NOTE: Yesterday we posted a satirical piece suggesting that ‘Anonymous’, the Trump insider who wrote an op-ed for the N.Y. Times in 2018 claiming that Trump’s inner circle was intentionally subverting the President’s actions for the good of the nation, and who is now about to release a book, is actually Melania Trump. Subsequently we received an email from the real Anonymous, which in the interest of transparency and fairness we reproduce here.

Dear Garden of Eaton or whatever you call yourself,

I have wrote you This Email because many of you are wondering why would anyone Blow a Whistle against such a Great President?

And the answer is So Simple.  It is because the American People deserve The Truth.  And to Tell the Truth about the Greatest President Ever you need the Greatest Whistle Blower Ever.

Some of you in the Fake News Media have compared me to Daniel Ellsberg and Deep Throat. So unfair! I Blow the Whistle at least a hundred times better than Dirtbag Daniel or Deep Doo-Doo. I hear that from a lot of people.

Garden Of, you made a very nasty post recently where you said that Anonymous was Melania Trump. Not even Close!  Though Melania would be a very classy Whistle Blower. If she ever tried it.  She better not!

I cannot tell you Who I Am but if you think for a minute about who is The Most Awesome Person right now you’ll probably get it!

It is a big responsibility to be this Country’s Whistle Blower in Chief. But sometimes we get so Distracted by the Lying Media’s obsession with a stupid Forest Fire (ok, whatever) or some supposed ‘Ally’ getting Ethnically Cleansed (so fake!), and we forget about the Great Job that our President is doing. And that is where I, the Greatest Whistle Blower in history, can help, by making you Keep your Attention where Attention needs to be Kept.

Plus I have an awesome Book Deal.  It will be the Greatest Book ever.  And don’t worry, I can Blow the Whistle and write a Great Book and be The Greatest President Ever at the same time.

Oops! You weren’t supposed to know that!

Sincerely, #realwhistleblower

[artwork courtesy of Jonathan Eaton]

NOTE: In honor of Anonymous’ forthcoming ‘insider’ book about Donald Trump, we reprise this Facebook post from September, 2018.

FOR MELANIA TRUMP (aka “Anonymous”)
To the tune of “Stand By Your Man” (with apologies to Tammy Wynette)

Sometimes it’s hard to be first lady
Pretending that you love that orange ham
Our USA has bad times
And he has good times
Doin’ things that no one understands

But if you love us you’ll subvert him
No one else can make him change his plans!
And if you love us, then please Mel, help us,
And snatch those papers from his hands.

Stand by your man,
So you can watch his actions
And all his nutty factions
Like freaking neonazis!
Stand by your man
That’s 24 by 7
Hold on to what control you can
Stand by your man

Stephen Fuller Austin (November 3, 1793 – December 27, 1836) was an American empresario. Known as the “Father of Texas”, and the founder of Texas, he led the second, and ultimately, the successful colonization of the region by bringing 300 families from the United States to the region in 1825[.…]Numerous places and institutions are named in his honor, including the capital of Texas, Austin in Travis County, Austin County, Austin Bayou, Stephen F. Austin State University in Nacogdoches, Austin College in Sherman, and a number of K-12 schools. – Wikipedia, accessed 10/22/19.

The short-lived Republic of Texas [the Anglo settlers] created in 1836 provided as much protection for slavery as possible. Texas’ 1845 annexation by the United States was controversial in some parts of the country precisely because everyone knew the Republic had been constituted as a slaveholder’s republic and was full of people who were enthusiastic about chattel slavery. Bringing Texas into the Union would upset the balance of power between the Northern free states and Southern slave states. – Annette Gordon Reed, “The Real Texas”, New York Review of Books, 10/24/19

Texas must be a slave country. Circumstances and unavoidable necessity compel it. It is the wish of the people there, and it is my duty to do all I can, prudently, in favor of it. I will do so. – Stephen F. Austin, 1833

Down here in the capital of the great state of Texas, we like to say “Keep Austin Weird”. In practice that seems to mean maintaining a sense of innocuous, tourist-friendly, non-system-upsetting conformist nonconformity. More Big Lebowski than Timothy Leary. Restaurants with dog-friendly patios. Weird!

And in our mildly progressive, just a bit behind the curve way, we have done some symbolically meaningful stuff. Like removing the statues of Confederate generals and statesmen – you know, the guys who led hundreds of thousands of their countrymen to their deaths in a vain attempt to preserve the institution of slavery – from their places of honor on the University of Texas campus. And renaming some schools (or, more economically, scrambling to find a ‘safe’ personage with the same last name).

But we have been ignoring the slave-holding elephant in the room.

Wanna hear something really weird? This capital city of Texas is named after a guy from Virginia who bought and sold other human beings, and forced them to labor for his own profit. And he loved slavery so much that he came to the Mexican state of Texas in order expand his slave-powered operations, and to encourage others to do the same.

But, you say (if you are slavery apologist), he just happened to own slaves, like everyone else. And anyway he’s not being honored for his slavery, but for his heroic deeds in founding Texas and in freeing the its people from the despotic tyranny of Mexico.

