Song of the Day 3/10: Travis, “New Shoes”

If you had asked me whether this story was real or something that ran in the Onion, I’d have guessed the Onion, but no, it’s real. It seems Donald Trump is in the habit of giving his aides a rather odd gift: $145 Florsheim men’s dress shoes. I’ll quote the Raw Story report, and tell me this doesn’t sound like the Onion:

According to a Wall Street Journal report by Alex Leary, the president has developed an obsession with the footwear and has made gifting them a ritualistic part of his Oval Office operations.

Trump has been known to suddenly pivot conversations to his “incredible” new shoes. During a January lunch with Tucker Carlson, he handed the media personality a pair of brown wingtips without warning. At cabinet meetings, he asks recipients: “Did you get the shoes?”

Some officials appear to feel compelled to wear the shoes in Trump’s presence despite their reservations, which has included putting them on and lacing them up during Oval Office meetings. One female White House official remarked: “All the boys have them.” Another joked: “It’s hysterical because everybody’s afraid not to wear them.”

The president has developed a system for the shoe distribution. He guesses people’s shoe sizes in front of them, asks an aide to place an order, and a week later a brown Florsheim box arrives at the White House — sometimes signed by Trump with a note of gratitude.

It’s the signed shoe boxes that make it art.

If this story line had been included in “Veep,” critics wouldn’t have just accused Armando Ianucci of jumping the shark. They would say he jumped a shark with a frickin’ laser beam attached to its head.

Travis formed in Scotland in the late ’90s and is popular in the UK, where nine of its 10 albums made the Top 10, but hasn’t had much success in the U.S. “New Shoes” appeared on its 2013 LP “Where You Stand.”