Life's Rich Pageant

It seems as though
if Donald Trump trusted anyone

it would be
the conventionally attractive women

of his Miss USA competition.

Or maybe it doesn't.

A former Miss Iowa competitor

Elizabeth Mae Davidson

and current field organizer
for Trump's presidential campaign

was fired after mentioning
in a New York Times article

that she was paid less
for doing the same jobs as men

and banned from speaking
at rallies and events

while male organizers were not.

Though she worked part-time
and had a second job
as a paralegal

male employees in her position
were not docked

for working part-time.

If on the off chance

he ever wanted
to rectify the situation

maybe he could borrow
some of the $20 million

Bernie Sanders' campaign
raised in January.

This poem © 2016 Emily Cooper.

A Malignant Progression

President Obama
has signed a memorandum

to create a White House
task force on cancer

and has appointed
Vice President Joe Biden

who has called this effort
a "moonshot"
to eradicate the disease

as its leader

having lost his son Beau
to cancer last year.

Even though Donald Trump
says he can defeat everything

with a simple application
of more bigness
and more badness than anyone

he's no doubt
going to find a way

to say something
completely wrong and insensitive.


This poem © 2016 Emily Cooper.

The Most Dangerous Game

If there is one person

in whom the general public
would feel comfortable trusting

to make an app

that first person who came to mind

would probably not
be Donald Rumsfeld

though luckily

it has nothing to do
with reviving the relics
of the Bush administration

and is just a game
called Churchill's Solitaire

which was not explicitly
created by him

but was created
with Rumsfeld's input

by developers Snapdragon Studios
and media agency Javelin.

However Rumsfeld
does call it "diabolical"

in his article
at Medium.com
describing the game's inspiration

from a meeting with André de Staercke
in 1973

a Belgian government aide

who the Nazis
during World War II
had forced into exile

and who later became
the secretary

of the forever inimitable Churchill

who had demonstrated to him
a more "demanding and complex"

version of solitaire
played with two decks

and 10 rows of cards.

The rest of the world wishes
that Donald had only realized

his programming potential
years ago

rather than pursuing
unknown unknowns.

This poem © 2016 Emily Cooper.

The Sound of Treachery

Fifty years ago

on January 22nd 1966

the top song
on the Billboard charts

was "The Sound of Silence"
by Simon and Garfunkel

and Bernie Sanders
for his latest television ad

has chosen
the duo's song "America".

He must be communicating
some really subversive message

like "Americans should not be silent."

This poem © 2016 Emily Cooper.

La Cebolla

Univision Communications
the largest broadcaster

of Spanish-language programming
in the U.S.

has bought a controlling stake
in satirical news site

The Onion.

The question remains

as to whether
the company will also sue

the satirical Donald Trump

for his offensive comments
about illegal immigration

and refuse to satirize
a single word
about his beauty contest.

This poem © 2016 Emily Cooper.

Stemming the Red Tide

Taiwan has just elected
its first female president

the oppositional
Democratic Progressive Party leader
Tsai Ing-wen

whose party has traditionally leaned in favor
of an independent Taiwan.

An official press release from China
says that there is "no denying
that the DPP's return rule

poses grave challenges
to cross-strait relations."

There's an opportunity
for Donald Trump

to make another cheap shot
at Hillary Clinton's
hopelessly female candidacy

though he may accidentally indicate
his anti-democracy leanings. 

This poem © 2016 Emily Cooper.

Nothing Has Changed

Donald Trump was most likely
not an avid fan
of David Bowie

who started out a Neo-Nazi
and ended up an outspoken advocate

for feeling comfortable
in your own skin

but at least
he's no stranger

to making a new and inadvertent self-reflection

every time
he sics his wit

onto someone
who disagrees with him.

Fellow Republican
Nikki Haley

isn't too fond of President Obama
but did concede

that at his State of the Union address
he did make a good point

when he namelessly rejected
Trump's favored form
of identity politics.

"Yes, Mr. Trump has definitely contributed
to what I think
is just irresponsible talk"

she said on ABC News.

Well perhaps.

Trump called her "weak on immigration"
and said that she asked him

for campaign donations
when she was running for Governor of South Carolina

and probably still would now
if he weren't running for president.

And as for Obama

"He's living in a fantasy land.
I think this man is living
in a fantasy land".

But at least Trump put on

a snazzy pair of reading glasses
when telling a crowd

the cautionary tale
comparing the venomous snake

in soul singer Al Wilson's
1963 song "The Snake"

to immigrants.



This poem © 2016 Emily Cooper.

State of the POTUS

President Obama
will give his final

State of the Union address
on Tuesday.

His aides say

that despite all his frustration
and all Republican candidates' wishes
to the contrary

that he intends to present
an optimistic view

of America's future.



This poem © 2016 Emily Cooper.

Rocking the Boat

(Apologies to the Hues Corporation)

So I'd like to know where
you got the notion

said I'd like to know where
you got the notion

to create
the aptly-named Anthropocene

which is an entirely new
geological epoch

brought about
by human activity

and is estimated
to have started between the years
1945 and 1964?

But ironically
maybe our "cargo full of love and devotion"

is made safest
by more than a few of us

"rocking the boat".


This poem © 2016 Emily Cooper.

Trump's M.O.

The footage
in Donald Trump's television ad

(well at least
his first official campaign-sponsored ad

for himself)

features non-Mexican
Moroccan-born migrants

who are entering
the Spanish autonomous city of Melilla

on the African coast.

Says campaign manager
Corey Lewandowski

"No shit
it's in Morocco."

That settles that.

