Michael Bloomberg Gets Voted Off The Island

America is a TV nation.

According to Nielsen, the average American now spends an astonishing 8 hours a day watching TV or video or YouTube.

We love to be entertained. It is now the core of who we are.

60 years ago, a person might go to the movies once a week and watch a film for an hour or so. Now, we pretty much live at the movies all the time — at home, in bed or on our phones. We are all entertainment all the time. It is what we respect above all else — the ability to entertain us.

Last night, in a search for the next President of the United States, the Democratic Party put on a reality TV show. It was pretty easy to understand. Just like Survivor or The Bachelor or The Amazing Race or The Apprentice, a group of people participate in a grueling elimination, week after week, to see who is left standing. Whoever survives until the final episode is the winner.

Or at least they go to the Grand Finale. The winner gets the White House and all the prizes that go with it.

And what is the measure of who gets to stay and who gets thrown off the Island, of who get to go onto next week’s show? Like Big Brother, it is likeability or popularity. The contestants we like the best get to stay. And, like on any great reality show, the viewers get to vote.

Last night, Michael Bloomberg got booted off the Island. And why? Because he is bad TV. Well, he is. He is terrible TV. He is stiff, he is uncomfortable, he has no ‘zingers’. Obviously, a man who can’t throw some zingers is incapable of leading the nation.

And, in a world in which the current occupant of the White House (I mean the winner of last season’s show — the former star of The Apprentice, a man who is GREAT TV — so entertaining), while that man is busy eviscerating the Justice Department, degrading the Rule of Law, riding roughshod over any basic decency in governance, destroying the last chance to stop climate change, blowing up all norms that make our country work and so much more, what were this year’s contestants doing? Throwing zingers! “Admit it! You DID tell dirty jokes!!” “How many houses do you have???”

That’s Entertainment!

Climate Change is boring.

Some 60 years ago, as a culture, we all made a collective decision. We would all commit to spending 8 hours a day, (or 6 or 4) watching TV and movies. Every day. Think of this as a kind of social experiment. What happens to a society that makes its number one priority, its number one value, entertainment?

You get Donald Trump in the White House.

And what are we going to get now? Who is going to be the winner for this season? The most capable? The smartest? The wisest? The best able to lead, to solve the myriad problems that confront the nation?

Nope

We are going to get the most entertaining. The best TV personality.

My guess is Bernie Sanders will take the nomination. Why? He is great TV. He reminds everyone of Larry David.

But live by the medium, die by the medium.

Bernie will also lose the general election?

Why?

Because Larry David always loses in the end.

As David Lean said in Lawrence of Arabia, it is written.

Another great movie.

If you thought this was interesting, and I hope you did, then check out my new book Don’t Watch This! How The Media Is Destroying Your Life.