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The Summer of Trump ... and Deez Nuts

By Clarence Page, Tribune Content Agency on

What does Donald Trump have in common with Deez Nuts, except for the way that their names make some people laugh?

Both Trump, the billionaire Republican presidential frontrunner, and Deez Nuts, the registered independent presidential candidate made up by a 15-year-old Iowa schoolboy, offer a measure of voter discontent with both major political parties.

They also remind us that we should make neither too much nor too little of candidates who are causing a sensation in August before an election year.

We shouldn't make too much of them because August is the slowest month for those of us who cover or comment on politics and government. It is also a time when the angriest and most upset voters show their appreciation for a candidate who breaks out of the usual mold.

Enter Donald Trump, a long-shot, politically inexperienced and tirelessly self-promoting mogul whose flip-flop over the years from liberal to conservative is conveniently overlooked, as long as he is willing to shake things up.

That's no problem for Trump, whose raw enthusiasm tries to make up for his inexperience with the big issues. He promised in one interview, for example, to "repeal and replace Obamacare with something terrific." Wow, what a concept!

 

It is amusing to me that Trump's passionate supporters, who have made him the Grand Old Party's frontrunner, include many who criticized President Barack Obama for his lack of experience in public office.

Deez Nuts, by contrast, not only lacks experience but doesn't even exist, at least, not outside the imagination of Brady Olson, teen son of rural Wallingford, Iowa, corn and soybean farmers, according to the New York Times.

Brady registered Deez Nuts with the Federal Election Commission and launched a webpage "to clear the way for a future third-party movement," he told the Times.

Deez Nuts' platform "suggests a libertarian tinge," notes the Times, which confirms my long-held belief that libertarianism is a tailor-made philosophy for 15-year-old boys -- and everyone else who longs for a life without limits.

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(c) 2015 CLARENCE PAGE DISTRIBUTED BY TRIBUNE MEDIA SERVICES, INC.

 

 

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