Supreme Court Dances Around The F-Word With Real Potential Financial Consequences
Dirty words make it to the U.S. Supreme Court only occasionally. One of those occasions came Monday, in a case involving a clothing line named "FUCT." The issue is whether the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office acted unconstitutionally when it refused to grant trademark protection to the brand name. And, for the justices, the immediate problem was how to discuss the the F-word without actually saying it.
The "FUCT" clothing line, created by designer Eric Brunetti, is mainly hoodies, loose pants, shorts and T-shirts, all with the brand name prominently displayed.
[...] Brunetti's case got a boost two years ago when the Supreme Court ruled that an Asian-American band calling itself "The Slants" could not be denied trademark protection. The trademark office had turned the band down, because it deemed the name racially "disparaging," but the court said the denial amounted to unconstitutional viewpoint discrimination.
Dealing with the brand name "FUCT" proved a bit more daunting in the Supreme Court chamber Monday. Deputy Solicitor General Malcolm Stewart referred to the brand name as a "profane past participle form of a well-known word of profanity and perhaps the paradigmatic word of profanity in our language."
Also at Reuters.
Previously: Two Unanimous SCOTUS Victories for Free Speech
Related Stories
On Monday, the Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) handed down two unanimous verdicts in favor of free speech. The first involved a dispute over "offensive" trademarks. Reason reports:
Today the U.S. Supreme Court ruled 8-0 in favor of the Asian-American dance-rock band The Slants, holding that the First Amendment protects the rights of the band's members to register a trademark in their band's "offensive" name.
At issue in Matal v. Tam was a federal law prohibiting the registration of any trademark that may "disparage...or bring...into contemp[t] or disrepute" any "persons, living or dead." The Patent and Trademark Office cited this provision in 2011 when it refused to register a trademark in the name of The Slants, thereby denying the band the same protections that federal law extends to countless other musical acts. Justice Samuel Alito led the Court in striking down the censorious rule. "We now hold that this provision violates the Free Speech Clause of the First Amendment," Alito wrote. "It offends a bedrock First Amendment principle: Speech may not be banned on the ground that it expresses ideas that offend."
The Slants, a band composed of Asian performers, had sought to reclaim the slur against Asians by adopting the name themselves.
The other case involved sex offender Lester Packingham, originally convicted in 2001, who had been prosecuted for making a Facebook post in 2010 about being thankful for having a traffic ticket dismissed. A North Carolina law barred convicted sex offenders from a broad range of social media and web activities, leading Packingham to be arrested again. Again, the SCOTUS justices unanimously found the law to be an over-broad restriction of speech and overturned it 8-0.
In both cases, multiple concurring opinions were filed. The justices reached their conclusions for various legal reasons, but they all agreed that offensive speech should be protected and that even heinous acts like prior sex offenses do not deprive people of free speech.
SCOTUSblog has more detailed coverage:
Matal v. Tam: Court documents/commentary and opinion [PDF]
Packingham v. North Carolina: Court documents and analysis of the opinion [PDF]
Submitted via IRC for Bytram
It's official. You can get FUCT, US Supremes tell scandalized bureaucrats in rude trademark spat
When Erik Brunetti in 2011 first tried to obtain a trademark for his clothing company FUCT, the US Patent and Trademark Office blocked his application.
The USPTO relied on a portion of the Lanham Act that allows trademarks to be denied if they "[consist of or comprise] immoral, deceptive, or scandalous matter." So Brunetti challenged the decision in court.
On Monday this week, the US Supreme Court in a 6-3 decision affirmed a December 2017 decision by the US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit that found the act's trademark limitation violates the US Constitution's First Amendment guarantee of free speech.
Pointing at its own 2017 ruling in Matal v. Tam, which said the USPTO could not deny music group The Slants a trademark just because the term might offend some people, the Supreme Court told the agency in so many words to get FUCT on its registry. "[T]he 'immoral or scandalous' bar is substantially overbroad," the majority opinion, from Justice Elena Kagan, reads. "There are a great many immoral and scandalous ideas in the world (even more than there are swearwords), and the Lanham Act covers them all. It therefore violates the First Amendment."
[...] In the past, trademark applications for beverages "Marijuana Cola" and "Ko Kane," for clothing line "Bong Hits 4 Jesus," were denied for being scandalous. But trademarks have been granted for "FCUK" and "Handjob Nails and Spa."
