The Political Script
Michael Kruse and Politico gots some 'splainin' to do...
Earlier this week, Congressman Eric Swalwell compared Republicans in Congress to WWE performers.
Swalwell's comments were the latest in a series by either elected officials or astute political observers that have come to the same conclusion: today's politics has become an absurd reality where what politicians say and do is much closer to performance art than actual governance. With cuckoo bananas Republicans like Marjorie Taylor Greene and Matt Gaetz teaming up to provide the worst business return on an event since the Frye Festival, it's easy to laugh and mock folks like them who clearly have misunderstood any type of "appeal" they might have outside their own home districts. But, truth be told, although Greene and Gaetz failed to properly gauge their own popularity, the GOP still has a market for these types of performances. After all, how else can you explain the "diminished and dominating" Donald Trump six months out, still making headlines with his speeches despite now being a twice-impeached private citizen? The truth is that there is an appetite for these types of performances in GOP circles and the question we need to answer is what is driving people toward these individuals who clearly aren't all there upstairs?
To delve into this question, we have to return to the premise that today's politics is performance art. That, sure, politicians may have certain beliefs and values but that they also ham it up for the cameras. In Swalwell's comments, he specifically identifies Ted Cruz as someone who actually complimented his work during the second Trump impeachment trial but who then ran to Fox News to complain about Swalwell and the work he was doing. Ted Cruz, you see, has embraced his role as the villain. He doesn't care that he's the least-liked person in Congress or that even those on his own team can't stand him. Like the DCU's very own Joker character, Cruz is perfectly content to be a lone wolf and to backstab even those on his own team in his quest for power. It's why Cruz can joke about his Cancun trip where he deserted his own constituents because to show remorse would show him to be (somewhat) human, and that's something he simply cannot do. Ted Cruz, former college debate champion, knows what it takes to drive home a point, and the point he must make to his audience is that he will fight for his conservative values, no matter the ultimate cost to his reputation.
Ted Cruz, like so many other Republicans, is simply playing a part.
But it's a part that doesn't work unless there is one key ingredient: a script. To fully understand Swalwell's comparison, we have to understand not only the key WWE actors but also how WWE unfolds. Because, yes, professional wrestling has its heroes and villains but a key part of developing those characters is the weekly scripts. When it comes time to wrestle, it's one-on-one action with both "athletes" having similar skills and abilities. What sells tickets and what gets the audience to buy products after the performance is the creation of larger-than-life wrestling personas and the way these personas are generated is through the creation of weekly episodes composed by a team of writers. It is the writers who create the heroes and villains. Backstories are produced. Wrestlers are conniving, or vicious, or courageous, or heartbroken. Sometimes, they overcome the odds to become a champion. Other times, they backstab their partner for solely selfish reasons and emerge to a chorus of boos from tens of thousands of irate fans. The greatest WWE champions were also the greatest performers and that is no coincidence. The WWE writers saw the appeal of people like Hulk Hogan, The Rock, and John Cena and made sure to generate positive storylines for them but there were also stories about their opponents that made sure that the most marque matchups would have a clear rival that one of the champions would have to overcome. By marketing these larger-than-life heroes, the WWE was combining actors and athletes into some of the biggest stars the entertainment industry has seen over the past 40 years.
The question then is who writes the political scripts that elevate or debase today's politicians?
The answer, dear friends, is the media. It is a media that is dying and it is a media that is desperate to stay relevant. So it has taken a page out of the WWE and has created its own scripts to simultaneously elevate or debase politicians of its choosing. We see it time and time again: the horserace for any and all national elections. The ongoing "Dems in disarray" anytime a Democrat is in the White House. The downplaying of each and every crime Donald Trump committed over the past four years. The thirty-year smear campaign of Hillary Clinton. And today, the efforts of news outlets like Politico to try and prop up somebody like Ron DeSantis, who the media has anointed as the early favorite to replace Donald Trump at the top of the Republican ticket in 2024.
Republicans don't need political scriptwriters, they have the conservative-owned media. That is their source of positive PR. From overt right-wing news to the opinion sections of allegedly "neutral" publications to the echo chamber that exists on Fox News, OANN, and Newsmax, Republicans have a monopoly on the ability to create their own public persona. For instance, anybody who followed Marjorie Taylor Greene prior to her election knew she was crazy. Everyone knew she had some messed-up beliefs. But right-wing media saw in her a compelling story. They saw in her somebody who was up-in-coming. The right's AOC, if you will. For right-wing media, the idea of having someone batshit crazy in Congress working against Nancy Pelosi and the Squad was pure entertainment gold. So rather than covering all those comments about Jewish space lasers, right-wing media sat on that and all other damning stories simply to allow Greene to forge ahead and take her place in the hallowed halls of Congress. It was right-wing media's version of a rags-to-riches story and they lapped up every minute of it.
That is what we are dealing with in 2021. Today's media is hopelessly lost in trying to figure out how to WWE politics. But the truth is that politics isn't entertainment. Every single legislative debate isn't a battle of good versus evil. Politicians don't need to provide a soundbite on network TV every single night to be a star in politics. In fact, those that aren't as popular are often the ones doing the most work. Yet our media, in an effort to remain relevant, has debased itself in a way that it can no longer be taken seriously. Comedian Michelle Wolf was right in 2018: the media needed Donald Trump because he was good for business. The idea of "if it bleeds, it leads" has now taken on a 21st-century version where "if there's drama, oh mama!" and nowhere was there more drama than the last four years and Donald Trump and the most corrupt administration in world history. Fortunately, with the steady hand of the Biden-Harris Administration, we've now seen stability return for the first time since the Obama years. Because of this, the media is grasping at straws in a world where even news coverage is down roughly 25% across the board and the media is struggling at creating scandals where there are no scandals to be found.
Knowing all this, we as consumers of news need to be careful. Our media is in a midseason ratings slump. Without Trump, they no longer have their star performer. But there are still scripts to be written, episodes to be made. Our media may have "miscast" Ron DeSantis as a rising GOP star but don't think for a second that they don't have someone waiting in the wings. Get ready for up-and-coming profiles on someone like Nikki Haley or Kristi Noem in the coming weeks to help ease the pain of the big DeSantis swing and miss. Because as we know from watching WWE when the ratings become stagnant, it becomes time to introduce someone new for the audience to get to know and to build up that character until they eventually become a star. Eric Swalwell was right: today's GOP is nothing more than a bunch of charlatans playing a part on national TV.
But it is a part that originates from the writers' room of our major media outlets.