It’s the G7 and as world leaders gather here’s the big question: who wore it better – Dr Jill and the psychobabble elder-care neediness of her ‘Love’ jacket or Melania, and her angsty Gen X ‘I really don’t care, do you?’ raised finger to America when visiting migrant detention in 2018. 

Dr Jill’s jacket is a metaphor for people who like metaphors, and being worn while accompanying husband Joe to provide maximum black/white contrast with Donald Trump – the anti-love president. Such intellectual colour blocking is on fashion trend right now and ‘love’ is one of the five magical words of Gen J. the Joyless Generation, especially when speaking to their cat — the other being; Tesla, biodegradable, Greta and lockdown.   

Melania claimed that her jacket was a critique of the moral bankruptcy of the industrial hate Trump media complex (well I think that’s what she said). Because when you are at the multi-million dollar Florida golf resort your husband built, do you really care? Do you? Especially when it comes to completely objective journalists that hate your guts but have no fashion sense. 

Of course, in modern politics terms like ‘caring’, ‘not caring’ and ‘love’ don’t really mean all that much at all. It’s the white noise of political agitprop. What politicians say when confronted by the Big Issue guy while the cameras are whirring before declining to buy a copy because they left their wallet in the other jacket – the one that doesn’t say ‘love’.  

And don’t be fooled by the faux subtexts, it really is that shallow and all about the jacket and who wore it better. This is what happens when the political classes attach themselves to symbolic things – the fibreglass wind farm or the wooden Greta autobahn. It’s why Julie Bishop’s red Dorothy shoes are in our national democracy museum, along with Cheryl’s boa, Christine’s white pantsuit and Wilson Tuckey’s codpiece.   

I remember 70-80s legend, trade unionist and professional communist John Halfpenny when asked why he was always taking first-class holidays to Paris and eating foie gras, replying: ‘don’t you think the left can enjoy nice things?’ Which was his way of explaining that Norm Gallagher was corrupt. Though Norm did sport a circa-1963 Beatles mop top – which brings us back to the Dr Jill Summer of Love jacket thing and the meaningless of try-hard political symbols and dressing like your attending a Woodstock reunion with a husband who appears to have lost his mind as a result of taking too much acid during the Hendrix playing of Star Spangled Banner back when he was 75 in 1969.  

Recently Kamala Harris was photographed being groovy and strutting from her zero-emissions jet wearing Timberland boots that apparently she was ‘rocking’. According to the political analysts and draping experts at Marie Claire, this showed she was ready to ‘Get Things Done’ even though the Timberlands weren’t walking anywhere near the Mexican Border to Get Things Done anytime soon. The medium is the message.

Let’s face it Kamala should have worn Melania’s ‘I really don’t care’ jacket at that car crash NBC interview about why she hasn’t been to the border yet despite now being responsible for the border crisis which according to her is apparently because she hasn’t been to Europe yet either. Then she did that nervous laugh thing. 

Which in a funny way brings us back to Melania and her jacket question: ‘I really don’t care, do you?’ 

And then when you think about it…. I didn’t think so.  

Michael Scammell wears a Taking Care of Business t-shirt out of a deeply embedded sense of neediness. He writes at https://mdswords.wordpress.com and Tweets at @MichaelScammell.