Also at NYT, Courthouse News Service, NPR, Reuters, National Review, CNN, and Vice.
Previously: Can You Trademark an Offensive Name or Not? US Supreme Court to Decide
Two Unanimous SCOTUS Victories for Free Speech
U.S. Supreme Court Considers Issue of Trademark Protection for Profanity
(Score: 5, Insightful) by DannyB on Tuesday April 16 2019, @07:08PM (26 children)
In this decade as it draws to a close, things have changed to where almost nothing is shocking or scandalous anymore.
There are some things which are immoral in some people's eyes.
There are some things which are offensive universally such as systemd.
But mere words that are shocking or scandalous? Have you seen Twitter?
Can the SCOTUS please come up with a simple euphemism for the word that shall not be spoken and move on?
I propose: Words Tactfully F'ed, or simply WTF.
The lower I set my standards the more accomplishments I have.
(Score: 2) by bob_super on Tuesday April 16 2019, @07:29PM (7 children)
Yup.
As much as I don't really want to explain to my children why people are walking around with swear words on their clothing rather than just in their mouths and on their tattoos and bumper stickers, I'm pretty sure that's a straight first amendment case. Not quite sure why it had to go to the Supremes.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Tuesday April 16 2019, @07:36PM
There might even be less vulgar shirts around if the guy gets his trademark and doesn't have to compete with (as many) counterfeits.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Coward, Anonymous on Tuesday April 16 2019, @07:54PM (5 children)
Seems pretty easy to explain to kids. Those people are idiots and are trying to get attention.
(Score: 2) by bob_super on Tuesday April 16 2019, @08:26PM (4 children)
Yes, but kids are also idiots always trying to get attention (hummm, could it be a coincidence?), and I'm not delighted at having to explain to them why they shouldn't be like their friends, or whatever moron is popular today.
(Score: 1) by Coward, Anonymous on Tuesday April 16 2019, @08:46PM
Hmm, mine isn't that age yet, so I might still come around to your view. With my kid, I keep disparaging comments to a minimum, hoping that when I do say something negative, it will send a strong message.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by stormreaver on Tuesday April 16 2019, @09:20PM (2 children)
If you can't easily explain to your kids what "fuck" means, then I don't think it's the kids who have the issue. It's sad to see such rampant emotional damage present in parents that they can't explain simple biological functions to their kids.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by bob_super on Tuesday April 16 2019, @10:41PM (1 child)
I can. That doesn't mean I should be happy to see it plastered everywhere.
You're drifting off-topic.
I've met many 20-somethings who include swear words in every single sentence. It's their right. But this motherfucking kind of bullshit lack of fucking respect and sense of fucking appropriateness totally sucks balls, and you damn well fucking know that the shitty motherfucking scumbags are gonna be seen as assholes or worthless whores, irregardless [sorry] of whether they have more education and IQ than you and I.
(Score: 2) by fido_dogstoyevsky on Wednesday April 17 2019, @03:08AM
OK, but next time wash your mouth out.
It's NOT a conspiracy... it's a plot.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 16 2019, @07:31PM (15 children)
Why should the government care if a proposed trademark is crass and vulgar? Let the applicant pay his fee and register the name.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 16 2019, @07:40PM (14 children)
exactly. none of their goddamned business. is it infringing on someone else's trademark? no? then fucking grant it you dumb motherfuckers!
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 16 2019, @07:45PM
Rushing to trademark Santorum personal lubricants.
(Score: 2) by fyngyrz on Tuesday April 16 2019, @08:12PM (12 children)
Totally agree.
From TFS:
So? How does this, in way, provide the government with any legitimate authority to override the first amendment?
Oh, hey, that's right — it doesn't.
--
Wow. Apparently it's "rude" to ask the parents
of a kid on a leash if it was a rescue.
(Score: 2) by bob_super on Tuesday April 16 2019, @08:30PM (11 children)
To be fair, the government is not preventing that person from using the offensive language on their product (that'd be a clear First case).
They contend that a Trademark is not a right, but a privilege, and that the people do not find a compelling interest in protecting your exclusivity to the right to use specific unpleasant language in the public space.
