为什么特朗普恨你的狗
为什么特朗普恨你的狗
Reaching for verbs to describe Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi’s final moments, President Trump grabbed hold of “crying,” “screaming” and “whimpering.”
在描述阿布·贝克尔·巴格达迪(Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi)的临终一幕时,特朗普总统紧紧围绕“哭喊”、“尖叫”和“抽抽搭搭”几个动词。
Reaching for nouns, he said that al-Baghdadi died “like a dog.”
对名词的选用则是巴格达迪死得“像一条狗”。
I wasn’t aware that canines expired in a signature fashion, but Trump knows best, even if he doesn’t know so very many words. About a week later, when he took characteristically nasty note of Beto O’Rourke’s decision to abandon the presidential race, he said that O’Rourke quit “like a dog.”
原来狗之于描述死亡是如此有代表性,我还真不知道。但特朗普对此是最了解的,尽管他并不知道太多词汇。一周后,他以自己特有的恶毒语气评价了贝托·欧洛克(Beto O'Rourke)放弃总统竞选的决定,说欧洛克“像一条狗”一样退出了。
Some similes demand repetition.
有些比喻值得多用。
This wasn’t one of them.
但并不是这种。
But a lack of verbal ingenuity never stopped Trump. And an animus toward a certain animal has long, well, hounded him.
然而遣词才智的缺乏从未使特朗普停下脚步。同时,对于某动物的这一情结已经了围困他很久了。
In his boundless unoriginality, he has likened women he dislikes to dogs. In his infinite incoherence, he has repeatedly tweeted of people being fired like dogs. I personally haven’t met all that many gainfully employed pooches, unless digging holes in the backyard is a profession, and when those excavators received orders to desist, none of them got a pink slip and a referral to career counseling.
凭着他那颗绝无新意的头脑,他把他不喜欢的女人比作狗。在他没完没了语无伦次的常态下,他反复发推文说谁谁像狗一样被解雇了。我个人还没有遇到过那么多能拿到肥缺的狗狗,除非在后院给自己挖地洞也是个职业。而当这些挖洞狗接到停工指令时,可是不会收到解雇通知,并被转接去职业咨询的。
Trump did recently make the acquaintance — from a distance — of a dog with a bona fide job. That dog is a Belgian Malinois named Conan. And Conan’s job, brilliantly executed, was to find, chase and corner al-Baghdadi. Trump called Conan “a beautiful dog, a talented dog.” The New York Post put Conan’s picture on its front page, along with the headline “Zero Bark Thirty.” Trump also tweeted a Photoshopped image in which he draped a medal around Conan’s neck.
不过特朗普最近的确远程结识了一只有正经工作的狗,一只叫柯南的比利时玛利诺犬。柯南出色地执行了寻找、追逐和围堵巴格达迪的任务。特朗普称柯南是“一只美丽的狗,一只有才华的狗”。《纽约邮报》(New York Post)将柯南的照片和头条标题“Zero Bark Thirty”(改编自《猎杀本拉登》[Zero Dark Thirty]片名——译注)一起印在了头版。特朗普还在Twitter上发了一张用Photoshop做出来的图,是他在往柯南的脖子上挂一枚勋章。
So this Malinois warrants decoration while “a dog” gets derision? Or is it just that every dog has its day? I used to believe that adage until Trump came along. He has had more than 1,000 days in the presidency, even as the White House goes to the dogs.
为何这只玛利诺犬被授予勋章,而“一条狗”则被嘲笑?还是说但凡“是条狗”都会有个出风头的机会?我曾经相信这句俗语,直到特朗普出现。如今他在位已经超过1000天,尽管白宫本身已经成了个蝇营狗苟之地。
Journalists with many news organizations (The Washington Post, New York magazine, Slate and more) have had a field day with Trump’s dogged use of “dog” as an all-purpose put-down. When it comes to “like a dog,” he’s like a dog with a bone.
对于特朗普持之以恒地使用万能的“狗”来造句噎人,很多新闻机构的记者有着亲身体会(《华盛顿邮报》、《纽约》杂志、Slate等)。对于“像一条狗”这个说法,他就像狗见了骨头一样死咬着不放。
You’re no one until he’s divined the flea-bitten mongrel within you — and you’ve joined a dog pound that includes the likes of Mitt Romney, Gen. Stanley McChrystal, Bill Maher, Steve Bannon, George Will, Omarosa Manigault Newman, my fellow Times columnist Gail Collins and many more.
他起初不会理睬你,直到他感知到你灵魂里有只被跳蚤叮咬的杂种狗——你会发现你已被归入到如米特·罗姆尼(Mitt Romney)、斯坦利·麦克里斯特尔将军(Stanley McChrystal)、比尔·马赫(Bill Maher)、斯蒂芬·班农(Steve Bannon)、乔治·威尔(George Will),奥马罗萨·马尼戈·纽曼(Omarosa Manigault Newman)以及我的《纽约时报》专栏同仁盖尔·柯林斯(Gail Collins)等等一大波狗狗之流。
Fun doggy factoids cling to him like so much Samoyed fur. He’s the first president in more than a century who doesn’t have a dog. According to the Chinese zodiac, he was born in the year of the dog. According to Ivana Trump, he provoked growls from her dog, Chappy, a poodle who could suss out a peacock. The media’s nickname for his first defense secretary, James Mattis, was “mad dog.” And from the forehead up, he’s a dead ringer for a distressed Pomeranian.
