Trump’s compulsion to mark territory is more than ego. It reflects a worldview where prestige matters more than truth, law, or restraint.

I was walking in the park recently watching a dog going from tree to tree lifting its leg. The behaviour apparently alleviates insecurity and anxiety, and the higher leg-lifts help them appear tougher and feel more secure.  The main reason, cited in Google, for leg lifting is to mark territory, signaling, “I was here.”

I thought of Donald J Trump. He has this condition.

So far and still counting, he has left his mark on dozens of Trump Tower buildings, plazas, streets, roads, highways and byways, boulevards, government buildings, condominiums, hotels, resorts, golf courses, casinos, not only in America but in countries all over the world. Games, magazines, songs, films, books, wines, beers, cocktails, ice, steak, vodka, collectible cards, drinks, chocolate, perfumes, sneakers, and The Bible all bear his name. Trump Mobile, a telecommunications company owned by The Trump Organisation was founded in 2025. Wikipedia can’t keep up.

Of course, he has an airplane to get around in - Trump Force One - which is about to get ritzier as he has accepted a plane worth an estimated $400m as a gift from Qatar, calling it “a great gesture”. He has renamed the Donald J. Trump and John F. Kennedy Memorial Centre for the Performing Arts, the Donald J. Trump National Institute of Peace, in Washington, the Donald J. Trump State Park, in New York State and he is building a big, bold, beautiful President Donald J. Trump ballroom after demolishing the historic East Wing of the White House.

He is planning a triumphal Arc de Trump, in Washington, bigger than those in Paris, Mexico and   even Pyongyang: Kim Jong Un the Supreme Leader of North Korea will be miffed. Plans for a  National Garden of American Heroes featuring Trump, in the Black Hills of South Dakota are underway. He has his eye on Mount Rushmore and adding his likeness to the monument of US Presidents George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Theodore Roosevelt and Abraham Lincoln. Who was Rushmore anyway, but a New York lawyer who was surveying gold claims in the Black Hills. Mount Trump would be much more appropriate.

There are entities created to honour Trump: TrumpRx, a prescription drug website and Trump Gold Card his immigration initiative. One billion meme coins were created in January 2025; 800 million owned by two Trump companies. He founded the crypto platform World Liberty Financial with his sons three weeks before the 2024 election.

Under development by the military is a Boeing F-47, a sixth-generation fighter and a Trump-class battleship for the US Navy as his centre piece for his “Golden Fleet” initiative. He will have the Donald J. Trump Presidential Library – administered by the National Archives and Records Administration, but all Presidents get one of those.

Internationally there is Trump Avenue in Ottawa, Ontario and Kiryat Yam Trump Park in Israel. In planning are Fort Trump a military base in Poland, Trump Station in Jerusalem, near the Western Wall in the Old City and Trump Heights, a settlement in honour of Trump’s recognition of the Golan Heights as part of Israel. The Trump Route for International Peace and Prosperity for ground travel will run between Armenia and Azerbaijan.

All these honours have come about through this man’s uncontrollable bullying, threatening and special kind of Trump diplomacy.

Significantly the species _Neopalpa donaldtrumpi_ a type of micro-moth was named in 2016 because the yellowish-white scales on its head are reminiscent of Trump’s hairstyle and they are looking for a putative new species of amphibian that is blind, with the proposed name of _Dermophis donaldtrumpi__._

Inevitably there are those who want to take the piss out of him, so we have a Trumpy Bear, featuring a tuft of hair in the style of his hairdo, and Trumpy Trout, a mounted animatronic talking fish head which says fish pun versions of Trump’s famous catchphrases. There is a six metre tall Donald Trump baby-shaped balloon in a diaper with a mobile phone; _Dump Trump_ – a satirical British statue; _God Emperor Trump_, a satirical Italian sculpture and Trump toilet paper was launched in Mexico in 2017 with the slogan “softness without borders”. And there’s Trump soap for small hands.

An interesting tribute is inspired by furniture maker and artist Hong Jinshi, Trump, the Buddha of Knowing of the Western Paradise or Buddha of Knowing Everything. The statue depicts Donald Trump in a Buddhist robe sitting in a cross-legged position with his hands folded on his lap, and his thumbs pointed outward, representing meditation and contemplation. I wonder where he got that idea?

Hong Jinshi hopes to eventually give a copy of the statue to Donald Trump as a gift, but he may have a problem. I wouldn’t want to draw Buddha to Donald Trump’s attention. The exact number of Buddha statues in existence number in the tens of millions, spanning countless temples, homes, and historical sites across the globe. And I would lay a bet there are more statues of Buddha than there are of Donald Trump. And Buddha is bigger. The single largest Buddha statue in the world is the Spring Temple Buddha in China is an impressive 208 meters including the platform. Don’t tell Trump that.

Another symptom of his condition is that he does not like to be challenged or questioned, and no one can tell him he is not the greatest of all time. In an eight-week long period analysed by Reporters without Borders, Trump insulted, attacked, or threatened the media at least 108 times in public remarks from September 1 to October 24, not including social media posts.

“ Quiet, quiet piggy,” he said pointing to one woman and “ You are hurting Australia very much. They want to get along with me’’, to a journalist when questioned about his business activities. He demands airtime on the commercial networks, to rant to the public, and they acquiesce, and they pay up when he sues them for millions of dollars. Will the BBC roll over too?

He has a War Department and plans, lots of them. He’s got big, beautiful war plans. We have seen what has happened in Venezuela, no problem. Next, he is warning could be Cuba or Panama, maybe Greenland, maybe Iran, maybe Canada.

We have been reminded this year with two fictional accounts of what might happen in the event of a nuclear launch. Annie Jacobsen’s book Nuclear War A scenario and Katherine Bigelow’s feature film, The House of Dynamite, both ripping, terrifying, edifying thrillers, describe the time from launch to target of a nuclear missile and the confusion, disbelief, bungling, destruction, anarchy, murder and mayhem that could follow. Khrushchev said some time ago the survivors will envy the dead.

The US President – as odd as this may seem – has sole authority to launch America’s nuclear weapons. The President asks the permission of no one.

Donald J Trump is the chosen one. In these scenarios he has six minutes to decide if he will blow up the planet, for game theory in the Pentagon has demonstrated regardless of how nuclear wars begins, once started there is no stopping global Armageddon.

But could he decide he does not want to destroy his monuments?