(Score: 2) by fyngyrz on Tuesday April 16 2019, @09:02PM (10 children)
Not "the people." The government.
The government is not the people. That's a very important, and very large, distinction. One we should not allow the government's misuse of the word to water down. Particularly when the government is working to control the people in spite of the constitution, instead of serving them according to the constitution, as has been the case for some time now.
Awarding trademarks, or not, is one thing; they're a tool to leverage business and tend to have value to the people as such, the more so if some form of exclusivity is provided. The authorization, and therefore the authority to do this is, in general form at least, present in the constitution's article I, section 8, clause 8.
Policing the people's trademark language is entirely another thing, and presents squarely as a first amendment issue. Not only is there no power to control what language people use to express themselves authorized in the constitution, the first amendment explicitly denies that power to the government.
The fact that they exercise such force (via the FCC or any other mechanism that imposes "these words cannot be uttered / shown / printed / etc.) should not ever be understood as anything but blatant arrogation of unauthorized power.
--
Diapers and Politicians should be changed often.
Both for the same reason.
(Score: 2) by bob_super on Tuesday April 16 2019, @09:34PM (9 children)
> The government is not the people.
You should consider fixing that, before it metastisizes.
> Awarding trademarks, or not, is one thing; they're a tool to leverage business and tend to have value to the people as such,
> the more so if some form of exclusivity is provided. The authorization, and therefore the authority to do this is,
> in general form at least, present in the constitution
So, the government, of behalf of the interest of the people, then ... Which is exactly what I wrote, if you read me again.
> constitution's article I, section 8, clause 8
Patents and copyrights are legally different from trademarks, by the way.
> The fact that they exercise such force (via the FCC or any other mechanism that imposes
> "these words cannot be uttered / shown / printed / etc.) should not ever be understood
> as anything but blatant arrogation of unauthorized power.
The same way that I am requested to keep my nuclear meltdowns on my own property, or for a much better parallel not rent public signage to broadcast porn, The People reserve the right to attach conditions of proper usage when leasing out The People's frequency spectrum. The broadcasters purchasing the right to temporarily conduct business over The People's spectrum are not coerced into doing so if they do not like the terms.
That old thing about being civilized implying some agreed limits on antisocial behavior...
(Score: 2) by fyngyrz on Wednesday April 17 2019, @05:31PM (8 children)
Too late. The authorized government was wholly consumed by the cancer many years ago. Any hope for the desired constitutional republic was lost with the rise of the now pure oligarchy here in the USA.
No: The government, of behalf of the interest of the government.
Yes, however, they're in the same ballpark; they're a mechanism that falls cleanly into the author portion of:
No. Nothing like. Forbidding abridgment of nuclear meltdowns is not an explicit constitutional limit on the federal government.
Again, the feds have no constitutional authorization to impose such a limitation, and in fact are specifically enjoined not to by the first amendment:
FTFY
FTFY, too.
Yeah, actually, that old thing about the government being limited by the constitution that actually authorizes its existence.
Of course, the oligarchy pays little attention to the constitution at all, unless it can use it to further its goals of further consolidating the control of the country by the rich and powerful; that's typically done with dog whistles and misdirection, well seasoned with sophistry and SCOTUS-driven redefinitions that range from subtly wrongful to outright absurdly so.
Interstate commerce? It means Intrastate commerce now!
No infringement on keeping and carrying arms? Goody goody, let's infringe like mad!
No abridging speech? Well, except when we want to, of course. Here, have a gag order. Otherwise, get over there in your "free speech zone" and you can say whatever you want cleanly out of the hearing of the people you needed to hear you. And by the way, here's a whole list of stuff you can't say at all. What's your security clearance again?
No abridging assembly? Um, well, let's see if we want to give you a permit.
No warrants shall issue? We don' need no steenkin' warrants anyway.
No unreasonable search? Hey, no problem, we'll just say it's reasonable. While completely ignoring the constitutionally provided definition of reasonable, of course. Plus, you know, within 100 miles of a border, we can do anything we want, because... um... BECAUSE!
No double jeopardy? Heh heh heh... we'll just claim it's civil, not criminal, and slap em again. Totally works, because... um... ALSO BECAUSE!