他的趣味轶事也像萨摩耶的毛一样不离不弃。他是美国一个世纪以来第一位没有养狗的总统。根据中国的属相,他是狗年出生的。据伊万娜·特朗普(Ivana Trump)说,她的Chappy——一条见到孔雀都会上去嗅探一番的贵宾——见到他会发出低吼。媒体对他的第一任国防部长詹姆斯·马蒂斯(James Mattis)的昵称是“疯狗”。从额头往上,他简直就像一只垂头丧气的博美。
But no one has definitively solved the riddle of what seems like a rabid case of canine contempt. I have my own theories, but first I have the more erudite insights of Justin Frank, a psychiatrist and psychoanalyst and the author of the book “Trump on the Couch.”
为何如患了狂犬病般蔑视犬类?至今没有人能解开这个谜。我倒是有我自己的理论,但首先我想介绍精神病学家和心理分析学家贾斯汀·弗兰克(Justin Frank)更博学的见解。他是《躺椅上的特朗普》(Trump on the Couch)的作者。
Frank noted that Trump is “phobic about germs” and no doubt sees dogs as four-legged germ factories. He probably also thinks “dogs are stupid because they obey,” Frank said. Disobedience is Trump’s preferred posture, at least for himself, although he broke with that to become, in Frank’s words, “Putin’s lap dog.” Disobedience, that is, and distemper.
弗兰克指出,特朗普对细菌“心怀恐惧”,毫无疑问,这令他视狗为四条腿的细菌工厂。他可能还认为“狗是愚蠢的,因为它们服从命令”,弗兰克说。特朗普偏爱不服从的姿态,至少他自己是这么认为的,尽管他背离了这个原则,变成了“普京的爱犬”(弗兰克的原话)。川普钟意的不仅仅是不服从,还有政治上的动荡(distemper,也有狗瘟之意)。
Frank raised another issue that the president might well have with dogs: When they’re around, they often steal attention, becoming the objects of people’s oohing and cooing. Trump likes the oohing all to himself.
弗兰克提出了另一个总统与狗的问题:当有狗的时候,它们总是抢走别人的关注,成为人们宠爱的对象。而特朗普要独占关注和宠爱。
My own sense? For Trump, all relationships are transactional and God’s creatures possess value only in accordance with their ability to elevate and enrich him. His affection for Kellyanne Conway hinges on her superhuman power not to break into laughter or spontaneously combust when she puts the most ludicrously adulatory spin on his most transparently execrable deeds. If border collies performed that trick, he would keep a kennel of them at Mar-a-Loco.
至于我的感觉?对于特朗普来说,所有的关系都是交易,并且世间万物的价值只与抬高他、滋养他的能力有关。特朗普之所以喜欢凯莉安·康维(Kellyanne Conway),是因为当她用最荒唐可笑的彩虹屁来赞美他最赤裸裸的无耻行为时,她拥有能忍住不笑或不会原地爆炸的超能力。如果一只边境牧羊犬也能做到这一点,他会在马阿拉歌庄园(Mar-a-Loco)给它留一个窝。
His regard for Rudy Giuliani depends on the hunched henchman’s openness to unscrupulous errands. If Doberman pinschers could pressure Ukrainian officials to investigate Joe and Hunter Biden, Trump would repurpose Camp David as a dog run and turn Ivanka’s pumps into chew toys.
他对鲁迪·朱利安尼(Rudy Giuliani)的重视,是出于这个驼背心腹对于无良差事的接纳程度。如果杜宾犬可以向乌克兰官员施压,要求对拜登父子展开调查,特朗普会把戴维营改造成遛狗的地方,并把伊万卡的高跟鞋给它当磨牙玩具。
But they can’t, just as Siberian huskies can’t hack Democrats’ emails — for that, a husky Siberian is handier — and golden retrievers can’t retrieve gold. Dogs are useless to Trump, at least by the criteria he cares about.
但它们做不到,就像西伯利亚的哈士奇不能黑进民主党的邮件系统一样——这活还是得找强壮的西伯利亚人——金毛也不能寻回金子。狗对特朗普毫无用处,至少在他所关心的那些事情上。
There’s no money in most of them, no votes in any of them, and they can’t play golf with him and tell him along the way what a manly drive and graceful putt he has. That’s lucky for Lindsey Graham, who would otherwise be swapped out for a Labradoodle lickety-split.
它们大多不值钱,没有投票权,不能和他一起打高尔夫并赞美他挥杆是多么有男子气概,推杆是多么优雅。看来林赛·格雷厄姆(Lindsey Graham)是幸运的,否则他早被一只飞奔的拉布拉多替换掉了。
Conan passed muster only by being a proxy for Trump’s own imagined machismo. Maybe Chappy was merely yappy. Like a Donald.
柯南能得到赏识,因为它替特朗普满足了他想像中的大男子气概。而Chappy只会大呼小叫。就像那个叫唐纳德的唐老鸭。