When I heard that Trump's ex Ivana, mother of Ivanka and Eric and Don Jr., had been buried in a corner of his Bedminster golf course, in New Jersey, I thought in my innocence that maybe she'd loved golf. I think it might be appropriate for my ashes to be distributed along the eternal scrappy rough of the 566-yard 12th hole of Gross Golf Course—they've cut down the strand of pines just to the left of the green on #3, so that's no longer an option.
It's more likely, however, that Ivana Trump cares nothing for golf and is being exploited in death by her statesman ex. Brooke Harrington, who researches tax avoidance schemes of the wealthy, points out that the law in New Jersey confers substantial tax advantages upon "cemetery companies." The definition of a "cemetery company" is "any individual, corporation, partnership, association, or other public or private entity which owns, operates, controls, or manages land or places used or dedicated for use for burial of human remains or disposition of cremated human remains." I would hope that the law included some limiting provision related to land used for more than one purpose, though I don't see that it does. In any event, we should all know by now that Trump is not averse to pursuing legally dubious strategies, or just outright illegal ones, if they advance his interests.
There has to be some reason that Ivana's remains are buried on her ex's golf course. That it was her wish might be the unlikeliest. Sad!
But no one's talking about Ivana's resting place now that Trump endorsed "ERIC" in the Republican primary for US Senate in Missouri. The problem with this is that there were three Erics in the race, two of whom were among the leading contenders, and Trump did not trouble himself with last names. Both Erics immediately claimed to have been endorsed by Trump. When journalists made inquiries, a Trump spokesperson said the endorsement "speaks for itself." I guess I agree with that.
The way in which each new bit of Trump lunacy tends to supplant the one before suggests a parlor game for us "haters": identifying a forgotten shard of Trumpean stupidity that elicits envious "Oh yeahs!" from the other contestants. You would not want to waste a turn on, for example, Trump's view that ingesting bleach might combat "the Wuhan virus"—that one's insufficiently obscure to be a crowd pleaser, I'm afraid. My go-to would probably be his proposal to augment the wall on our southern border with a moat to be well stocked with either snakes or alligators. Apparently White House staffers were placing calls to engineers, zoologists—experts from various fields who presumably could advise regarding the project's cost and plausibility. Imagine being an actual expert and taking one of those calls.
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