Trumpia, Part 1

Trump Trivia . . .

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I got up at 3.00am our time to watch the inauguration.

I noticed that The Donald made the following repeated hand mannerisms during his speech:

and

And, like the old joke about wondering why the baseball was getting bigger, then it hit me.

The new President was sending a message:

and

meaning

Who was the message being given to and what is he meaning by it?  I haven't worked that out yet, so you guys reading this put your thinking caps on and do a Robert Langdon.  I've done the hard part.

In the meantime, some Trumpia . . . 

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Donald John Trump was born June 14, 1946 in Jamaica Estates, Queens, a neighbourhood in New York City. He was the second youngest child of five children. Of his four siblings, three are living: Maryanne, Elizabeth, and Robert. Trump’s older brother Fred Jr. (who was 8 years older than Donald Trump) died in 1981 from alcoholism, which Trump says led him to avoid trying alcohol or cigarettes.

Photo from Donald Trump’s Instagram page, undated.

Donald Trump, left, with his brother, Fred Jr, brother Robert, sister, Maryanne, and sister Elizabeth.

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Trump is of paternal German ancestry and maternal Scottish ancestry. His mother and all his grandparents were born in Europe. His paternal grandparents were immigrants from Kallstadt, Germany, and his father, who became a New York City real estate developer, was born in the Bronx. His mother emigrated to New York from her birthplace of Tong, Lewis, Scotland. Fred and Mary met in New York and married in 1936, raising their family in Queens.

Trump with his parents at New York Military Academy

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Due to behaviour problems, Trump left his school at age 13 and was enrolled in the New York Military Academy, where he finished the eighth grade and high school. He attained the rank of captain.

Donald Trump, pictured in his 1964 New York Military Academy yearbook.

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The original German Trump family name was Drumpf, a point hammered by Last Week Tonight host John Oliver. It is not clear when it was anglicized or by whom. There are some researchers who maintain that it was in the 1600’s in Germany and some who suggest that Trump's grandfather changed it upon coming to the United States at 16 years old in 1885. 

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Trump attended Fordham University in the Bronx for two years, beginning in August 1964. He then transferred to the Wharton School of Finance and Commerce at the University of Pennsylvania, which offered one of the few real estate studies departments in United States academia. While there, he worked at the family’s company, Elizabeth Trump & Son, named for his paternal grandmother. Trump graduated from Wharton in May 1968 with a Bachelor of Science in Economics.

Donald Trump with his father, Fred Trump, after graduating from Wharton in 1968.

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Trump was not drafted during the Vietnam War. While in college from 1964 to 1968, he obtained four student deferments. In 1966, he was deemed fit for service based upon a military medical examination, and in 1968 was briefly classified as fit by a local draft board, but was given a 1-Y medical deferment in October 1968. In an interview for a 2015 biography, Trump attributed his medical deferment to heel spurs. In December 1969 Trump received a high number in the draft lottery, which would also have exempted him from service.

In a 1997 interview with shock jock Howard Stern, Trump talked about how he had been “lucky” not to have contracted diseases when he was sleeping around. “I’ve been so lucky in terms of that whole world. It is a dangerous world out there. It’s scary, like Vietnam. Sort of like the Vietnam-era. It is my personal Vietnam. I feel like a great and very brave soldier.”

See/hear the interview at:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h822LPnM5uw

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The First Lady of the US, Melania Trump (born Melanija Knavs, April 26, 1970; germanized to Melania Knauss, is a Slovene-American former model. Born in Slovenia, she became a permanent resident of the United States in 2001 and a citizen in 2006. She is the second foreign-born First Lady of the United States, following Louisa Adams in 1825.

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Donald and Melania Trump have one child, Barron William Trump, born March 20, 2006. Melania suggested his middle name and her husband suggested his first name. He plays golf with his father and is reported to be fluent in Slovene. He is said to like wearing a suit and tie, and Trump's nickname for him is "Mini-Donald".

Why named Barron? No one knows for sure but it is known that Trump has had a fascination with the name for quite a while, including using it as a fake persona. According to the Washington Post, Trump used the alias "John Barron" when speaking to the press as far back as 1980. In 2004, after the success of The Apprentice reality show, there was a brief attempt to create a scripted drama based on Donald Trump's life. When screenwriter Gay Walch delivered the pilot to her subject, he had only one note: change the character’s last name to Barron.

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Donald Trump’s four other children came from two different marriages. Eldest kids, Donald Trump Jr., Ivanka, and Eric were born to first wife Ivana and are widely known for appearing in Trump's "The Apprentice" series. 

Tiffany came from Trump's marriage to Marla Maples. She's been seen on "The Richest Kids of Instagram," and is the closest in age to Barron, with a 13-year age gap.