Trump's Not a Racist; He's a 'Scorch'

I have news for Cory Booker — now dubbed Cryin’ Cory on Twitter, evidently because he got a little bent over some recent remarks of our president. Donald Trump’s not a racist.  He’s a “scorch.”

Wazzat, you ask?

As a rough contemporary of the president, hailing from the same metropolis, he from Queens and me from somewhat more tony Manhattan, parts of it anyway, I remember a certain type of schoolyard personality being called a “scorch.”  At least it went that way at Senator Robert F. Wagner Senior Junior High School, aka JHS 167, back in the fifties.

A scorch was the kind of kid who, when someone muffed an easy fly in stickball, would scream out, seemingly totally incensed, “You [f-word]ing [derogatory word for Puerto Rican], how could you [f-word]ing drop that [f-word]ing ball, you dumb [f-word]ing [derogatory word for Puerto Rican] idiot?!”

Of course, no one paid that much attention because it was just one of our scorches — there were more than one, of all races and creeds — mouthing off and, soon enough, he and the Puerto Rican kid were heading off to the local candy store together — known, in my case, as Jesse’s Jip Joint — to share a cup of hot French Fries with way too much ketchup, as if they were best buddies. Indeed, often, they were.

Now we have a “scorch” as president.  Some say this is a bad thing.  I — you may guess — say no.  A president who is a scorch is just what America needs after decades of escalating political correctness that, of late, has reached ultra-nauseating levels, particularly on our college campuses and among the mega-hypocritical (someone has to come out with a neologism that goes beyond mere hypocrisy) media, almost all of whom say scorch-like things when they don’t think anyone’s listening.  It’s human life.

Ah, you’re saying, but he’s monsieur le président.  He must be diplomatique.

Oh, really? Like the foreign minister of Norway or some such?

How about someone who creates real change and actually makes things better for the people he helps govern in a democratic state, but on occasion says ugly things that might make you wince (or not)?

One of the other characteristics of the scorch was that he liked to toot his own horn a lot.  (Yes, most scorches were hes, but there were a few shes, even then.)

That’s something I think, in this and other cases, we can all agree on.  The scorch is almost always a bit of a braggart.  But is that a bad thing?  Again, not necessarily, especially if said scorch brags about something that’s of significance and true. (Alas, not always the case for a scorch. They have weaknesses, as we all do.) The scorch has to make the situation clear, especially if he is surrounded by anti-scorches who seek to bring him down.  Sound familiar?

In any case, our scorch-in-chief, being constantly under attack for matters large and small, almost always fights back in the grand tradition of all scorches.  Called a racist ad infinitum, he struck back the other day with some interesting facts on that greatest of playing fields for the modern scorch — Twitter. (Yes, many of his enemies are scorches, if they would only admit it.)

Unemployment for Black Americans is the lowest ever recorded. Trump approval ratings with Black Americans has doubled. Thank you, and it will get even (much) better! @FoxNews

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 16, 2018

This is the true nightmare for Senator Booker and others — not whatever random scorch-like utterances our president might make now and into the future.

Roger L. Simon is an award-winning novelist, Academy Award-nominated screenwriter and co-founder of PJ Media.  His latest book is I Know Best:  How Moral Narcissism Is Destroying Our Republic, If  It Hasn’t Already.