First things first: Donald Trump has no sense of humor. None. A sense of humor requires one to understand irony, and this, in turn, requires cognitive flexibility. There is nothing flexible about Trump’s thought processes.
A sense of humor also requires good working vocabulary, because comics juxtapose words and concepts in a unique way designed to make us laugh. Donald Trump has low working vocabulary. When speaking off the cuff, as opposed to reading from the propagandic claptrap written by Stephen Miller, he demonstrates a preference for oft-repeated stock words and phrases, and the words he uses rarely exceed two syllables. Two-syllable frequent fliers include “quickly,” “happen,” and “very,” as in, “A trade deal will happen very quickly.” He also favors “windmill” and “ballroom.”
A sense of humor requires a healthy ego and the ability to poke fun at oneself. Donald Trump’s diseased ego is so malformed that self-effacement is impossible. Any admission of even the most minor flaw or misstep would shatter his fragile psyche like an eggshell.
As is evident in the video footage of Donald Trump and Jeffrey Epstein backslapping and yukking it up at the “girls-gone-wild”-style dance parties they used to throw for themselves, Trump appears capable of laughter—as long as the context is the sexual objectification of women. That is Trump’s idea of hilarity. He is also able to laugh when one of his friends or supporters makes a crude remark about something or someone he does not like. Otherwise, he occupies a humor-free zone.
The White House Correspondents’ Dinner, where comedians and assorted others poke fun at the famous, is a major annual event in Washington, D.C. While some of the jokes might be wince worthy, unfunny, or just downright mean, some of the jokes get a big laugh. Barack Obama got a big laugh in 2011 when he made fun of Trump’s D-list television show, as Trump sat grim-faced in the audience. The carefully coiffed and tuxedoed Trump adopted the posture he always assumes when fuming: arms crossed, scowling, staring, and making a mental note to annihilate the person who just had fun at his expense.
Someone should have mentioned to him before he ran for the presidency that comedians and other folks capable of humor take a lot of verbal pot shots at the famous and infamous, including candidates for public office and office holders.
Because he has the intellectual and emotional maturity of a toddler, the behaviorally disordered chief executive throws a tantrum when funny people say funny things about him. He takes to Truth Social or Fox News, or perhaps the nearest microphone at the residence of the British prime minister, to whine about the comedians who make a living mocking public figures. And then he makes a few threatening phone calls and files a few lawsuits and gets them fired.
Trump wants to silence anyone who gives him “bad publicity.” He does not seem to understand that the person who provides the bulk of his bad publicity is him. Every time he opens his mouth and makes another inaccurate, offensive, inane, or self-congratulatory remark, he provides new material to the comedians whose humor he hates. Attention hog Donald simply cannot keep his mouth shut, and since most of what comes out of his mouth is nonsensical word salad, he sets himself up over and over again.
I spent a career working with emotionally disabled students who often said and did things that elicited mockery from their classmates, and the mockery distressed them. I wish I had a dollar for every time I said to one of them, “If you don’t want people to fire at you, stop handing them ammunition.” Trump provides endless ammunition to the snarks and jesters of late-night television. Truth be told, although he has absolutely no sense of humor, and certainly no verbal skills, he practically writes the material for them.
When you travel through the world wearing orange make-up, cotton candy combovers, and neckties the length of your arms; when you compound the spectacle by saying ridiculous things continually; when you invite cameras into high-level meetings so that the video feed of assorted toadies competing for the “Most Pathetic Suck-Up in the Universe” award can be broadcast from coast to coast; when you stand before the United Nations and proclaim yourself the best president in American history and that you deserve a Nobel Peace Prize; and when every word you write leaves the impression of functional illiteracy (the “covfefe” episode from Trump’s first term was particularly amusing), then it really should come as no surprise that people cannot help but laugh at you. And boy oh boy, do they ever.
Trump is such a thin-skinned, over-indulged baby that he simply cannot tolerate being a figure of fun, not even for a moment. This being the case, the very act of channel surfing through the late-night TV lineup as he prepares for a long night of posting jeers, threats, and indecipherable gibberish on Truth Social must hurt his feelings.
And when Donald John’s feelings are hurt, he unleashes the Hounds of Hell. The Federal Communications Commission starts denying requests for media mergers and starts threatening to revoke major broadcasting licenses. The lawsuits are announced, and cowardly media executives buckle on cue.
