I looked at his ass. And then I looked at his legs. I said, “His ass—shit, it’s like a pile of muscle.”

我看了看他的屁股。然后我又看了看他的腿。我说：“他的屁股——妈的，就像一堆肌肉。”

—President Donald Trump, on Senator Jon Husted.

——唐纳德·特朗普总统，评价参议员乔恩·赫斯特德。

During the long Russian winters, Joseph Stalin would gather colleagues at his dacha, in the birch forest outside Moscow. After dinner, they would sit by a fire, and, if Stalin’s mood was right, they would play a drinking game called Who Has the Best Bum in Moscow? The game consisted of each player going around and talking about who they thought had the shapeliest bottom in the Politburo. Stalin would indicate the winner by declaring, “Where did that guy go to school—the University of Perfectly Formed Buttocks?” He would then laugh, and his colleagues would laugh along and applaud. If they didn’t applaud appropriately, they were shot.

On the train from Washington to Gettysburg, Abraham Lincoln made notes on his upcoming speech. Across from him sat his right-hand man and Secretary of State, William Seward. At one point, Lincoln dropped his pencil. Seward stood and then bent over to fetch it. Though Seward was sixty-one at the time, Lincoln noted, “My God, Bill. I could rest a pitcher of iced tea on that ass. What a marvellous, muscular bubble it is.” Seward thanked the President. Lincoln then looked out the train window and asked, “What’s another way to say eighty-seven years?”

On June 20, 1972, President Richard Nixon met in the Oval Office with his then chief of staff, H. R. (Bob) Haldeman. Like many conversations in Nixon’s Oval Office, this one was recorded. More than eighteen minutes were lost, but Nixon’s personal secretary, Rose Mary Woods, kept notes:

NIXON: Do you ever urinate outdoors, Bob?

尼克松：鲍勃，你有没有在户外小便过？

HALDEMAN: I’m sorry, sir?

霍尔德曼：抱歉，先生？

NIXON: No . . . what I meant was . . . have you heard that new song?

尼克松：不……我的意思是……你听过那首新歌吗？

HALDEMAN: Which one, sir?

霍尔德曼：哪一首，先生？

NIXON: “Brandy (You’re a Fine Girl)”? Surely you’ve heard it.

尼克松：《布兰迪（你是个好姑娘）》？你肯定听过。

HALDEMAN: I have, yes, Mr. President.

霍尔德曼：是的，我听过，总统先生。

NIXON: She serves the sailors whiskey and wine—just marvellous.

尼克松：她给水手们端上威士忌和葡萄酒——太美妙了。

HALDEMAN: It’s a wonderful song.

霍尔德曼：是首好歌。

Rustling sounds as Haldeman stands to refill his coffee.

NIXON: Man to man, Bob, I hope your wife appreciates your figure as much as this nation does.

尼克松：男人对男人，鲍勃，我希望你太太对这个国家的欣赏程度赶得上你身材的一半。

HALDEMAN: Oh . . . um . . . thank you, sir.

霍尔德曼：哦……呃……谢谢您，先生。

NIXON: What a blessing to have pert buttocks.

尼克松：拥有紧致的臀部真是一种福气。

HALDEMAN: Indeed.

霍尔德曼：确实。

NIXON: Is it just me or have Kissinger’s bums got huge? Bums like pillows. That will do for today, Bob.

尼克松：是只有我觉得还是基辛格的屁股变大了？像枕头一样。今天就到这儿吧，鲍勃。

“Asses, asses, asses, asses.” So said Charles de Gaulle as he walked behind his troops through the streets of Paris after the Liberation, in 1945—except he said it in French. “This nation owes its freedom and its future to the taut, firm buttocks of its brave young men. Let us go forward on your behinds!”

During the Egyptian President Anwar Sadat’s historic visit to Jerusalem in 1977, he asked to meet with the former Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir. Sources who were there that day say the two shook hands, before Meir welcomed Sadat in his native Arabic. Looking at his backside, she then whispered, “That’s quite a tuchus.” Sadat smiled, confused. Meir pointed to his behind, and said, “Apparently the Pyramids aren’t the only things made of stone. Hey, let’s call it the Middle East piece.” They laughed and laughed but didn’t keep in touch after that. ♦