I watched the latter stages of the White House press briefing yesterday. The one some call the leader of the free world appeared in person. He behaved in all the disgusting ways you have come to expect. He is full of hate for everyone except, of course, himself.
The performance for the press corps was much more alarming than it was informative. And, yes, performance is the correct word. I left the experience with renewed disdain for His Worshipfulness. (Thank you Han Solo for allowing me to borrow the appellation and its load of irony.)
I always find it interesting to read The Guardian for a slightly different view than I get in American media. Their writers are often confounded by their spinoff ally that poses as the very model of the modern major democracy. More Americans should read this discussion of the structural elements of our system of representation. I’m not sure that most people really understand how grossly un-representative our system is.
But back to yesterday’s press conference with the president. A Guardian writer reminded me that the American press is like a bag of candy for a demagogue. They have a symbiotic relationship in which a president with no manners co-exists perfectly with a press with no cojones. The Brits see it clearly. Today’s piece in The Guardian by Suzanne Moore makes the case for a press corps walkout. What they were able to deliver to their readers and viewers as their work product yesterday was all reality show and it had little to do with the work of a democratic government. Trump was the star and they were the foil.
Ignore him and let’s get on with the business of governing America. There are taxes to collect, schools, bridges and hospitals to build, people to be educated, a nation to be protected from other countries’ dictators, and, of course, the golden door must remain open and managed for the welfare of both the current citizens and those who seeking asylum. He doesn’t seem interested in any of that business. But I am. And you should be, too.
South of Town: Notes and Scenes from Texas' Upper Gulf Coast 