridge to the Isle of Capri so he could honor/mock a fortune-teller’s sarcasm?
Pierce, cf. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Legends_of_Catherine_the_Great#Death_while_having_sex_with_a_horse
(Posthumous vilification is the idea)
@ 44. Trumpist bad faith troll “beholder” :
Dude, this is the “hellscape” that YOU fucking created by your advocacy for Trump and his fascist tyranny. If you didn’t want that you shouldn’t have worked for years to inflict that Fascist dictator upon our world a second time. You have zero good options now thanks to the installation of your preferred dictator.
Nor do other vastly better, innocent and more ethical and rational people a large number of which you have already de facto killed.
Dunno. What is your state anyhow? Apart from denial obvious. You don’t sound too upset at the thought which, yet again, exposes you being a Trumpist – not that we don’t already know.
You think the Trumpists will win this Civil war? Remember how incredibly unintelligent, wilfully ignorant and self-destructive the Trumpists like you are.
Neither do all the red states notably Alaska. Geographical advantages aren’t all necessarily all they’re cut up to be esp in modern warfare.
(Note again folks the airquotes put by the disingenuous troll around “rational blue states.”)
Of course in war, everyone loses.
My personal preferred option would be the USoA’s military stepping in and removing the Trumpists followed by a major reset of the USoA’s Democracy. Problem is Trump has already appointed too many loyalists. OTOH, the navy especially is in a rightly mutinous mood now. Justifiably so. Plus Trump’s contempt for the good people there & continued war. All the traitor Trump states vs the actual USoA military? Yeah. I think and hope the Blue States will do the “crushing into dust” there. We’ll see.
Whatever happens now, far too much damage has been done and too many people killed and destruction occurred needlessly thanks to you and the others who failed to support kamala Harris when it mattered and would have saved lives and so much else. You “beholder” Trumpist troll have blood all over you and we all know it.
@ ^ Clarity fix – that’s :
Will there be breaking point even for the loyalists where they finally decide ENOUGH!!! Then revolt? Sure hope so.
”Tell me what my tiny state will do up against a gigantic-ass “Trump” state other than get crushed into dust.” – Disingenuous Trumpy troll “beholder”
Question is what would YOU do Trumpy troll to oppose the fascist take-over and which side are you supporting in such a likely Civil War? Oh, wait, don’t tell us you’ve already made it clear that you stand with the Fascist side & would help them oppress, destroy and murder others including people on this blog rather than opposing the Trump tyranny that you’ve already put so much effort into inflicting on us all.
.* Found out today that if you type “Kegsbreath” on wikipedia it automatically comes up with Hegseths page FWIW.
@48 StevoR
So lemme get this straight. Your preferred solution is for a military dictatorship, likely headed by Hegseth, almost certainly headed by MAGA brass, to be put in charge and to magically implement your solutions.
You are deeply unserious, delusional, or both.
This contains my asessment of things USoA~wise here :
https://freethoughtblogs.com/pharyngula/2026/06/28/infinite-thread-xxxx/comment-page-5/#comment-2310522
(Dóh! Wrong thread, mea culpa.)
Please point out where I’m wrong if i am. I’d rather be wrong by my own choice here but am I?
As predicted in #10, Google has caved and relabeled their maps as Lake America.
Apple lost the race to be the most servile of the mega-tech corporations.
Mapquest already stated that they weren’t going to bother.
Good for them.
I just hope that ICE/DHS doesn’t pay them a visit and shake them down for a “campaign contribution”.
@52 raven: Maybe for US only? Looking at it from UK, it’s still Lake Ontario.
Demon Flying Fox sings Truth and Defiance here – Canadian Resistance Army – Lake Ontario (Official Music Video) 2 & a half mins of musical power and fun.
Also via DW news Canadians laugh off a lake name change – but what about an ocean? 12 mins 45 secs length.