As the new year dawns on us, it brings many things –– commitments to health, wealth, new jobs and resolutions in general. It also brings with it a very exciting milestone in many millennials lives –– their very first presidential election. That is, the first one where their vote actually counts. As a college-aged woman, I try to keep myself pretty well-educated on the political scene, and I'm particularly interested in the variety of contestants we have running for the Republican party nomination (read: I'm terrified). From absolutely zero political experience, to wanting to build walls, refusing Muslim immigrants, setting women's rights back several decades, defunding Planned Parenthood and opposing the now-legal marriage equality law –– the list is quite extensive. A fun drinking game to play while watching debates, should you be of age, is to take a shot every time someone says the words "radical Islamic terrorism." Better have 9-11 dialed and ready to go.
This all being said, I feel as though Shakespeare would have the most fun picking fun at these goons running for office. Our favorite Bard might have had a few choice phrases for each of the oh-so-qualified candidates. Here's what he might have said:
About Ben Carson:
"O gull! O dolt! As ignorant as dirt!" (from Othello, Act 5 Scene 2)
About Chris Christie:
"Highly fed and lowly taught." (from All's Well That Ends Well, Act 2 Scene 2)
About Jeb Bush:
"False of heart, light of ear, bloody of hand." (from The Tragedy of King Lear, Act 3 Scene 4)
About Ted Cruz:
"Not so much brain as ear wax." (from Troilus and Cressida, Act 5 Scene 1)
About Carly Fiorina:
"Infinite and endless liar, an hourly promise-breaker." (from All's Well That Ends Well, Act 3 Scene 6)
About Jim Gilmore:
"All eyes and no sight." (from Troilus and Cressida, Act 1 Scene 2)
About Mike Huckabee:
"The soul of this man is his clothes." (from All's Well That Ends Well, Act 2 Scene 5)
About John Kasich:
"A fusty nut with no kernel." (from Troilus and Cressida, Act 2 Scene 1)
About Rand Paul:
"Thou art a boil. A plague sore, an embossed carbuncle in my corrupted blood." (from King Lear, Act 2 Scene 4)
About Rick Santorum:
"I wonder that you will still be talking. Nobody marks you." (from Much Ado About Nothing, Act 1 Scene 1)
About Marco Rubio:
"Tempt not too much the hatred of my spirit, for I am sick when I do look on thee." (from A Midsummer Night's Dream, Act 2 Scene 1)
About Donald Trump:
"Anointed sovereign of sighs and groans." (from Love's Labour's Lost, Act 3 Scene 1)
"All the infections that the sun sucks up." (from The Tempest, Act 2 Scene 2)
"Lump of foul deformity." (from Richard III, Act 1 Scene 2)
"Veriest varlet that ever chewed with a tooth." (from Henry IV Part 1, Act 2 Scene 2)
"More of your conversation would infect my brain." (from The Tragedy of Coriolanus, Act 2 Scene 1)
And, my personal favorite:
"Methinks thou art a general offence, and every man should beat thee. I think thou wast created for men to breathe themselves upon you." (from All's Well That Ends Well, Act 2 Scene 3)
Choose wisely, my friends.
