mercredi 1 mars 2017
America, You’ve Been Punk’d
The way things are going, I wouldn't be the least bit surprised if we all woke up tomorrow and Ashton Kutcher was sitting in the Oval Office, arm around Donald Trump, as they both laugh conspiratorially over the gullible Americans who believed everything they've seen since November of 2016 was real. In unison, they declare, "America, you've been punked!"
Honestly, it's been hard to shake this surreal theater of the absurd that seems to be our new reality. It's not like there haven't been public gaffes and blunders in the past; one of the most beloved presidents of all time, John F. Kennedy, made a speech in Berlin on June of 1963 declaring, "I am a jelly doughnut," while reading a speech which hadn't been properly grammar-checked. The thing is, these mistakes and blunders seem to be happening at an alarming rate and at a time when we're also being sold a bill of goods about "truth" and the possibility of there being a subset of truth called "alternate facts".
This week's blunder at the Oscars was confusing and weird, but not as troubling or disorienting as watching the recent Senate confirmation hearings; Rick Perry gets confirmed as secretary of the Department of Energy, a department he once wanted to dismantle and famously forgot the name of during the 2011 presidential debates. Seven years ago, that kind of big-time public gaffe and irony was an anomaly. These days it's just another day on Capitol Hill. Consider when you hear Mr. Perry's colleagues say he may have a bit of a "learning curve" in this role, just how scary that statement is. This man is in charge of our nuclear arsenal! Consider, also, the quality of the man he's replacing - Ernest J. Moniz. Mr. Moniz was once chairman of the MIT Physics Department; It sort of feels like Mad Magazine's mascot, Alfred E. Neuman, is taking over for Einstein. "What, me worry?"
It's incredibly disarming when news coverage is almost indistinguishable from Saturday Night Live skits. The recent senate confirmation of Secretary of Education Betsy De Vos played like a typical send-up with Kate McKinnon. When De Vos was asked about guns in school she cited the possible need in case of grizzly bears. Seriously? Grizzly Bears? When did this become an issue on par with the disturbing and all too frequent cases of gun violence in American schools?
Here's the thing: a screw-up at the Oscars, or an insignificant production problem with sound check, like the Mariah Carey's New Year's Eve performance really isn't that big a deal. "That's entertainment!" as they say. But the delusional, absurd, and oftentimes fictitious content pouring out of our nation's capitol should give us pause. When I'm watching the nightly news coverage I want it to be distinguishable from binge-watching episodes of Punk'd!
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