OPINION

OPINION Purple is the New Party

Trump series finale goes rogue

by Paul Moomjean paulmoomjean@yahoo.com

All presidencies have been a little like reality shows since the 1950s, when the president was able to speak to the people of this country through television. Before that, it was radio, and before that newspapers. But the last 20 years, since 24-hour news dominated our news prism, we have seen each president live out their term with watchdogs surrounding them. The news was usually about their policies or actions, but not necessarily them. While President Ronald Reagan was an actor who became president, Barack Obama was the first “celebrity” president, with his charisma and convention speech abilities. His use of the media to push agendas and gain international support showed us a window of the future of leadership. So, in 2016, when America elected Donald Trump, much of that support stemmed from his ability to play the media, and his presidency was like four seasons of The Apprentice, with mass amounts of firings and turnover, Trump having his kids by his side and a finale — a wild series finale — with a mass riot and the president being banned from Twitter.

What makes this all so surreal is that this tragic and bloody end is everything Never Trumpers predicted and for which they were laughed at by independents and conservatives who built the pathway to power for the Trump brand. The last two and a half months have seen Trump attack fair elections, destroy faith in our democracy, be cited as a potential safety risk with his dog whistle tweets, inspire a group of MAGA supporters dressed in red hats and bear suits breaking into the halls of Congress on Jan. 6 and finally a second impeachment. It took 2021 less than a week for America to become a cross of Cobra Kai’s Season 2 high school karate battle and a special episode of South Park.

What President-elect Joe Biden has ahead of him is a near impossible task, with over 75 million Americans believing their vote was annulled. Chatter about secession has been hovering over red states, with Texas coming up again and again as the potential first fruit. To say Biden is entering Abraham Lincoln-like circumstances would not be a stretch. The country is split, no doubt, and organized violence has occurred against the tenements of our democracy, yet maybe the only saving grace is that the binary oppositions dwell amongst each other instead of separated by physical borders as in 1860. Georgia, Texas and Virginia are examples of states split down political lines, yet there was a time when the consensuses were more in line with each other. So, the fear of secession is not one to stay up at night over analyzing.

Biden will have to find a way to confront the rioters who stormed the capital building, stealing items and vandalizing property, and convince them conspiracies are off. Biden will need to work with Republicans to create bipartisan legislation on issues all Americans can agree on. Healthcare and student loan relief would be a good place to start, as many would benefit from both sides of the political aisle. What will be the hardest part is overcoming the rhetoric coming from Trump’s media bandwagon. Many on the right are crying hypocrisy when it comes to the “patriots” versus the summer BLM “looters” because the arrests are coming hard and many of those Jan. 6 rebels are now on no-fly lists. This group of aggravated and agitated citizens was sold a bill of goods by Trump, talk radio and Fox News hosts who danced dangerously between political conspiracy and revolution talk. The result was a black eye for the United States history books.

Trump’s reign of rule by media is over. Without his Twitter account, he can’t engage the same way as he did before. While I believe Twitter, as a private company, has the right to expel who it wants, it may have poked the bear too hard here. People feel stifled and shutting down a current president feels like an overreach of power. Who is next? Could be anyone at this point.

As we begin the Biden reality show that is American news, just remember that the promise was a restoration of values and tradition. That might be boring as hell, but I think we all can take a little more boring these days.

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Michael Cervin, David Michael Courtland, Ivor Davis, Emily Dodi, Alicia Doyle, Chuck Graham, Chris Jay, Daphne Khalida Kilea, Karen Lindell, Paul Moomjean, Mike Nelson, Tim Pompey, Emily Savage, Kathy Jean Schultz, Alan Sculley, Kit Stolz, Mark Storer, Leslie A. Westbrook, Alex Wilson, Kateri Wozny

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