The Invitational Week 109: The Alternaugural Address
Write something funnier with the words from the latest Jan. 20 diatribe. Plus AMAZING anagrams.
Pat Myers and Gene Weingarten
Jan 30, 2025


Is it the BACONATOR or some fake CRAB-TOONA? See more anagrams for the Wendy’s artery assault in today’s results.
Hello. Or, alternatively, “O hell.”

Today’s Invitational results are from our Week 107 anagram contest, in which we challenged you to scramble and rescramble all sorts of things, which you did to great result. The contest was inaugurated around the time of the Inauguration, meaning that one thing on everyone’s minds was the new malevolence in the White House. We make no apologies for a certain theme that inevitably permeated the entries.

In the meanwhile:

"Aliens from Mars love me, you know. ‘Great One,’ they said to me, ‘make our planet your new state.’ I said, ‘Perhaps after Panama.’”
For Invitational Week 109: Using only words that Trump used during his 2025 inaugural address, write either a fake passage from an alternative inaugural speech, as above, or just anything else: a “quote,” an observation, a joke, a dialogue, a poem, whatever. For consistency, please use the White House transcript, skipping over notes like “(applause).” You may also attribute your quote to someone other than Trump, or to no one. Within a single entry, you can’t use a word more often than Trump used it.

Since we’ve done a number of “word bank” contests over the years, we’ve developed some ground rules about hyphens, capitalization, whether you can add an S to a word, etc. And if you’re gagging at the prospect of mulling over the re-president’s odious fulmination over and over — you’re saved: You don’t actually have to read it! Because once again, Hall of Fame Loser Gary Crockett has provided us with a list of every word Trump said, along with the number of times it occurs in the speech. See both the rules and the word list at this link right here.

How long should these things be? Depends on how funny and clever they are; if an entry becomes boring or difficult to read, we’re likely to toss it. To see what we went for last time, see the nifty inking entries from our 2024 State of the Union contest.

Deadline is Saturday, Feb. 8, 2025, at 9 p.m. ET. Results will run here in The Gene Pool on Thursday, Feb. 13. As usual, you may submit up to 25 entries for this week’s contest, preferably all on the same form.

Formatting this week: It’s just our standard request to write each entry as a single line (i.e., don’t push Enter until you’re finished that particular entry). That way we can shuffle all the entries and won’t know if you’ve sent us one entry or 25.

Click here for this week’s entry form, or go to tinyurl.com/inv-form-109.

This week’s winner gets a candle encased in this little metal shell (pictured front and back). We have it on excellent authority that Donald Trump received five of these as gifts from all his known children. Donated by superdad Jeff Contompasis.


Runners-up get autographed fake money featuring the Czar or Empress, in one of eight nifty designs. Honorable mentions get bupkis, except for a personal email from the E, plus the Fir Stink for First Ink for First Offenders.

Wittiness > Witness It: The multi-anagrams of Week 107
In Invitational Week 107 we asked for a sentence or two that included either (a) a word or name plus at least two anagrams of it or (b) a multi-word phrase that included at least one anagram of it. We would declare the results utterly astonishing in their ingenuity, except that these and other Losers have repeatedly blown our socks off in previous Invite anagram contests. Remember, each of these anagrams rearranges all the letters in the original phrase, with no letter used twice.

Third runner-up:
Come across FLORIDA MAN and you’ll see RANDOM FAIL. (Jonathan Jensen, Baltimore; Chris Doyle, Denton, Tex.)

Second runner-up:

The EGOMANIAC,
A MEGA-ICON,
I.E., MAGA CON,
has COME AGAIN. (Jesse Frankovich, Laingsburg, Mich.)

First runner-up:

“SACRE bleu!” complained Usha. “No fair!
JD’s foisted this immigrant SCARE!
No one CARES there’s no basis,
He’s off to the RACES —
And soon to deport our au pair.” (Mark Raffman, Reston, Va.)

And the winner of the earrings that look like miniature plastic bags holding live goldfish:
FACE IT—HARMFUL EGO! Our CHIEF GOLF AMATEUR, who cannot distinguish a HUGE LIE FROM A FACT, favors the name THE GULF OF AMERICA. (Jesse Frankovich)

Today’s Gene Pool Gene Poll:

POLL
Which among the top four winners is your favorite?
3rd runner-up: Florida Man
13%
2nd RU: Mass deportations
0%
1st RU: Sacre, scare, cares, races
13%
The winner: Gulf of America
73%
15 VOTES · 2 DAYS REMAINING
As always, if you think the best among today’s inking entries were unjustly buried in the honorable mentions, shout out your favorites in the comments.

Leave a comment

LOSERS — OR LESS: Honorable mentions
Donald and I, STORMY DANIELS, did it once — his mushroom dick reminded me of TINY MORELS. SAD. (Leif Picoult, Rockville, Md.)

In better times, she’d slice the LIMES,
And SMILE and salt the glass.
But the MILES we’d roll would take their toll:
Tequila kicked our ass. (Mark Raffman)

It would be a DIRE SIN for a biology INSIDER not to know the difference between an amphibious SIRENID and flying IRENIDS and NERIIDS. (Yes, I IS NERD.🤓) (Jeff Contompasis, Ashburn, Va.)

In ELON’S “SIEG HEIL” SALUTE on Inauguration Day, I SEE SOUL-SELLING HATE. (Chris Doyle)

The ELON MUSK NAZI SALUTE pleased the USUAL ZEALOT KINSMEN. (Duncan Stevens, Vienna, Va.)

