Les Whitenaugh
Jul 21, 2017 · 2 min read

We’ve watched a majority of Survivors now, and I can’t even call it a guilty pleasure anymore; I watch in the same spirit that I pay attention to the Untied States of Trumputin. I miss George Carlin, and imagine his riff about the national psyche shifting from baseball to football as might be applied to the shift from “informed consent” voting, to the “Survivor Bully Takes All” spirit that has infected our once proud, if not always fair, nation. Trump fanatics enable every facet of his narcissism, forming ever more convoluted and tone-deaf rationalizations, ignoring not merely the facts, as reported by that pesky lyin’, Revenuer-lovin’ media, but the facts as admitted live on camera by the perps themselves — it appears something like 35% of (who, just hardcore DT base) still deny every aspect of complicit, compromising behaviors before the election, even though Donald Jr. has just admitted yet more astonishing particulars.

If Reagan was the “teflon President,” what does that make Trump? The real problem is not even him, but the deaf, dumb and blind faithful whose fingers must be getting sore from cramming ever deeper into their ears. Sinful criticism comes from self-righteousness, a quality nurtured by the Republican strategists of the past twenty years, but trademarked as a brand by the Trump campaign.

So, Survivor evolved with our national politic, and the ability to bracket all sorts of morally low acts within the context of “it’s just a TV game show” is now appropriated for justification of any low act in life, which is after all, just another competition streaming live on Facebook.

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