Trump and those pays de merde

Oh dear whatever next? Donald Trump is alleged to have poked yet another stick at Newspeak enthusiasts. From the BBC

US President Donald Trump has sparked outrage after he was reported to have used crude language to describe foreign countries in an Oval Office meeting.

Mr Trump said he did not say “anything derogatory” about Haitians and appeared to deny calling any countries “shitholes”, as was reported, generating a worldwide backlash.

However Democratic Senator Dick Durbin said Mr Trump used “racist” language.

The president did call some African nations “shitholes”, he said.

 A blunder? I don’t think so. I wonder if Trump plays chess? Whether he said it or not this feels like another move in the game, one that is bound to stick if I may use the expression. Why is it bound to stick? Everyone knows why.

Around the world, journalists reporting in other languages faced the question of how to translate what Mr Trump had said.

• In French, headlines featured “pays de merde”, using the expletive to refer to the countries but without the word “hole”
• In Spanish, “países de mierda” was used, similar to the French, as well as “países de porquería”, which means “trash countries”
• In German, “Drecksloch” , which literally means dirt hole but like the word used by Mr Trump is considered vulgar
• In Dutch, one newspaper used “achterlijk” (backward) as its headline
• In Japanese, a word that translates as “outdoor toilet” was used
• In Portuguese, one outlet used a word that translates as ‘pigsty’, while others translated the quote literally