If Donald Trump issued the Gettysburg address, this is what he would say

‘They built a country based on this big new deal called freedom. I’m Trump. Believe me, nobody does deals better than me’

If Donald Trump were elected president, what speech would he deliver? John Lichfield imagines his own Gettysburg address

One score years ago and six, when I worked in Washington, I wrote a parody of the Gettsyburg address as it might have been spoken by President George Bush (senior). I stole the idea from a celebrated 1950s spoof of Abraham Lincoln’s famous speech as spoken, or mis-spoken, by President Dwight Eisenhower.

My version, published in The Independent at the time, attempted to copy the bizarre speech patterns of George Bush père – a mixture of schoolboy and Texan slang, tortured syntax and unfinished sentences. It was meant to be affectionate. The older George Bush is a nice man and was a better president than we realised at the time.

Today I am moved to write another Gettysburg address, as spoken by Donald Trump, though I cannot say this one is meant to be affectionate.

First, here is the original from November 1863. President Lincoln was speaking at the inauguration of a war cemetery, three months after the battle of Gettysburg during the American Civil War.

1863: Abraham Lincoln

Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.

Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battle-field of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.

But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate – we can not consecrate – we can not hallow – this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract.

The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here.

It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced.

It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us – that from these honoured dead we take increased devotion – to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion, that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain – that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom – and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.

2016: Donald Trump

A bunch of time ago, our grand-daddies did something great. Yeah, our grand-daddies. Our grandmas, what were they doing? I’ll tell you. Painting their nails or going to the bathroom. Something disgusting, most likely.

It was our grand-daddies built this great continent. I’m Donald Trump and, believe me, Trump knows about building. They built a country based on this big new deal called freedom. I’m Trump. Believe me, nobody does deals better than me.

But our grand-daddies’ deal. It wasn’t bad. It said everyone was equal – actually, all men, they said, “all men” – I guess they really meant all white men. The lying liberal media wouldn’t let them say what they really meant. Political correctness even then.

Give me a break. Only Donald Trump says it how it is. Anyhow, our grand-daddies said all men were created equal.

Now we are in this big fat ass-kicking contest. You know why? To decide whether this great country stays free. And stays great. Or goes down the tubes. That’s the way it is.

Very simple. You have come here today to listen to Donald Trump. We are here to open the Trump Cemetery. Greatest cemetery that was ever built.

A bunch of guys died here to stop an army of illegal immigrants from the south. It is only right that Donald Trump should build them a cemetery.

And not just any ol’ cemetery. A Trump cemetery. I can tell you. Building things. Nobody is close. Trump builds the best cemeteries in North America. World-class cemeteries.

Do you think the liberal elite lying media will report fairly what Trump says here today? Forget it. Do you think the lying liberal elite media will remember what I say? Not a chance.

Here’s the way it is. Very simple. It is for you folks and for Trump to finish the freedom job our grand-daddies started. Sweep it all away. The elites. The media. The politicians. The total disarray and gross incompetence. That’s the way it is.

Simple. We have to make this country great again. So this nation, under Trump, can be born again. And kick the rest of the world’s ass. So that government of ordinary hard-working folks, by The Donald, for ordinary, hard-working folks, shall not go down the toilet.

Thank you all very much. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you very much, everybody. Thank you. Beautiful. Thank you.