No ex post facto laws? Oh hey, sure, why not? Have some more, they're tasty! If it seems really tough to do, no worries, again, just use civil law and pretend the ex post facto clause is only applicable to criminal law. Totally works. We will crush you with additional punishments subsequent to your initial sentencing. We like that. A lot. Really a lot.
No compelling someone to be a witness against themselves? Hey Leroy, you got the bucket and the water? Or do we not do that until we get the defendant out of jail for refusing to answer and stick 'em in Guantanamo? I can't remember. Oh well. Let's see how they like spending time in pound-em-in-the-ass and/or shiv-em-with-something-stabby prison for not answering. So we don't have to torture them. After all, we won't be torturing them! It was totally them prisners, Martha! Not Our Fault! And besides, losing your job, the associated income, probably anything you have a loan on, and any ability to get a new job wouldn't compel anyone, amirite? Of course I are.
No private property be taken for public use, without just compensation? Well, except, lemme see, yeah, I've got it: Property has no rights, so it can be seized without a warrant and used any way we like. Hey, this works great.
Speedy trial? Yeah, we'll get to you maybe next year. Or the year after. We're busy, ya know. Be careful about taking up that chocolate on your pillow in the meantime, m'kay?
No excessive bail or fines? Hey, Mr. makes-20k-a-year, we've got a million dollar fine for you. How fun is that? (the only acceptable answer is "very fun, your honor, may I have another?")
No cruel or unusual punishment? Your anus is real stretchy, right? Oh anyway, that's the other prisoners doing that to you, nothing to do with us (whistles and walks away.)
Powers not granted to the federal government by the Constitution, nor prohibited to the states, are reserved to the states or the people? Oh, hey, commerce clause. You know, the one that says we can regulate
interintrastate commerce. Hey! Did you know your telephone is an "instrument of interstate commerce", and so anything you do with it is a federal matter? Oh yeah.Sophism. It's what's for dinner. And Lunch. And Breakfast. And Elevensies. And snacks. If all that's too much for you, here, we have a diet for you that's entirely sophist. You'll stay trim or your diet will be bread and water, comrade.
And there's no fixing this. This is not a slippery slope. Constitutionally and authorized-government-wise speaking, this is a hellhole. The bottom of a hellhole. Or, to return to your metaphor, the whole fucking thing is cancerous.
</RANT>
--
Jst Sy N to Lssy Cmprssn.
(Score: 2) by bob_super on Wednesday April 17 2019, @07:02PM (4 children)
"I believe that my country is not the heaven of freedom and justice it claims to be. It makes me very angry. I shall harvest the energy of my anger and focus it into ranty posts on obscure websites where it amount to preaching to the choir. Tremble, Evil Corporations and your puppet politicians!"
Are you going to do something useful about it, just take it like the SHEEPLE, or move out ?
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 17 2019, @09:22PM
Those aren't mutually exclusive. You can rant on random websites and try to enact change in real life.
(Score: 2) by fyngyrz on Thursday April 18 2019, @12:13AM (2 children)
That's very presumptuous of you. You don't know me. I'm 62. I might have done a thing — or even two — by now.
--
I have neither the time or the crayons to explain.
(Score: 2) by bob_super on Thursday April 18 2019, @12:22AM (1 child)
Do feel free to elaborate, so we might all follow your example.
(Score: 2) by fyngyrz on Thursday April 18 2019, @12:43AM
You sure you want that? What if it's not what you expect?
--
I've fallen off your lawn and I can't get up.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 17 2019, @07:08PM (2 children)
"No infringement on keeping and carrying arms? Goody goody, let's infringe like mad!"
i agree with your overall rant but the 2a is currently very infringed. the people are supposed to have firearms in line with "current military and police use" so the gov doesn't have more firepower than the people. not this hunting/personal protection only bullshit.
(Score: 1, Troll) by bob_super on Wednesday April 17 2019, @08:21PM
I'm suing the city, because they won't widen/streghten the road to ten lanes to the nearest airport. How else am I supposed to driver my stealth bomber out of the garage when it's fully loaded with nuclear cruise missiles ?
(Score: 2) by fyngyrz on Thursday April 18 2019, @12:40AM
Not sure what your "but" is for there — that's what I was saying.
