Trump Fret

A recent poll indicated that a majority of people would prefer Hillary Clinton as president, but would rather watch Donald Trump on television for four years. WTF? How can a man who was once relegated to the entertainment section by The Huffington Post be a joke no more? How can he be so close to the presidency and yet so far from competent for any elected office?  Surely this country has gone mad with cynicism concerning our government, how money is made and, most frighteningly, each other.  While it’s always been a mad, mad, mad world, it seems to me that the mania inspired by a never-ending news cycle has added steroids to our human folly — and then publicized it. 

Feature a celebrity foible and your sales go up.  Include Donald Trump in a debate – or anything for that matter – and your ratings skyrocket.   Appeal to our most base, jingoistic, petty, dark and vulgar humanity…. And you too might be president.  My soul is in the basement, my heart in my throat.  How can this world, my world, be this kind of mad, mad, mad?

Sure, I disagree with Barack Obama on certain points. I’m not Hilary Clinton’s biggest fan.  And, I still laugh when I think about Mitt Romney asking, “Who let the dogs out… wuff, wuff.” I disagree with Bernie Sanders’ argument that college should be free – I don’t believe that anything is ever truly free of some kind of cost. However, none of the aforementioned opinions embody the deep cynicism that government should be mere spectacle the way that Donald Trump does.

Government as monolithic? As a ‘frustrater’ of industry? As a mass whose wheels of service move too slowly because of an abundance of cogs?  Yes, yes and yes. But government that is as noxious as a reality TV program written by Edgar Allen Poe and produced by Mark Burnett? No. No. No, Mr. Trump. But cynicism – and polls – show me that many answer “Yes” to ‘The Donald.’ Donald Trump has finally taught me true cynicism. I’m in a deep hole of cynicism – and I fear the office of the president may join me here in November 2016.