Being anti-choice seems to be the presidential brand du jour. Peppi fits right in

What are we skinning? Celebrity criminal lawyer and chronic internet-attention addict Franco Debono suggesting that former Xarabank presenter and current chronic plastic fetus carrier Peppi Azzopardi serve as the nation’s next prime minister.

Why are we skinning it? Because it brings together two of the country’s most persistently annoying public figures in one sentence, for reasons that cannot help but be telling of the current (and arguably, eternal) national mood.

How is that? Well, it could arguably be all about Franco Debono pitching for his own version of the Trump phenomenon by putting Peppi forward as candidate for head of state, which is a thing in its own right.

It certainly is a ‘thing’, though more likely akin to Lovecraft’s The Thing that Should Not Be, and/or John Carpenter’s titular disgustingly protean creature from the ‘80s classic of the same name... Your Christmas movie marathon was distinctly different to mine...

What can I say, I’m a Halloween-every-day kinda person. The promise of a Peppi presidency must be very exciting for you, then.

More than The Thing, it gives me They Live vibes, if nothing else. Now you’re going down a reference-rabbit-hole that’s gonna lose most of the audience...

Which proves that the Peppi life is not the life for me. You don’t choose it, it chooses you.

Seriously though, how unifying IS Peppi, really? It’ll depend on who you ask. I mean, he spearheaded the country’s most-watched ‘discussion’ programme back in the day...

The ‘day’ being the relatively sedate mid-90s to early ‘10s, though... Which apart from its comparatively quiet political climate, was also a time before such divisive, sensationalistic ‘culture wars’ could be comfortably fought by each and every one of us from the comfort of our couches as we clutched our respective digital devices...

Wow, observational cultural commentary that ALSO rhymes! Never let it be said that I skimp on bestowing holiday gifts, late to the party as I may be...

The real gift here is that Franco Debono opted against crowning himself prospective president... A truly shocking out-of-character move – a glitch in the script that we can only attribute to a piercing holiday hangover.

Do say: “Conflating ‘populist’ with ‘unifying’ has caused little but long-term grief for our culture internationally, so maybe we should dodge that bullet locally?”

Don’t say: “Being anti-choice seems to be the presidential brand du jour, so Peppi would fit right in, actually. After all, even after the powers-that-be chose to get rid of his televisual shout-fest, he still appears to be hovering around, ready to polemicise his next hobby-horse opinion to oblivion.”