Friday, February 3, 2017

May this Presidential Administration Die Hard with a Vengeance

Trump's supporters think he's this guy


I feel like Trump’s supporters think he’s like John McClane in the original Die Hard: A no-nonsense, tough-talking New York everyman who shoots straight and kills all those foreign terrorists who literally declare a ‘War on Christmas' and take a bunch of hard-working, all-American (largely white if I recall) corporate employees hostage in order to rob their company (which ironically, is a Japanese firm, if you remember) on the night of their holiday party. Despite their fancy tailored clothes, organizational savvy, high-tech gadgets, and eloquent, erudite continental mastermind leader Hans Gruber (Alan Rickman, chewy scenery with aplomb), McClane defeats them with sheer guts and determination, showing not just the bad guys who is boss, but all those pencil-necked, bureaucratic West Coast lawmen and bumbling feds who get in his way, as well as a useless media embodied by a craven, self-serving TV newsman.

But Trump is really this guy

Me, I think Trump is Harry Ellis. If you don’t remember, Ellis is one of the corporate hostages – a cocky, coked-up, snooty and obnoxious yuppie who blatantly hits on McClane’s wife Holly and goes out of his way to belittle McClane’s working-class status when they first meet. Later in the film Ellis decides to take matters into his own hands, telling Holly, “Hey babe, I negotiate million dollar deals for breakfast. I think I can handle this Eurotrash.” However, his ‘negotiation’ consists of blowing McClane’s true identity to Gruber and trying to get McClane to surrender (and likely be killed). It doesn’t work, and for his troubles Ellis doesn’t even make it to the end of the movie. Which is what I’m hoping for the current demented presidential administration.