Opinion: The Newest Reality Show, The Trump Presidency

Two years ago it seemed most unlikely that Donald J. Trump would now be the 45th President of the United States. The host of the NBC property 'The Celebrity Apprentice" was bringing in nice ratings numbers and making money for the NBC network.

Jeb Bush and Hillary Clinton were everybody's choices for the next election cycle in 2016. All that then changed like the husbands of the Kardashian clan with almost as much predictability. I guess when Bruce Jenner became Caitlyn Jenner in April, 2015, very live and in front of all America, we should have been prepared for the Donald Trump transformation starting when he rode that escalator at Trump Tower.

At first Trump's escalator ride was promoted and reported as a publicity stunt to boost next season's ratings for his television franchise. Others thought it to be a delusional personality exposing itself to America. Now let me mention here in print that in 1975 I sat in the George Washington University cafeteria in Washington D.C. when a man approached me at a lunch table and said, "Hi, I am Jimmy Carter and I am running for President." Honestly I was looking for campus security and we all now know how that played out. As they say, only in America.

Since I never understood the Kardashian phenomenon I did not pay attention to that new vein of American TV viewer that loves reality TV shows. I never grooved on Donald Trump from Queens, N.Y. saying, "You're fired!" or those rescue survivor deals, including one where they run around naked in the jungle. I guess it's a generational thing or something along those lines.

Watching the last Presidential cycle on cable TV almost every night I couldn't believe what I was watching. It was as if Donald Trump was the Beatles and it was 1964 America all over again. It was almost like we were North Korea where the only dude on state TV is Kim Jong-un. I guess, looking back, Trump coverage was great ratings and advertising revenue for all the cable networks but I will bet my last $20 none believed Trump would ever become the Republican nominee, let alone the 45th President of the United States.

Then came the primaries with big rallies and the protests and lets make no mistake about Trump's ease as ringleader in front of the camera was sort of like Jerry Springer in the his crazy days. In rural America, Donald Trump was a happening ticket, a Beatles 1964 ticket.

On election night I was as surprised as I was when Bill Buckner let that Mookie Wilson ground ball goes through his legs during game six of the 1986 World Series, as Trump started that election night sweep of Florida, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Wisconsin, Iowa and then Michigan.

To be honest, I still can't believe it, but it happened live on every network. However, honestly, the real impact did not hit home until Donald Trump became President and the White House has now become the set of the biggest reality show ever, "The Presidency."

Now, hourly, we get those surprise executive orders, the reactions, retraction, the tweets. The leader to leader phone calls that now seem like some low level reality writer submitted them in a failed script, but it's all real. What you see is what you get. We do not have a traditional poll reader, focus group reacting politician. Instead, we have a perhaps well intended but still an amateur politician sitting in the Oval Office sworn is as President of the United States.

I understand how white working class middle America was ignored by the Democrats and the only person who heard their voices was Trump. He was the ultimate kick the table over, drain the swamp protest vote. He is an outsider now in charge in Washington, D.C. and now his flaws are magnified. Running the USA is not like lining up thousands of real estate closing every day, it's very complicated. However, what we are still getting is the network reality TV coverage approach to governing. Provocative, drama driven, weird things are happening. President Trump was not incorrect when he said he was hurting coverage of the Super Bowl this year. Ratings are still on his mind — it's all he knows and knowing how to generate them for the networks and his hard campaigning made him President.

Will the new reality show, "The Presidency", run the full four years? Will it be picked up for another four years? Will it be canceled before the four years are up? These are the questions that fuel the drama on cable news TV as North Korea and Iran march toward a nuclear bomb, China toward world domination and Russia tries to stage a successful "Make Russia Great Again" campaign of its own. Admiral William Halsey is quoted as saying, "There aren't any great men. There are just great challenges that ordinary men like you and me are forced by circumstances to meet."

We will now learn if he was right.

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