The past four years have felt off, tense, surreal, comic, and competitive. They haven’t made sense. The world doesn’t make sense. Numbers and words do not matter in the ways that numbers and words are meant to matter. Things have felt off in a way that is hard to name. We’re five months into a pandemic, and rather than following the advice of doctors and health professionals, wearing a mask has somehow become “political”. Society is on the verge of absurdity, and people of getting dumber. It’s hard to figure out how we got here, but it gets a little easier when you realize: WE’RE ALL ON THE APPRENTICE.

If you ever watched the television show our Reality-Commander-in-Chief produced, you get it. In the show, he was surrounded by his kids. They had roles of import, as long as they bowed to their fathers wishes. The show was made up of contestants that were talented people all doing Trump’s bidding. Each contestant stayed around exactly as long as they pleased him. Achievement, excellence in the show, was based upon nothing more that Trump’s approval.

In the show there was always a task, and that task was always a competition. Mr. Trump would set up the rules, have other people check on the progress, and then he’d decide who would win. The decision was a feeling, based upon little more than his opinion at that time.

One thing that struck me when I watched the show (which I liked quite a bit, p.s.) was how often the contestants would begin a contest by saying “Mr. Trump…” and finish the statement with something like: “said”, “wants”, “is inclined to”, “prefers” or some other phrase that was all based upon pleasing Mr. Trump. (Often citing his inclination for beautiful women, bold action, and nice things).

At the end of each episode, he fired someone. You could tell he liked doing it. When it came time to make the decision of whom to fire, it was often little more than his feeling. Someone could have done well but lost: fired. Someone could have sound logic, but Trump disagreed with that logic: fired. Trump considered them a threat: fired. A contestant didn’t rub Trump the right way: fried. A contestant could have performed quite well on a task but said something wrong in the boardroom: fired.

When he made these decisions, he sat on one side of the table while everyone else sat on the other. The room was tense, unsure how things would go, and the contestants could barely talk. Trump had no problem butting in mid-comment, rarely asked a question, and barely listened to a response. When a contestant did speak, it was usually to sing his praises, and thank him for the opportunity to be on another episode of the show.

One thing that was affirmed over and over: It didn’t matter what they thought or knew, it mattered what Trump thought and knew. The things he ultimately cared about were: the ratings, how he looked, and what he thought.

This is now America.

His personality is represented very well in this photo:

He had people tear-gassed so that he could to walk to a church and hold up a Bible. This was not a church that he went to. And it’s not a message the book would support. If you turn the pages of the book he’s Luke 18:9-14, you find the story of two people that go to a church to pray. One promotes his own righteousness, the other his own sin. One sings his own praises, the other asks for mercy. It is the later, in God’s eyes, that is justified. The photo itself is terrible. The question it begs is: who is this for? You’d be hard-pressed to find a passage to support the action. Which means: it’s all about the optics.

Optics are key in reality tv. They often differ with reality. In reality, he was a terrible boss. His companies have filed for bankruptcy on several occasions. He’s been involved in thousands of lawsuits. Most of what he has comes from name rather than credential. He’s worse as president. He judges a press conference not on the depth of knowledge, but on the “ratings”. He judges a company not on the quality of their product, but on that companies opinion of him (Ex. Goya). He judges a person not on their actions, but on their opinion of him (Ex. Charlottesville, ex. Steph Curry). He judges states and cities not on how it those states are performing, but on whether they support him (Ex. California, Alabama, Seattle, Portland, Detroit, Chicago). He judges a leader not by how they treat their citizens, but how they respond to him. (Ex. North Korea, Putin, Philippines). He judges a news outlet not for its quality of journalism, but rather the slant they take on him.

In turn, the Oval Office has become The Boardroom of The Apprentice. He sits in there, surrounded by people that cater to his every whim and impulse, that slant truth those whims, and makes a decisions based upon that impulse rather than logic or reason.

To his credit, he’s charismatic, funny, and good at the game. He knows how to win. He’s mastered the ability to control situations. He’s damn good at manipulating people. He’s now done this with the country. He uses his Twitter account to drive the stock market. He changes his opinion of a person the second they’re not blindly loyal to him. He’s fired practically all his cabinet. He attacks anyone that disagrees with him. The only people he allows to stay are the ones that do his bidding.

It’s bizarre.

It’s crazy to watch.

And like The Apprentice, you can’t have a discourse because if you disagree: you’re fired. It’s either Trumps opinion, or it’s wrong. The man has made words, which he as the best of, meaningless. He’s made Truth whatever he decides to say at any given time. The rest is “Fake News”. It’s truly bizarre. Many of the same people that bashed him on the 2016 campaign trail now support him Trump with blind loyalty, not because of his actions but because of his power. It’s “Yes Mr. Trump”, or “Mr. Trump says”, or “what Mr. Trump means”, even when this means justifying hateful (Ex. his “white power” retweet). It’s like they’re all sitting in that boardroom, hoping not to be fired. Just to stick around, they’ll do whatever he wants. He was good at Reality TV, and has brought that skill to political commentary. We are the contestants. He is the host.

It suddenly all makes sense, when you realize: WE’RE ALL ON THE APPRENTICE.