Picking on the Presidents

From 3-year-old Sarah's insightful observation upon surveying her first (and yes, there have been many) placemat of the presidents, "Where are the LADY presidents?" to Darren's unabashed, long-term (5 years+ and counting) commitment to his Commander in Chief of choice, Chester A. Arthur, leaders of the free-world fascinate our twosome.

Lately, the name-calling typical of nine-year-olds has seeped into our normally sweet-speaking home. (Okay, maybe "normally sweet speaking" is an exaggeration, but name-calling IS new!)

Apparently, a position of power doesn't prohibit their pithy commentary.

Rather than pencilling in the pictured presidents' names on the blanks below, a wide open window was provided to word-play and wise-crack White House dwellers past and present. Some of the snark is basically bullying---based on empirically unfortunate aspects ---e.g. William "Chubs" Taft and Millard "Babyface" Fillmore. Others alliterative with pleasing pentameter ---e.g. Benjamin "Buttface" Harrison, Calvin "Cooler" Coolidge and William "Meaty" McKinley. However, a few express a clear affinity --- Abraham "Hunk Man" Lincoln and James "Lips" Madison. Granted "Buttface" and "Chubs" are not exactly nice, but a few (whose names have been changed, but may be less-than-innocent) are so double-plus un-nice and disrespectful (e.g. "Idiot", "Weirdo" and  "Ugly"), I am going to talk a little truth to power with our pair tomorrow over breakfast.

If only Bill Maher's, Keith Olberman's, Rush Limbaugh's and Sean Hannity's parents would've pondered the same...