FTFY
No, there's nothing at all in the 2A about "current military and police use", either pro or con. The reference to militia in the explicatory or prefatory phrase was written to refer to the majority of able bodied men, not something like a government controlled national guard (there was no such thing, that was the point, in fact); the "well regulated" phraseology in the same section was written to indicate consistency of arms. There were specific laws written in the years just subsequent to this that specified what that consistency meant; so much shot, so much powder, etc. In the context of the day, what they meant and intended was quite clear.
In any case, this section is not the instruction to government, it is just (obviously part of) the explanation for what follows. Certainly no one of that time would have said "no, you won't need arms to hunt for food", for instance. So we know the explicatory phrase is only the tip of the iceberg... and yet it doesn't matter much, because it is, after all, an explanation. The instruction, the explicit restriction on the government to not infringe, is crystal clear.
The 2A, as presently constituted, explicitly forbids government infringement on the keeping and carrying of arms. There's no limit on that. There obviously should be, but they're very much afraid to try to change anything significant in the bill of rights (actually any part of the constitution), lest they let the constitutional convention dragon out of its box. So instead, they rely on arrogation of power in the form of unauthorized law.
Personally, I think the 2A is in extreme need of revision; but as it stands, pretty much every arms law on the books is in blatant violation of the constitution. The government is very much in the habit of doing whatever the fuck it wants, whenever it wants to. Which is one of the key reasons why we don't actually have a constitutional republic, but instead, an oligarchy. It is also why today the constitution is, at best, only treated as an advisory document. If the government wants to violate it, it will. As been demonstrated over and over, and often enough such malfuckery has subsequently been rubber-stamped by the incompetent puppets in the SCOTUS.
--
You can't fix stupid. But you can elect it.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Coward, Anonymous on Tuesday April 16 2019, @08:26PM
When I was a kid in the 80s, the Dead Kennedys [wikipedia.org] were sometimes in the news. If it's ok to have a band name that mocks the tragic deaths of popular politicians, I don't think a simple misspelled swear word raises the bar, no matter the font size.
(Score: 2) by driverless on Wednesday April 17 2019, @05:39AM
Jeezus, if the Supreme Court is too precious to say the word that the case is about then I say fuck the fucking fuckers.
(Score: 3, Touché) by nobu_the_bard on Tuesday April 16 2019, @07:49PM (1 child)
I'll admit I just want to see a court record where one of the justices uses it as an excuse to drop the f-bomb twelve times in one sentence in a question.
That would just be... interesting to see...?
(Score: 2) by Thexalon on Wednesday April 17 2019, @12:32AM
It was Ruth Bader Ginsberg, wasn't it? After all, she's sometimes known as "The Notorious RBG".
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 16 2019, @07:57PM
something is wrong w/ the world.
now we have to deal with another requirment in our quest to make a axiomatic system self consistant: it's elements can not be assembled so as to offend ... aka ... curse. *sigh* this shit is getting difficult.
srsly, tho ... letter combos that describe a fruit can be ... throw into the legal system grinder and now C9MMON and wrongly typed curse and swear words can be too?
*sigh* i suppose it will all get old and the only people really getting shafted is "the society for a pure a consistant curse words dictionnary" 'cause everything broadcasted will get old or turn into ... sand... ala streusand effect ^_^
(Score: 2) by opinionated_science on Tuesday April 16 2019, @08:21PM (8 children)
The can all FCUK off!!!
(Score: 4, Funny) by c0lo on Tuesday April 16 2019, @10:49PM (6 children)
For the fashion-impaired, FCUK [wikipedia.org]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 2) by opinionated_science on Tuesday April 16 2019, @10:51PM (5 children)
I've seen folks in T-shirts hassled in airports...
you can't make this crap up!!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 17 2019, @04:50AM
Back in 2000, I went on a family ski trip to Breckenridge [wikipedia.org]. There's a double-diamond run there called "The Devil's Crotch." It's steep and generally has big bumps (moguls). At a tourist shop in town, I saw a T-Shirt emblazoned with a curvy woman with horns, a tail and a pitchfork. Next to her was the double-diamond symbol (one of several used to rate the difficulty of ski runs [wikipedia.org]), and a caption reading "I licked The Devil's Crotch," and "Breckenridge, CO at the bottom. So of course I bought a couple of them. One for me and one for a friend.
A week or so after the trip, I went down to Orlando, FL for the SANS Conference [wikipedia.org].
