Donald Trump is really quite good at one special skill: Branding.
He has slapped his name on a ridiculous range of consumer merch – from teddy bears to a urine test. His policies and behavior, however, have turned the brand so toxic that only two merchandisers have kept his name on their products. Still, some two dozen luxury condos and other glossy real estate projects blare his name, plus 17 global golf resorts are branded with his logo. Then, of course, there’s his very own post office.
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Yes, the “Old Post Office Pavilion,” an iconic 1899 federal structure that once housed our country’s postal service and was home to various other national government agencies. Located just five blocks from the White House, he and daughter Ivanka had it converted into a hotel for the rich: “The Trump International Hotel, Washington, DC.” They even transformed what once was the office of America’s postmaster general into a 5,000-square-foot swank suite, which can be yours for about $25,000 a night. There’s an even larger presidential suite, which The Donald immodestly named for himself, charging up to $29,000 for a one-night-stay (plus $4,000 in taxes). Branding the once-public facility with the Trump name was “really important,” Ivanka declared at the hotel’s launch. “You’ve got to be careful,” she explained – “you can’t allow people to walk by thinking it’s a post office.”
Daddy agrees. Now that he’s in the White House, he even wants to bring the family’s sensibility for branding to your local PO. The Trumpsters say, it’s time to turn our historic public mail service over to the magic of the free market profit motive and give it the efficiency that only corporations can provide. You know, like airlines and cable companies do.
To help keep our public post office public go to: USMailNotForSale.org.
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