The BACONATOR might not contain a COAT O’ BRAN… OR CAN O’ BAT … or even something obviously fake like CRAB-TOONA, but it does contain the key to your next clogged artery. (Leif Picoult)

America PINES for a prez with a SPINE
And the judgment (let’s keep this between us)
To make dictators quail, and not list us for sale
To the ones who keep stroking his EGO. (Mark Raffman)

Hey, federal workers, what do you want to do on Trump’s EXECUTIVE ORDERS?
“EXCRETE? VOID? SURE!” (Duncan Stevens)

According to Pat Robertson, SANCTUARY CITIES are a plot to give immigrants SATANIC SECURITY. (Chris Doyle)

THE WASHINGTON PIST: IT HASN'T GOT HIP NEWS
(Eric Nelkin, Silver Spring, Md.; animation from Wordsmith,org)

CATS’ ACTS CAST SCAT. (Jeff Contompasis)

Hasn’t MELANIA TRUMP had enough of MR. MANIPULATE? (Jonathan Jensen)

If you’ve bought a TRUMP MEME COIN, you’ve MET PREMIUM CON. (Duncan Stevens)

I went to an IMAGINE DRAGONS concert and risked SENIOR-DAMAGING … GONAD MIGRAINES. (Jeff Contompasis)

Mark Zuckerberg hopes META’S “MASCULINE ENERGY” will attract INSECURE MAGA-STYLE MEN. (Chris Doyle)

So three guys, ARNOLD, ROLAND, and RONALD, walk into a bra … (Jeff Contompasis)

At the end of THE TRUMP ERA, I will gleefully shout “TERM UP, HATER!” (Jonathan Jensen)

To Blake Lively, JUSTIN BALDONI has worked himself into a JAIL-BOUND SNIT. To Justin Baldoni, BLAKE LIVELY is BLEAKLY EVIL. (Chris Doyle)

THE UNITED STATES CONGRESS is where NUTCASES DISSENT TOGETHER. (Jesse Frankovich)

I WILL ASK THIS: WHAT DO YOU GET WHEN YOU CROSS A POLAR BEAR //
WITH A SEAL? WHY, IT’S NO SHOCK, SIR—YOU WOULD GET A POLAR BEAR! (The words after the slashes form a perfect anagram of the opening words.) (Jesse Frankovich)

Whenever I would hear Doris Day sing “Que SERA, SERA” … it would SEAR my ARSE. (Jon Ketzner, Cumberland, Md.)

While a teenager, ALEC GUINNESS exhibited GENUINE CLASS even while suffering ACNE UGLINESS. (Jeff Contompasis)

Once again, the FELON PRESIDENT brought in his FETID PERSONNEL. (Jonathan Jensen)

You thought you’d heard all the rumors about PETE HEGSETH, but did you hear what happened when he said, “GET THE SHEEP”? (Duncan Stevens)

When the man with the orange MANE coins a MEAN NAME, I hope a few follicles fall out. AMEN! (Stephen Dudzik, Olney, Md.)

And Last: The cartoonist was so mad she could SPIT! She shouted, “This job is the PITS!” So she quit. (You can read all about it in The Washington PIST.) (Beverley Sharp, Montgomery, Ala.)

And Even Laster: With GENE POOL INKS, we KEEP ON LOSING. (Jesse Frankovich)

Note: We do want you to get to the rest of The Gene Pool, and we know it
doesn’t fit the contest’s call for “a sentence or two,” but we have to show
you Jon Gearhart’s tour-de-force fantasy of THE STATE OF THE UNION ADDRESS by
Trump, which includes fifteen anagrams of that phrase. It’s just below, after
the "Still running" line.

Oh, here’s one really last And Last: Next week, JOINT LEGISLATION will yield NO GIANT JOLLITIES. (Jeff Contompasis)

The headline “Wittiness > Witness It” is by Jesse Frankovich; Kevin Dopart wrote the honorable-mentions subhead.

Still running — deadline 9 p.m. ET Saturday, Feb. 1: It’s our biennial “Joint Legislation” wordplay contest. Send us some giant jollities!

Trump’s Alt-Inaugural speech, containing fifteen different anagrams for “The
State of the Union Address”, by Jon Gearhart:

This inaugural speech can act as my substitute for THE STATE OF THE UNION ADDRESS
that I should have been giving in 2021 following my other landslide victory.
ATTN DEFEATED ONES: O SHIT — RUSH!! In case you were wondering,
I SENT THE DRONES OUT, FATHEADS. Wherever my enemies try to hide, I will
FIND THE AREA TO SEND OUT THE SS and THEN DO NEFARIOUS DEATH TESTS on them.
(Oops, how did that get on the teleprompter?) THESE SHATTERED FOUNDATIONS
that Joe Biden has left for our country need to be rebuilt along with an
electrified border wall 100 feet high. For those who saw fit during Biden’s
watch to DASH TO THE U.S. — DEFENESTRATION will begin promptly. There will be
THOUSANDS OF TIES THREATENED as you either must abandon your children who were
born here or take them with you when we throw you out an 80-foot-high window
installed in the wall just for this purpose. HO, THERE — STUDENT AID’S NOT SAFE
anymore. Biden wanted to pay off your loans, but that ship has sailed.
Don't go trying TO HIDE THE ASSETS AND FORTUNE you amassed while not paying
off your loans during the COVID hoax — I wrote the book on hiding assets,
so I know where to find them. THE DEI TREND'S OUT FANS, SO HATE will be the
law of the land. I have NOTED THE U.S. RED STATE FASHION in the District
all week and approve bigly, but I’m actually surprised there’s not more
FAT-HEADED TOUR SNOT IN SHEETS roaming around. Take comfort in knowing
THAT THE END OF U.S. TEARS IS DONE as I take over. Prepare to congratulate us
ON THE UNTIED STATES OF RED ASH, ’cause my pals and I are gonna
burn this mother down. (Jon Gearhart, Des Moines)



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