There was a curious juxtapositioning of events yesterday morning.
When the Associated Press called Pennsylvania for Joe Biden at 11:25 am, Trump was on the golf course, no doubt cheating at the game as he is often accused of doing. He apparently was told the news while he was playing and he looked decidedly glum as his motorcade went back to the White House, accompanied by the jeers of people on the streets, extended middle fingers, and chants of “Lock him up!” He is playing playing golf again today, with protestors at the gates of the golf club. Maybe he will play every day until it is time for him to leave the White House. That would be a good thing because that means he won’t be doing any more damage.
Meanwhile in Philadelphia, things were even weirder. Trump’s personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani, accompanied by Trump’s second idiot son Eric and members of his legal team, were holding a press conference, for reasons that are not clear, in the back parking lot of a landscaping company, not the most impressive of backdrops.
And so it was that Giuliani was standing in front of a dozen or so Trump lawn signs taped to the garage door of a commercial landscaping company whose biggest clients include the Philadelphia International Airport and the Northeast Philadelphia Airport when he learned that the AP and all the networks had called the race for Joe Biden.
Here he is learning the news of Biden’s projected win from reporters.
Needless to say, Twitter went to town, as in this from comedian Patton Oswalt.
This is not over. For we shall mount our righteous stand at Four Seasons Total Landscaping. Next to Fantasy Island Adult Books. Across the street from the Delaware Valley Cremation Center. Between the fire extinguisher and yellow hose. #MAGA pic.twitter.com/hxuAsbEjXi
— Patton Oswalt (@pattonoswalt) November 7, 2020
The Four Season Total Landscaping company that agreed to have the press conference on their premises is taking a beating on Yelp, with a bunch of one star ratings accompanied by comments such as this one.
Quality landscaping often requires fertilizer. The best natural fertilizer is bull shit. That’s why, with inventory running low, they invited the outgoing president to leave a steaming truckload of the freshest bullshit. I hope to avail my victory garden of the finest bullshit known to man. People are telling me it’s the best bullshit they’ve ever seen.
In a wild instance of the universe finally trying to make up for the measure of humor that has been stolen from us this year, on Saturday Rudy Giuliani gave a Very Important Press Conference at Philadelphia’s Four Seasons… Total Landscaping Company.
Some people have suggested that the president-deselect tweeted it out before making sure the Four Seasons was bookable, and then the broken, chain-smoking Trump staffer who is tasked with papering over reality to match whatever he blurts out had to scramble to find something to make it true. Others suggest that some hapless lackey called a Four Seasons without checking to make sure that it was the Four Seasons and some hilarious staffer saw the marketing opportunity of the millennium and went ahead and accepted the booking.
It doesn’t matter which is correct. This is a gift from our very best trickster gods at the top of their game, and we must simply accept it and clutch it to our hearts in joy that, by whatever miraculous path, Rudy Giuliani gave what he claimed was a press conference of crucial national importance in front of a landscaping company which was, in a painfully on-the-nose reflection of his recent career, tucked between a porn shop and a crematorium.
I don’t know why the company agreed to hold the conference on their grounds but even if they are big Trump supporters, I do not think it is nice to drive down the reputation of a legitimate business because of this decision. Yelp has temporarily suspended any new ratings.
I look at it this way: if you run a landscaping business called Four Seasons in a town where there’s a Four Seasons hotel, you receive a LOT of phone calls where you say “No, sir, this is the Four Seasons Landscaping place. You want the Four Seasons HOTEL. Their number is…”. That has to be something that happens at the very least every week, if not every day.
So… you get a phone call from someone looking to book an opportunity to make a speech for the President’s campaign. I see two ways this can go:
1. You’re a Trump supporter. NO WAY are you going to let this opportunity slip through your fingers. You keep quiet and say “Yessir, Four Seasons, that’s us.”, take the booking and smile happily.
2. You’re a Trump hater. You look across the road at the crematorium and next door at the dildo shop and picture the scene with the campaign’s great and good giving their best side to the cameras in the parking lot… NO WAY are you going to let that opportunity slip through you’re fingers. So you keep quiet and say “Yessir, Four Seasons, that’s us” and take the booking and try not explode with happiness when they don’t realise.
I honestly can’t say which of those I think is more likely, but I hope it’s (2).
@1 under #1 you would *have* to realise that that would make your “preferred candidate” look incredibly stupid. I mean, you would *have* to. So, no, I can’t possibly see how they could specifically be Trump supporters. (I mean, they *might* be, or they might not be, but they didn’t accept the booking just because they were.)
I kind of have this occasional scene in my mind where Trump is in his office with Rudy going “On *COME ON* man, they’ve got to see it by now surely? I mean, no one could *possibly* thing this was legit. For *FUCKS* sake, I actually stated the opposite of something on recorded video -- all they need to do is rewind 2 minutes to disprove it. They’ve *GOT* to know I’m just trolling them, surely? What more can I possible do to prove it?”
My suspicion is that the phone person at the business was just surprised and confused by the request. “You want to book our carpark… for a press conference? Um, okaayyyy…”
“you would *have* to realise that that would make your “preferred candidate” look incredibly stupid”
You’re asking me to imagine someone who is
(a) a Trump supporter
(b) working a job answering the phone at a garden centre
(c) smart and quick on the uptake.
Tough one. Then again my preferred interpretation is a hater with (b) and (c), so…
Option #3: the owner of the landscaping business (who apparently has some pretty big contracts), donated 2-3 million dollars to Trump campaign and had negotiated some deal for a private Trump rally at one of his business. (Everything is transactional, even those things you believe in.) There have been a number of them reported over the past few years, Trump or a surrogate speaking to a crowd of dozens at a fairly small business. The marks don’t seem to have any regard to how this looks to an outsider (or to their own employee’s), and the conmen are happy to take the money for what is really only a couple hours repeating a canned speech.
I do take a little offence at the news report of:
There are clearly 42 signs taped to the garage door. That probably took at least 35 minutes, and may have been a joke-from-beyond-the-grave by Douglas Adams.
Voltaire’s prayer is powerful stuff.