In Trump’s Orbit

“In Trump’s orbit” seems to be the favorite phrase of all the “cool kids” in the media right now after his positive COVID-19 test, rapidly gaining ground on the ever-popular “existential threat”. Without even trying, I returned an entire page of search results from newspapers, magazines, media all over the country sporting headlines or ledes with the phrase “in Trump’s orbit”. You could play a drinking game with it on cable news, but you’d end up in the ER.

So, while the media were beating this poor, misbegotten phrase to within an inch of its life, I had to ask — what, exactly, is “in Trump’s orbit”? The answer, of course, was instantly clear — spent rocket stages, dud rocket stages, derelict satellites, tools lost overboard from ISS spacewalks, the odd NRO top-secret payload, drifting fields of orbital collision debris, a Tesla roadster… wait, wut?

16×20 inch medium-res color .jpg image, 2.9mb