Part One

Back in 2003 I was working out of my home state. I was sent to California to work in a refinery near Oakland. And California hit the big time news with a successful effort to recall Governor Gray Davis from his second term. My closest of kin was a native Californian who found the recal ridiculous. For one thing the newly reelected Democratic governor was perfectly honest and capable. The Republican legislator who sponsored the recall was notoriously not so. And then when the recall was successful, he backed out of the whole thing and did not run to replace Davis himself.

What followed was a political maelstrom with over a hundred contenders and a fracas that was simultaneously horror show and low comedy that would have kept Spitting Image busy with tons of papier mache had they still been around. And long story short, California got The Governator. Arnold Schwarzeneggar was elected, served a full term, and was reelected.

The next year, The Apprentice ‘reality show’ premiered with Donald Trump. I watched some of the early episodes. Trump did not take to the screen very much in the episodes I saw. The contending novices and the tasks set them took up the bulk of the show and provided the competitive tension. Trump would furnish the gravitas as the ‘decider’ at a final boardroom showdown and got to utter the immortal phrase: “you’re fired!”. Right from the start I could not see why anyone would humiliate themselves to be subjected to that man’s judgment. I would find it defiling, but then, in America the trappings of wealth, power and competence is accepted as a substitute for the real thing in so many cases. Fronting a reality show is definitely one of those cases.

That show with Donald Trump went on until 2015. Then Trump left for possibly higher things, and the show morphed into Celebrity Apprentice with guess who as the new decider:

Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger.