by Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls
Some time ago, it was popular amongst those in Trumplandia to disparage left wing celebrities as obviously not having any influence in America’s political thinking, given how popular Donald Trump continued to be. Something about this really pissed me off. It continues to make me angry.
I don’t know about you, but Donald Trump has been a celebrity — a household name, even — for about 30 years. So, when a center-right person I know said it was “ironic” that his ilk thought people did not want to hear the political views of celebrities, I grew a little bit furious.
It is so glaringly obvious that Trump is and was a celebrity that it just boggles my mind that anyone would think otherwise. It is just crazy. It’s not “ironic,” it’s hypocritical, plain and simple. This, of course, raises the question of how can the volk of Trumplandia square the circle of this situation.
I have struggled with this for some time. There is no easy answer. Either they’re just too stupid to realize that they’re being hypocrites or they don’t care. It all boils down to the fact that while Trump is a celebrity, he’s their celebrity.
So, in a sense it’s all tribal politics. They are all so wrapped up in wanting to Make America Great Again, that basic things like facts and logic escape them. Remember, not only was Trump on TV for several years for The Apprentice, but he also was the subject of a Celebrity Roast on Comedy Central. I sent this to my center-right acquaintance, and that did not seem to make any difference.
But I guess for me the question is — is there any way we can bridge the divide. Is there anyway we can, maybe, from a center-left perspective, “pull a Trump” and get a popular liberal celebrity to run and win office. While Al Franken is one notable example of that happening, it’s actually kind of rare.
The one person I wish would run for major elected office, is Jon Stewart. He’d be perfect. In this new world where politicians are celebrities and celebrities are politicians someone like Stewart fits the bill as the “perfect candidate.” Ideally, he’d run for governor of New Jersey or something like that, but I am so desperate that I would give him a slide and let him run for president.
Though, of course, it would be interesting to see how his comedy industry friends responded to that.
All of this does not address the central issue — why do the residents of Trumplandia, which is are all of us really given political reality, feel so willing to vote for a celebrity in the first place? We have reached a strange new time when people are so angry with the established political order that people are willing to give one of the most powerful jobs in the world to a complete moron who’s only real talent is going bankrupt and being a loudmouth on TV.
The amount of willingness to ignore cold hard facts about Trump on the part of his supports is something that we’re all going to spend a lot of time debating and mulling in the years to come. I suspect that 20 years from now we’ll still be talking about all of this and we won’t understand what has happened or why.
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