The Apprentice debuted in 2004.
I never watched this damn show in real time, so I was rather shocked at the impact it wound up having on this planet. “New York is my town,” host Donald Trump brays in the opening credits… except it isn’t, never has been. New York hates his guts, and not for the reason he or his followers would have you believe. It’s not because of his background. If there is one thing New Yorkers love, it’s a self-made man or woman. Ellis Island and Wall Street are both here. As are Broadway and the broadcast networks. Restaurants and record labels! Someone who starts at the bottom, has a dream, gets organized, rolls up his sleeves, and gets it done? We love that more than anything. It’s why people move here. But New Yorkers have long known that’s not what Donald Trump is about. We remember when his equally repellant father was alive. We were there when Donald inherited all his wealth, then diminished it with a series of terrible business decisions. We watched him sanctify the love of greed that characterized the ’80s, as magazines breathlessly reported his limousine exploits surrounded by supermodels and escorts. He’s great at SPENDING money. Earning it? Increasing it? Making something? Where’s the evidence? It’s a SHOW.
And if that lie left any stomachs unturned, there was that racist full-page ad in 1989 condemning five innocent boys for a gang rape they did not commit, then his refusal to apologize when they were exonerated, followed by his racist attacks on President Obama. I guess when New York is Trump’s town, it doesn’t include Harlem, the Bronx or Brooklyn. 25% of New York is black, more if you include Latinos of color, and the Trumps tried to keep black people out of their buildings.
To borrow from Ed Koch (and New York WAS Koch’s town), “How’m I doin’?” We’re only on the CREDITS to The Apprentice and I’m just getting warmed up.
By the way, the reality show starring people who know about business is Shark Tank, not The Apprentice. Did the creators of Trump’s show even know what the word means? An apprentice is someone who learns at the feet of a mentor, acquiring skills, learning a trade, embarking on a path to a future. In the white collar world, the word “intern” has come to replace it. In both cases, the job description implies some kind of exchange of free or cheap labor for hands-on education. That’s not what this is. On The Apprentice an abusive employer berates and humiliates job applicant contestants, firing them willy-nilly with no rhyme or reason like the Red Queen from Alice in Wonderland. Far from being good business, it’s the worst possible way to run an enterprise, a search for Yes Men and lickspittles who will become, I guess, some sort of extension of the boss’s unchecked, erratic will. You want a business to go down the tubes? Act like THAT.
On the show, the creators give Trump this evil, Godfather-like lighting where he sits at this table and makes frowny faces at his quivering supplicants. Is that supposed to be cool? They DO know that if he’s a Corleone, he’s Fredo, right? In between these wretched, Caligula-like spectacles, Trump reads short pep talks off a teleprompter which make him sound like he knows something about business and finance or for that matter anything at all. This was before he swindled all those people with his fake university, defaulted on bank loans to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars, and took an oath on the Bible he broke 1,000 times over.
Hey, what an excellent qualification for President of the United States! He played a successful businessman on a reality-based game show! Trump hosted this farce until 2015, at which point his racist remarks from his campaign speeches got him fired from his own show. “You’re Fired!” We fired him again in 2020, and I hope to God we keep firing his ass all the way down to hell before the sun sets on this country. Sorry he fooled you, America. Because here in New York, he wouldn’t get elected dog catcher.
On the dollar bill it says “E Pluribus Unum”. Apparently in the heartland, the slogan is “Thank you, sir! May I have another?”
Ya been took! Ya been hoodwinked! Bamboozled! Led astray! Run amok!
Enjoy your birthday, you fish-smellin’ bag of bowling balls!
(Travalanche) 
You must be logged in to post a comment.