In his oft cited Attitudes
Toward History, Kenneth Burke challenges critics to hold themselves to
highest of standards. Regardless
of subject, “criticism,” he writes, “best be comic.”
Comic criticism requires an attitude of humility,
sensitivity to irony and complexity, and, most of all, a commitment to finding
fools where others see villains.
The comic critic fundamentally seeks to humanize his or her subject so that we might correct it, rather
than eliminate it. This challenge,
at times, can be quite difficult.
Nowhere is this charge to stay comic more tested, at least
for this critic, than when considering political discourse and campaign
rhetoric. Especially, when that
rhetoric is “from the other side” of the political divide.[1] Uncle Kenny (Burke) urges me to listen
carefully to Ted Cruz and his rabid supporters judge them as fools. For the Burkean critic, Cruz is a
misguided, mistaken fool. Not a
villain, not a populist thug, not an opportunistic hate-monger, a fool.
This. Is. Hard.
But it get’s harder.
See, I probably don’t really have to take Ted Cruz too seriously. He’ll never win anyway (though, even he
probably thinks of himself as running for VP). The Trumpster, on the other hand, really tries my comic
patience. Donald Trump, by most
polling data, is the favorite for the GOP nomination. I can laugh at Ted Cruz and, in some contexts, I can laugh at Donald Trump.
But the prospect of a Trump presidency is a little hard to stomach.
Trump fails most criteria for candidate viability, but his money,
fundraising network, and the groundswell of popular support generated by his
vitriol and bigotry just might dwarf the fact that he doesn’t “look
presidential” or “know anything about foreign or domestic policy.” By most measures, Trump is a terrible
candidate, but that doesn’t seem to matter this early in the primary campaign.
What I find interesting about all of this, though, is that
my trouble with Trump is that he’s hard to take seriously and it is precisely that fact that makes him hard to understand
comically as any good Burkean critic
should. His persona—a strange
blend of narcissism, used-car salesman, reality TV host, and spray tan—is such
an exaggeration of humanity that I’m not sure who he really is (or if, he really
is…). And yet, I can’t seem to
laugh at him—even when he’s on Saturday
Night Live (see above, if only for the moment where Larry David calls him a racist and Trump doesn't deny it) or when he makes his GOP opponents look like
idiots during a debate. I just can’t find it in
myself to think of Trump as a fool.
The fool exists to be corrected for the betterment of
society. When Trump suggests, as
he did on the Late Show with Stephen
Colbert (see below), that he has “no apologies” for anyone he’s wronged or
anything he’s done, it becomes evident that he is not interested in
correction. Trump is ridiculous,
to be sure, and he wears the fool’s cap (or whatever that thing on his head
is), but he is no fool.
At the same time, however, his hyperbolic persona makes him
hard to see as a hero or a villain—Burke’s tragic foil to the comic fool. He isn’t easily distilled into the good
bin or the evil bin. Even as a person on the opposite side
of the political divide, he doesn’t read as a threat, because I just can’t take
him seriously. I struggle to
believe, for even just a minute, that he could actually be president. If he’s a villain, he’s just not that
scary. I feel like if I just don’t
pay attention that he’ll eventually just go away. Even though the reality of the matter is that he has already
made the shortlist for the conversation next November and shows no signs of
backing down—or apologizing—anytime soon.
I’m not sure what all this means. It is, however, an uncomfortable position for the comic
critic. I can’t seem to think of
Trump as a fool or a villain. I
can’t get my head around it.
Maybe, that’s because he’s neither. Even if you hate him, and plenty of
folks do, he’s not serious enough—not really—to take comically and if he can’t be a fool, he can’t be
a villain. He’s a curious mix of
equal parts terror and ridiculousness.
For this comic critic, Donald Trump is no fool. He’s a clown.
