What’s an Omarosa?

Remember back to 1985 and the film “Back to the Future,” where the “Marty McFly” character informs the 1955 version of “Doc Brown” that Ronald Reagan was the president, which inspired the response, “Who’s the vice president? Jerry Lewis!”

The punch line being that one entertainer (remember “Bedtime for Bonzo”) would turn government into a whole crew of entertainers. How ridiculous!

OF COURSE, IT would seem that the ludicrousness of three decades ago is all-too much our modern-day reality. Things we never would have thought credible are the norm of now.

That’s how I’m regarding this whole ongoing situation regarding President Donald Trump and one-time staffer Omarosa Manigault-Newman. The one who these days supposedly says tape recordings exist of Trump using racial slurs, which causes The Donald to now openly refer to her as “that dog.”

The connection between the two goes back to the days when Trump was host of reality television shows, and Manigault was one of the contestants. From what I can tell, her character was the sort-of nasty personality on the program – which I suppose fits some role in the overall show.

I write “from what I can tell” because I have to admit, I never actually watched the show. I never heard of Manigault in those days, and even after I learned that the Trump presidency gave a job to someone who had been a character on his show, I didn’t care enough to really find out who she was.

MEANING I HAD to do some instant research on Tuesday to try to figure out what the big deal was with this instance where Manigault felt compelled to tell of secret tape recordings of Trump and also took the non-disclosure documents she was asked to sign in order to get a job working for Trump’s 2020 re-election campaign and provided copies of them to the Washington Post.

I went all this time without bothering to find out who she was because I really didn’t care. I would have presumed that the idea of anyone affiliated with the Trump presidency back in the days when he played television show host would not have been considered a credible persona to be working in the White House.

Shows you how little I know.

Although to tell you the truth, it shouldn’t be surprising that someone as much a political amateur as Donald Trump would put a whole crew of amateurs into positions of power and authority.

SUCH AS MANIGAULT, who may have been a government staffer back in the days of Al Gore as Vice President (personnel people from back then now say she was “the worst hire we ever made”). But her real credentials are the fact she was on The Apprentice and The Ultimate Merger television programs.

So is she really now as incompetent as Trump is trying to make her out to be? She may be. He may be telling the truth, for once!

But why should he have any reason to be shocked? Who did he think he was hiring when he picked her for a spot in the White House Office of Public Liaison (which basically means she was responsible for presenting Trump’s image to the public)? He certainly had no reason to think she had any real credentials for a public service job.

I’d take this whole controversy (yes, I think it sleazy for someone to go about secretly tape-recording their boss to slip him up) as further evidence of how grossly unqualified Trump is to be this nation’s chief executive and how the 2020 election cycle can’t come soon enough to give the electorate the chance to replace him.

ALTHOUGH THERE HAVE been so many more incidents during this Age of Trump to show us how unfit he is to hold public office – and how delusional that segment of our society is that still, to this day, thinks his election in 2016 was a good thing for the country.

Meaning now that I have bothered to look into this, I wish I could undo it. For I fear that bothering to learn who Manigault is has managed to squeeze some more essential (or interesting) knowledge from my memory.

And as for that old “Back to the Future” joke, it doesn’t seem quite so funny anymore.

Because compared to all the level of nonsense that has occurred in this Age of Trump, the idea of Jerry Lewis as Vice President doesn’t seem anywhere near as absurd.

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Why, oh why, would he want to be president; for the television ratings?

For Hillary Clinton, the reason she’d want to be U.S. president is simple. She’s the ambitious sort who probably thinks that if her husband was capable of getting elected to two terms of work in the Oval Office, why can’t she.

 

Campaign a stunt to promote television show? Or just a figment of Michael Moore's imagination?

The fact that she’d be the first female in that role, if she succeeds in winning the Nov. 8 general election, also entices her – the thought of a legacy that would make her a historic figure has its appeal.

BUT WHAT ABOUT Donald Trump? What would make a real estate developer who has built countless structures (and named so many of them after himself) want to have a position as head of the bureaucracy that comprises the federal government?

Perhaps it’s the fact that it doesn’t really make much sense that makes some people suspect Trump isn’t really interested in holding the post – and may very well consider outsourcing the position to someone else should he manage to prevail on Election Day.

Which is a ridiculous thought. Then again, so much of what has occurred under the guise of the Trump presidential campaign has been absurd.

I found it interesting to read a Michael Moore (as in the documentary filmmaker) commentary where he suggests that Trump got into the presidential bidding as a publicity stunt, of sorts, to promote that ridiculous television program, The Apprentice.

YOU KNOW, THE one that everybody thinks is ever so cute because he’s always barking out “You’re Fired!” at people. As though there’s really anything interesting about watching someone get dismissed from their place of employment.

Under Moore’s theory, television executives backed off of Trump when they started hearing his anti-Mexican rants that began his campaigning. But Trump – and his ego – got caught up in campaigning to the point where he can’t really quit now.

Now I don’t know if I really buy this theory. I don’t doubt television executives are trivial-minded enough to concoct such a scheme. I’d just like to think that someone business-oriented like Trump would knock it down before it got started.

After all, a presidential campaign takes time away from business interests if done right. And Trump doesn’t exactly seem like the kind of person who’d turn over leadership of Trump Enterprises to daughter Ivanka or son Donald, Jr.

I’VE KNOWN PEOPLE who work in construction who have done business with Trump Enterprises who say that he micromanages the details of his projects, literally insisting on personally approving any expense over $100,000.

To the point where I know construction types who say they walked away from a chance to make very big money on projects because they didn’t want to deal with The Donald watching over their shoulder on every little detail.

To my own sensibility, Trump is the business-oriented type of person who probably views government officials as some sort of wasteful middle-man he is forced to deal with. Worse yet, they impose all kinds of restrictions that add to his expense – which means cutting into the financial bottom line of the buildings he erects.

By running for office, he’s eliminating the middle-man and gaining the authority to sign off on his own interests. I’m sure the last thing he’d want to do if he were to get elected president would be to have to turn over management of his company to someone else.

IT WOULD DEFEAT the whole point of why he got involved in this campaign to begin with! To my mindset, business-oriented people are not fit for government, largely because they’re not used to the idea of having to compromise and negotiate deals on behalf of conflicting interests.

Particularly for someone like Trump, he’s used to getting to bark orders and having them followed. How would a “President Trump” react the first time Congress told him symbolically to “shove it!”

 

Is Hillary really in for a crushing defeat? Zip says so

I actually think that the best thing for Trump’s personal sanity would be for him to suffer a crushing defeat on Election Day.

Which means that for the nation’s sake, we should hope that the Zip poll – the one by an app surveying people anonymously that has Trump winning 81 percent to 19 percent – is downright ridiculous.

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