And what was it about that Mexican tyranny that so upset Stephen F. Austin? Was it the restrictions on his freedom of speech? Was it taxation without representation? Was it blatant corruption in Mexico City?

No, no, and no. What really got Austin’s goat was the fact that slavery was outlawed in Mexico, which was trying to shut it down in Texas.

Funny, we never heard about that part of the story when we learned about the Texas fight for independence in Sam Houston elementary school.

Now I don’t know about you, but I’m a little embarrassed about living in “Austin”, Texas. And a little ashamed that no one cares. My fellow Slaveholderians, we can do better! Why can’t we live in (Ann) Richards, TX, (Ornette) Coleman, TX, (Lightnin’) Hopkins, TX, (Janis) Joplin TX (that would be too cool!), or (Barbara) Jordan, TX?

And if we’re still hung up on dead white guys, how about Edmund Jackson Davis, the Webb County rancher who led the 1^st Texas Cavalry regiment – for the Union Army?

Because I’m tired of living in Slaveholder, Texas.

And after we’re all living in Edmund Jackson Davis, Texas, we can talk about Travis County.

WASHINGTON — President Trump has decided to host the Group of 7 meeting next June at the Trump National Doral near Miami, Mick Mulvaney, the president’s acting chief of staff, said Thursday, a decision that prompted immediate questions about whether it was a conflict of interest for him to choose one of his own properties for a diplomatic event. – N.Y. Times, 10/18/19

Dear World Leader,

Welcome to Trump National Doral!

Be sure to sign up for our referral program! If your friend, fellow leader or despotic tyrant reserves an entire floor any time in the next 6 months, you can earn a free night’s stay or a jumbo pack of anti-tank missiles to ward off that next Russian invasion!

Enjoy the bottles of natural spring water on your nightstand. The first bottle is free!

We feature a wide array of indoor and outdoor activities, including two 18-hole PGA golf courses, an Olympic-size pool, and deeply humiliating but absolutely obligatory photo-ops with The President!

And when you need to wind down from an anxious day of worrying about whether that peace treaty back home is still holding up, enjoy a perfectly grilled steak at The Trump Roast, or the zany entertainment at sTrumpets! We accept Euros, dollars, and unverified intelligence on our opponents.

Hi-speed Internet access is secure and free, provided in partnership with our friends at the GRU, so you can freely discuss anything you’ve seen, heard, read or just dreamed up about Hillary Clinton, the New York Times, or Hunter Biden! Get your creative juices flowing and go wild!

Tipping is optional here at Doral, but if you feel that our service meets your standards, a cash gratuity will help our cleaning staff feed their children or fix their car enough to pass state inspection. And rest assured that all our staff is completely legal, as far as we know!

On the other hand, let us know immediately if the mint is missing from your pillow.  Someone will be on a one-way flight to Honduras, whether they’re Honduran or not!

NOTICE: we strive to create an environment that is enjoyable for our guests while remaining respectful of our beautiful natural setting.  As you wander the grounds, for your own safety, be alert at all times and keep away from alligators, Burmese pythons, Rudy Giuliani, and massage-parlor madams who may have evaded our security systems.  

We know that a little part of you has died since November, 2016. Here at the Trump National Doral we know what that’s like – we’ve been dying since 2012!

(Reuters) – Lev Parnas and Igor Fruman, two foreign-born businessmen associated with U.S. President Donald Trump’s personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani, were arrested on federal charges they conspired to funnel foreign money to U.S. political candidates, prosecutors said on Thursday[….] Parnas and Fruman were arrested on Wednesday at an airport outside Washington carrying one-way tickets to Vienna. – “Factbox: The Criminal Charges Against Giuliani’s Associates”, N.Y. Times, Oct. 10 2019

Our advice to spies, saboteurs, double agents and finks of all stripes: once your cover gets blown and you need to get out of Dodge in a hurry, go ahead and splurge on a round-tripper. Nothing says “Arrest Me” like a one-way ticket to Vienna. Which is worse, 10-20 in Leavenworth or taking shit from the office manager about the expenses on your corporate Amex?

Steve Eaton, Oct. 6 2019

1. Glaciers

2. An intellectually (at least) independent Hong Kong

3. Birds, fish, honeybees and butterflies

4. Seasons. Like autumn. Autumn was nice.

5. Civility

6. Public discourse

7. Civility in public discourse

8. Letters. With paper and stamps. And words. Lovely, thoughtful words.

9. Complete, like, sentences? with subjects? and verbs? and shit like that?

10. Conservatives, of the old-fashioned optimistic, technology embracing, Chamber of Commerce type. If they every really existed.  It all seems so quaint now.

11. Immigrants. (Just look around.  Do you really want to be stuck with what we got?)

12. The feeling that, over the long haul, we can and will make this a greener, less violent, better educated, and fairer country and planet for everyone

And five things we DON’T miss

1. Statues of Robert E. Lee and schools named for Stonewall Jackson

2. Bad coffee

3. All-white-male space missions, Supreme Courts, and whatever else

4. Having to go to “the mall” to get anything

5. A world without recycling