President Donald Trump announced that the Gulf of Mexico would be known as the .
I laughed.
It's not a joke.
Just days later, the Gulf of America has become a real thing.
"As directed by the President, the Gulf of Mexico will now officially be known as the Gulf of America and North America's highest peak will once again bear the name Mount McKinley," the U.S. announced in a statement. Interior includes something called the Geographic Names Information System (GNIS), a federal outfit operated by the U.S. Geological Survey. They're the official geography naming people.
Just Monday, Google said will also make the change. They're the unofficial digital map naming people.
When using Google Maps we'll also see as we look at Alaska, home of the highest mountain peak in North America. The name was changed to Denali by President Barack Obama, but most people in Alaska, Democrats and Republicans, already called it that. Those who live there fought for decades to officially change the name.
The indigenous Alaskan Athabascans have lived with the 20,320-foot mountain for thousands of years. They don't call it Mount McKinley. They call it Denali.
William McKinley, the president who led this nation to win the Spanish-American War of 1898, never saw his namesake mountain. In fact, he never made it to Alaska.
Instead some prospector emerged from a trek and heard that McKinley had been nominated as the Republican Party's presidential candidate. I guess that was like network breaking news, so he named a mountain that already had a name.
But, hey, if we're going to rename geographic features willy-nilly — including a body of water that's as central to our state's identity as that big mountain is to Alaska's — let's look at what else we might want to change around here.
Maybe Baton Rouge can be called The City of Southern LSU. Maybe the LSU Tiger Stadium, Death Valley, can be the LSU Bayou Slaughterhouse.
Let's rename Lake Pontchartrain after Gambit columnist Blake Pontchartrain.
Since we're looking at Facebook and Instagram owner Meta building a mega tech facility in Richland Parish, maybe the place can be called Meta World — or Meta World Parish, anyway.
Peter Youree developed Shreveport's first skyscraper, an amazing 10-story building, so the city's longest street is named after him. But he's old news. Perhaps it's time to rename the street 50 Cent Avenue, after Curtis Jackson, a Shreveport native rapper who is developing part of the city's downtown area.
Gulf of America sounds all-encompassing, as if Trump intentionally included North, Central and South America in his thinking. Maybe. Er, no.
shrugged, saying maybe the United States and all of North America should be called “América Mexicana” or “Mexican America.” She said the rest of the world would call the ocean basin the Gulf of Mexico, as it's been called by the . Change the name and I guess Louisiana petro companies like Dow, ExxonMobil and Shell have to change their maps and some naming conventions, too.
Trump hasn't completed two weeks in office yet and he's shaking things up.
Just because he can change the names of places doesn't mean he should.
Unless we can, too.