Emotional visual metaphor
is all well and good

or at least
a highly-indulged-in
trope of campaign ads

but upon hearing the line

calling “for a temporary shutdown
of Muslims entering the United States

until we can figure out
what’s going on”

the public
may be conveniently persuaded

that when it comes
to invasions

spelling doesn't count.

(And hey this time

at least the two countries

have the same
first and last letters.)

This poem © 2016 Emily Cooper.

New Year's Resolve

President Obama's
New Year's resolution

is to proceed
with executive orders

putting in place
new gun control measures

including one major provision
that will require
some unlicensed gun dealers

to get licensed
and to conduct background checks 

on potential buyers. 

And not a single Republican
or NRA lobbyist

can tell him
he won't keep it.

This poem © 2016 Emily Cooper.

First Breach Doctrine

Security researchers

have discovered
that more than 191 million

US voter records

containing voter names and addresses
voter ID numbers
phone numbers

birth dates
and political parties

are now visible
to the public.

Most states currently already allow
access to some of this information

as a matter
of public record

though in South Dakota
for example

access comes with stipulations
against selling the data.

The breach appears
to have been caused

by a third-party firm
that bought the data
from software company Nation Builder

owned by venture capitalist 
Ben Horowitz

and Napster co-founder
and Facebook's first president
Sean Parker

then sold it
at a lower cost

to political campaigns.

Mama don't let

your voter records
grow up to be

data breaches.

(As if the emails
from the DNC

weren't incredibly personal
date invitations

from the president already.)

This poem © 2015 Emily Cooper.

Dynamic Personal Mobility

Pope Francis says
of the atheists

who don't really care
one way or the other

about what God
does not have to offer

that they will still
get into the same place

in which they
have no reason to believe

as will followers
of the Christian God.

He says

"God’s mercy has no limits
if you go to him
with a sincere and contrite heart.

The issue for those
who do not believe in God

is to obey their conscience."

In effect
nothing has changed

and atheists worldwide
will no doubt respond

"Okay cool.

What do you think
we've been doing?"

But they take for granted

that the Pope
had to pull a lot of strings
with God

to upgrade them
from "eternal damnation."

(And right when God
was working

through Santa Claus
to help him deliver

2 billion Hoverboards.)


This poem © 2015 Emily Cooper.

Boy Vey

In his latest Tweets
Donald Trump
now seems less bothered

by the fact
that Hillary Clinton

who said he has
a "penchant for sexism"

was absent
for a brief moment

at the start
of the Democratic debates

on Saturday

and more bothered
that a female person

might have to go
to the bathroom in the first place.

"I know where she went.
It's disgusting.

I don't want to talk about it."

This not-talking-about-it
talking-about-it

accompanies another Tweet
defending his choice of words

when observing
that the Democratic candidate

was "schlonged" by President Obama
during the 2008 campaign.

Either that comment
is also incredibly sexist

(and it's not like Trump
is a big fan
of Obama's immutable attributes either)

or the "schmuck"
needs to learn himself some Yiddish

before he whips out
his penchant again.

This poem © 2015 Emily Cooper.

The Scorn Trooper

On Saturday

Hillary Clinton
walked in about a minute late

relaxed and unfazed

to the Democratic debate
on ABC

hearkening back
to the debate
on October 13th

when she joked
that it took her longer to pee

than her male colleagues

Rumor has it

she was actually tweeting Donald Trump
and his supporters

a "huge spoiler"

about the new Star Wars movie

namely that a black actor
plays a Stormtrooper

and smugly anticipating

the waves of support
in her direction

and the subsequent sycophancy
of Trump's followers

caused by such a revelation

when Trump complained
about the "politically correct" casting.

It's true no news stories exist
to corroborate that rumor

but at least that would explain

why Trump tweeted
"It was really strange
when Hillary was missing

from the podium last night.

Not very presidential!"

rather than criticizing ABC
for airing the debate
a minute too soon.

He seems truly hurt

and granted her campaign
is more than
a little hawkish

but he'll probably get over it
soon enough.

This poem © 2015 Emily Cooper.

Crimea River

Now that Donald Trump
has received the ringing endorsement

of charismatic Russian leader
Vladimir Putin

who called him
“a very bright and talented man” and

“the absolute leader
of the presidential race”

we can soon expect
a 2016 shirtless-horseback-riding
and protester-heckling calendar

and not a moment too soon.

Every other country
will wish they were
on such good terms

and Bernie Sanders will be upset
that Trump single-handedly
brought about the end of Communism

(the 1991 dissolution
of the Communist Party
being a hoax

of course).

And only a 13-year-old
Justin Timberlake song

will be the appropriate Tweeted response
to all of Trump's haters.

"Don't it make
you sad about it?"

This poem © 2015 Emily Cooper.

Bully Pulpit

After his luncheon
with Killer Mike

Bernie Sanders
must be trying out
his rap skills on Twitter

when he writes
"In my view
we need to invest in jobs and education

not jails and incarceration"

and rues that "Today no piece of legislation
gets onto the floor

of the US Senate

unless it was bought
and paid for."

The message is good
and it rhymes

though the meter
a little clunky.

But it flows better

than Donald Trump's
new beef

with Ted Cruz.

"I was disappointed that Ted Cruz
would speak
behind my back

get caught
and then deny it.

Well welcome
to the wonderful world
of politics!"

It's got a juvenile
passive-aggressiveness

that should appeal

to all the bullies
in middle school

who are running smear campaigns
for class president.

(Though sixth-graders
tend to have
terrible taste in music.)

This poem © 2015 Emily Cooper.