As Election Day approached, a couple of friends, both New York media execs, asked me if I wanted to join them at celebratory events they were producing to mark Hillary’s pending victory. The Donald Trump we had been presenting on Saturday Night Live seemed to delight nearly everyone in the People’s Republic of Manhattan, so I had many such invitations. The SNL Trump sketches prompted people to approach me, thank me, and beseech me to “keep going” more than any other portrayal or piece I have performed. It was ironic, to say the least. In 2013, Harvey Levin wanted the public to believe I was a hate-filled homophobe. The Post said I was a racist. Suddenly, liberal downtown types were coming up to me everywhere I went, all day, every day, urging me to continue with this funny way to channel all of their not-so-funny fears, as well as their hatred of the suddenly viable Trump candidacy. And then this god-awful nightmare descended.
There is no point in dissecting Hillary Clinton’s loss here. Enough analysis of that exists to last us all ten lifetimes. I had always admired Secretary Clinton’s mind, her courage, her self-control under painfully difficult circumstances, and her tenacity. Trump, of course, exploited the fact that voters across the country would accept him as the sharp, no-nonsense, can-do executive he portrays on television. And he knew that they would not consider the fact that in New York, his hometown and base of operations, Trump is endured, at best. I will not go so far as to say he is a punch line, because in New York, making a lot of money counts for something, and according to him at least, Trump has made a lot of money. But Trump was never an admired New Yorker, a sought-after speaker, or dinner guest. He has never shown an appetite for the Great Political Imperative that New York politicians must manifest in order to be a real leader: empathizing with the day-to-day hustle and bustle of working-class New Yorkers. In fact, he has actually been an enemy of the working class, refusing to pay many of his contractors and using undocumented workers on job sites going back to the 1980s. Trump has abused power at every station stop of his life. Now he has the most powerful position in the world. Some people make a lot of money, but it does not fundamentally change who they are. Others become rich while choosing to never honestly reflect on the role luck played in their good fortune, electing to tune out the cries and complaints of those who can only truly be helped by reforming the system that enriches the Donald Trumps of this world.
I could go on. In another book, perhaps, I might go into greater detail about what the president of the United States ought to do and who that person ought to be. We have so many problems in the modern world, and we can no longer plead ignorance of any of them. Prioritizing those problems, knowing what order we must proceed in, like triage, is essential. Foreign policy, education, war-making, jobs, environmental regulation, disease control, infrastructure, criminal justice and incarceration, climate change, a fair tax policy, immigration, and, yes, a government role in curating our diverse cultural heritage: all of these, and more, must be on the table. The presidential candidate who defeats Trump in 2020 must present a clear, transparent plan for what he or she will do and when. The thing that is clearest now is that Trump must go, either in 2020 or sooner. It is imperative that we replace those who think they own this country with those who built it.
On May 8, 1962, John Kennedy addressed the United Auto Workers in Atlantic City on the subject of the responsibility of both organized labor and auto executives to control inflation. This excerpt from that speech says it all. When we read it today, Kennedy exhorts us to raise the bar, increase our expectations, seek a man or woman who will at least attempt to work for all Americans and do as much good for as many of them as possible. As he put it:
Now I know there are some people who say that this isn’t the business of the President of the United States, who believe that the President of the United States should be an honorary chairman of a great fraternal organization and confine himself to ceremonial functions. But that is not what the Constitution says. And I did not run for President of the United States to fulfill that Office in that way.
Harry Truman once said there are 14 or 15 million Americans who have the resources to have representatives in Washington to protect their interests, and that the interests of the great mass of other people, the hundred and fifty or sixty million, is the responsibility of the President of the United States. And I propose to fulfill it.
I believe America is a great country, but we are never greater than when we actually do great things: World War II, the moon landings, the Peace Corps, the billions upon billions of dollars we gift every year to a world in need. At times, we’ve also elected some truly great leaders. One thing we ought to do, however, is shore up the integrity of our electoral system. Because it isn’t really a democracy if you can’t honestly count the votes.
16
Doubt Thou the Stars Are Fire
I love second chances. I love the concept of renewal. I love to see people come back from some adversity, self-inflicted or not, and untangle themselves from a difficult situation. They may correct some perceived mistake they’ve made. Make amends, if you will. Consequently, they prove to themselves and to others what they’re capable of, what they’re made of. You can call it redemption, or choose another word, but most important, they find some real degree of peace, even happiness.
I’m always nudged by the phrase “Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” I understand the basic impulse to live, to survive. I’ve witnessed how countless people around the world have suffered and died in pursuit of their liberty. It’s the last part, however, that always pokes at me. When was I happy? Truly happy? Back during my grass-cutting career, my brother Stephen and I would go to a Chinese restaurant near our house and order fried rice. We’d sit on the curb in the strip mall parking lot, eating out of the containers. It was our very own fine dining experience. I never ate better in my life. Those pickup football games at dusk, the testosterone and ego galloping up and down the field that we carved out within the golf course. I can feel that air around me now. We were so focused and present. No cell phones. No streaming TV. There was nowhere else we wanted to be, no one else we wanted to be with. When I close my eyes and think back to that time, that feeling runs through my heart again. What I wouldn’t give to go back and see us then. Just to look at us, at my young self, and say, “Do you realize that you have everything you could want right here?”