I checked into my hotel, got changed and put on my new favorite t-shirt. As I walked over to the convention center, I started getting all kinds of dirty looks. I checked to make sure my zipper was up and then I realized it was the t-shirt.
I laughed. Some people are just really uptight and need to mind their own FUCTing (see what I did there?) business.
(Score: 2) by driverless on Wednesday April 17 2019, @05:42AM (3 children)
This one [tshirthell.com]?
(Score: 2) by NotSanguine on Wednesday April 17 2019, @07:33AM (2 children)
I see your t-shirt and raise you a fuck. [amazon.com]
No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr
(Score: 2) by driverless on Wednesday April 17 2019, @07:37AM (1 child)
I'd rather have these [amazon.com].
(Score: 2) by NotSanguine on Wednesday April 17 2019, @07:46AM
Those are cool, but you won't get as many admiring glances as when you're wearing a t shirt.
No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr
(Score: 2) by krishnoid on Wednesday April 17 2019, @05:56AM
Or perhaps consider alternative fucts.
(Score: 5, Funny) by NotSanguine on Tuesday April 16 2019, @08:53PM (2 children)
Five years or so ago, while I was at the airport in Norfolk, VA. checking in for my flight home, I saw a guy wearing a sweatshirt that said "STFU."
So I went up to him and asked, completely deadpan, "What school is that?" The guy looked a little perturbed, so (as he was a good four or five inches taller than I was and outweighed me) I chuckled and said I was just joking.
We shared a laugh and had a brief conversation while we were on the line together.
I don't really see why this should be a big deal, as FUCT could be an acronym:
Fervently Unpacking Chocolate Tamales
Festive Undulation by College Teachers
Freaky Uplift in California Territories
Fabulous Universal Chess Tournament
Free Underwater Camping Tents
Financial Underwriters Coordination Test
Faith Unwavering, Christian Truth
The possibilities are endless.
No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 17 2019, @12:59AM (1 child)
1) Freedom Under Conservative Terrorists.
2) Get 60% of the US wearing FUCT underpants
3) PROFIT!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 17 2019, @05:21AM
>> Freedom Under Conservative Terrorists
Unfortunately, there is a distinct lack of freedom for those living under the oppression of conservative terrorists.
The common folk who were forced to live under the "caliphate" of ISIS are one obvious example.
(Score: 4, Funny) by RandomFactor on Tuesday April 16 2019, @09:28PM
a few of decades back, and we and another couple decided to go out to eat. There was a Thai place that we had noticed recently, so that was suggested.
The conversation went vaguely like this:
What do you want to do for dinner?
H1: Phucket?
W2: Phucket. Phucket?
H2: Phucket. Phucket?
W1: Phucket.
And we packed up and went to dinner.
В «Правде» нет известий, в «Известиях» нет правды
(Score: 3, Funny) by isostatic on Tuesday April 16 2019, @09:44PM (5 children)
That’s nothing — Didn’t the U.S nearly have a president named after the post-anal sex mix of shit and sperm? Imagine explaining that to your kids. They just ended up with one named after flatulance.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 16 2019, @10:25PM (3 children)
While I have heard of Trump as an expression for flatulence, one could easily argue that it is far more common to use the term "Trump" to indicate buggery, particularly of immigrants and/or the middle class by their superiors in the upper class. Ergo Trump may more precisely defined as the flatulence occuring post sodomy.
(Score: -1, Offtopic) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 16 2019, @11:11PM (2 children)
Despite the fanciful wishes of the coastal crazies, the job of the President is to ENFORCE the laws enacted by Congress. Some of those laws involve preventing the illegal entrance of foreign citizens into this country. There are a lot of US citizens who would like the President to be successful in that effort. The are also many that would agree that most of the so-called asylum seekers are merely opportunists or economic refugees rather than fleeing any governmental oppression or credible fear of danger.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 17 2019, @01:02AM
Freedom Under Conservative Terrorists
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 17 2019, @04:32AM
Yup. You're so right. I wish this president would do so. You know, like the ACA. Like not using funds appropriated by Congress for one purpose and reallocating them for another. I could go on, but I'm sure you'll ignore it as it conflicts with the worldview that others have told you to believe in.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 16 2019, @10:26PM
Nearly? Maybe in another timeline.