By Trevor Stone Irvin | August 26th, 2026 | Year of the Dark Lord
Yesterday, there was a sharp contrast between life and death, light and darkness, beauty and ugliness, love and malice.
Beauty, love and light died yesterday and ugliness, hate, and darkness still breathes. What I wouldn’t trade to see the reverse of that.
Yes, Dolly Parton, a universally loved person who universally loved us in return and gave of herself freely, died at the age of 80.
And Donald Trump, a universally reviled, disliked and putrid man, who gives of himself nothing, also 80 years of age, still lives while he sits seething in his bucket of reeking vitriol longing for ever more retribution.
One was born to poverty. The other to vast wealth and grotesque excess.
One was self-made. One was given everything.
One created. One destroys.
One gave. The other took.
Contrast.
Dolly donated millions to children’s charities.
Donald and his son scammed a sick children’s charity they set up to pocket the donations for themselves.
Think about that.
Dolly lifted up children. Donny stole from them.
Quite the contrast.
When caught with his hand in the till, Trump was required to pay $2 million back to charities. Dolly gave millions away to charities voluntarily. Donny’s adult family had to get mandatory training not to scam children. No one in Dolly’s family needed any training of the sort.
Again, contrast.
Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library gave away over 332 million books to children around the world. Trump locks up children from around the world who come to America.
One of the reasons Dolly created her Imagination Library to give away books to children was because her father couldn’t read or write but was the smartest man she knew.
Donald’s father could read and write but used those skills to create contracts that cheated our government and discriminated against black people to prevent them from living in his rental properties.
Contrast.
Dolly’s talent was vast. A world class singer-songwriter, musician, actress and businesswoman. Her success was self-made out of the Tennessee bedrock she sprung from. She started early, writing her first song at six years of age.
She was a true talent and rare rags-to-riches story.
Trump was a riches-to-more-riches story. His only talent, the ability to lie with abandon.
One of 12 children born in a one room cabin on the banks of the Little Pigeon River and raised by loving parents, Dolly’s abilities and drive took her to the heights of the music and entertainment business. (Later, when Dolly was still young, the family was able to “move up” to a 2-room cabin on Locust Ridge, Tennessee).
Donald was one of four children raised by two vile, self-interested parents in a five-bedroom Tudor style mansion in Jamaica Estates, Queens, New York, and rose to the top of the real estate business by nepotism and the coattails of his corrupt father’s money, dealings and influence.
Contrast.
Dolly has been showered from every corner of the music and business world with every accolade and award possible, too many to count. She even declines awards. Dolly declined to accept the Presidential Medal of Freedom from the Trump administration twice. She also declined it when offered by the Biden administration as not to show political favoritism. My god, that speaks volumes.
Donald Trump childishly receives pretend, made-up, participation trophies and awards from sycophants and people trying to buy access to his corruption. He even takes and keeps other people’s awards, among them a Nobel Prize Medal and a FIFA trophy, and calls them his own. Donny will accept any fictional award from anyone, anywhere. And that speaks volumes as well.
Contrast.
Dolly turned down big money to pose nude for Playboy magazine.
Donny walks in unannounced on young nude girls in the Miss Universe Pageant he owns.
Contrast.
Dolly had a stunning figure which caused much discussion and led to things being named after her. The large, thick appearance of the Army’s T-72A main battle tank, due to its bulging frontal armor, led to its unofficial nickname, “The Dolly Parton.”
Dolly was big in all the right places.
Donny is big in all the wrong places.
No one names anything after Donny. He lamely tries to plaster his name on other people’s buildings and monuments because no one else will.
Contrast.
Dolly was known for her infectious laugh and spirit. She was self-deprecating, funny, vivacious and routinely made fun of her special brand of wardrobe and ginormous hair styles. In probably her most famous quote, she said, “It takes a lot of money to look this cheap.”
Donny never laughs, is never funny, the word self-deprecating is unknown to him, and even the mildest of criticisms enrage him. Trump is so thinned skinned you can see his decaying internal organs though it. In one of Donny’s most famous quotes, he said, “I love the uneducated.” Or maybe it was, “If you go after me, I’m coming after you!”
Contrast.
It was not enough just to make our lives better with her music, or donating millions to charities, or giving a million dollars to fund the creation of the Maderna COVID vaccine, which saved millions of people. No, she bought, expanded and made a successful theme park and called it Dollywood. I remember my first thought when I heard that was, “Is she nuts? A theme park?” Well, don’t bet against Dolly, She knows an awful lot that I don’t. What couldn’t that woman do?
In these times of eternal entertainment celebrity divorces, Dolly was married once, to one man, Carl Dean, and they stayed together for almost 60 years.
Donald Trump has been married three times, to Ivana, Marla, and The Death Queen, Melanoma. Each marriage started by cheating on the previous wife. He has had to compensate so many women with bribes to keep quiet about his infidelities that it takes a lawyer and an accountant to pay them all off and keep track.
Contrast.
Yesterday, in an unfortunate moment, the universe took one of its most brilliant, beautiful and talented objects from us and in a fit of carelessness left us with the ugly, no talent, dregs of humanity.
Yes, contrast.
Maybe we should try to be the Dolly she thought we could be.
Into the wind Dolly, into the wind.
And in closing, Jolene had nuthin’ on Dolly.
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