Despite making an enemy of sports several months ago, our big, dumb president went down to Atlanta’s Mercedes-Benz Stadium for what he probably hoped was bloody gladiatorial combat. It was a contentious scene, with protestors from the Democratic Socialists of America projecting anti-Trump and pro-sanctuary city sentiments across the stadium’s exterior and a crowd that sounded divided as to whether they loved or hated this lumbering oaf.
The real standout of the evening, however, wasn’t Trump’s reception so much as his seeming inability to sing along with the National Anthem, the song for which he fought so valiantly after Colin Kaepernick and other NFL players chose to kneel during it as a peaceful protest.
Unfortunately, despite him saving the song in the same manner with which he saved “Merry Christmas,” it, um, really looks like he doesn’t know the words. As the footage shows, he lands a few phrases—“bright stars,” “red glare,” “home of the brave”—but spends the rest of the song either staring into oblivion or slowly working his soft jaw like some dead-eyed fish.
The memory of right-wingers piling on Barack Obama for the size of his American flag pin fresh in their minds, people didn’t hesitate to take Trump to task.
Let us remember, however, that Trump is very old, and, as BBC’s Anthony Zurcher reminds us, his hearing has gone the way of his rotting, fly-ridden brain—there’s a reason, after all, he is incapable of doing anything but bellow.
Best he stay in his bedroom from now on, where he can eat cheeseburgers, bounce against the headboard, and, in our wildest dreams, watch the Gorilla Channel to his heart’s content.
In the meantime, we’d like to see the Bad Lip Reading guys have a go at this one.