It was in precisely this way that the Trump administration extorted millions from ABC News in response to George Stephanopoulos referring to the sexual abuse of E. Jean Carroll as a “rape,” when the judge in that case had previously acknowledged that while it could not be considered a rape under the exact definition in law, the attack was a de facto rape because it involved forcible sexual penetration.
ABC could have gone to court to defend Stephanopoulos and the free press; they did not, even though there was a high likelihood that they would have won. Instead, they caved to a bully.
At CBS, Trump sued over a “60 Minutes” interview with Kamala Harris that he claimed was “doctored” to edit out her “word salad.” Once again, Trump practically invited the mockery to which he is routinely subjected, since his own unique brand of word salad is so utterly incoherent that he has self-branded it “The Weave,” as if it were the linguistic equivalent of a drunken sailor… which it is.
In fact, there was no Harris “word salad” during the interview, and the editors of the segment said they doctored nothing. This highlights another of Donald Trump’s notable traits: the incessant projection of his own physical, intellectual, and character flaws onto others.
In any event, the suits at CBS did not care. They could have gone to court to defend the free press, and they would have won, but they did not. They not only paid out on the specious “60 Minutes” lawsuit, but, in a separate episode, they fired comedian Stephen Colbert as well. This time, they were in the middle of a merger between Paramount and Skydance. Damn free speech and political satire, and full speed ahead.
Then Trump turned his ire on ABC again, in the wake of an inappropriate remark made by Jimmy Kimmel following the murder of Charlie Kirk. ABC, anticipating another regulatory or civil suit from the Trump administration, preemptively suspended Jimmy Kimmel.
The MAGA-controlled Congress has abdicated its responsibility to defend free speech and freedom of the press, and the corporate entities that now largely control the various news and entertainment media outlets have abandoned all principle as well. And once again, since our elected representatives and the captains of broadcast journalism do not give a rip about the end of democracy and the degradation of the Constitution, it is up to us to make it stop.
Since the parent company of ABC is none other than the Disney corporation, hundreds of thousands of ordinary citizens began a massive boycott of Disney’s cable channel, “Disney +,” and picketers arrived at both ABC studios and the pearly gates of Disney’s theme parks.
And something amazing happened: Jimmy Kimmel was reinstated by ABC, at the behest of parent company Disney.
Had a miracle occurred? Not exactly. According to one of the bedrock principles of behaviorism, behavior that is rewarded is likely to be repeated. Behavior that is punished is likely to diminish.
For Disney, ABC, NBC, and all other “infotainment” entities, money is the reward. All behavior is driven by financial self-interest. Therefore, Donald Trump’s lawsuits and regulatory threats imperil their very raisons d’être—the generation of massive profits for themselves and their shareholders. Period.
The suspension of Jimmy Kimmel, it turns out, was the bridge too far, because so many of Disney’s theme park patrons, television subscribers, and movie ticket buyers decided to boycott Disney that the end user had the final say. All of us, collectively, made it more painful for Disney to capitulate to the bully than to ignore the consumer.
Thus, it appears that when all of us close our checkbooks and cancel our subscriptions, it is even scarier to craven media conglomerates than are Donald Trump’s threats and lawsuits. The bottom line is that infotainment corporations cannot exist without an audience.
A publisher of books that no one reads will soon be bankrupt. A manufacturer of clothing that no one wears will soon go broke. A restaurant serving food that no one wants to eat will soon be closed. A broadcasting corporation that has no audience will soon be shuttered, as well.
The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal have been singular in their determination to stand up to Trump. News and entertainment organizations with courage who refuse to capitulate are finding, as do children who are picked on at school, that standing up to bullies is the only way to defeat them.
Unsurprisingly, the lawsuits filed against The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal have been dismissed for being utterly baseless. Both organizations have stood up for their reporting and, in the process, have burnished their reputations as First Amendment champions. Conversely, CBS, ABC, and their parent companies have now been rightfully inducted into the Cowardly Conglomerates Hall of Fame.
We have more power than corporations have courage. If we all close our wallets, they cannot survive.
What a relief to know we can still act to defend the Constitution of the United States of America, even as our elected representatives refuse.