Somehow America’s made it through primary season without destroying itself. Although I guess that could still happen—we’ve got a solid 12 hours or so before the polls close out west. We’re on the cusp of finally wrapping all this nonsense up and getting on to the main event, with California, New Jersey, Montana, New Mexico and the Dakotas holding their votes today. You can use any number of words to describe the last year (twenty years? century? entire history?) of American politics—interminable, depressing, disgusting, an elaborate hidden camera prank, literal Armageddon—but we’ve gutted it out and came out of the other side of the storm with a presidential match-up custom tailored to piss off and alienate every single person in America even more than primary season did. The system works!
It’s incredibly unfair to equate Hillary Clinton with Donald Trump, who’s an openly racist buffoon running solely on right-wing hatred and resentment and the lie that he can help others become as rich and successful as he pretends to be. Still, a lot of people hate her, and when combined with a news media that has made Trump the lead story from day one, that has resulted in the situation our country now faces, with one of the most vilified and least popular politicians in America facing a clueless, self-aggrandizing, unwittingly self-parodying, potential tyrant.
We know how Clinton got here, and can also probably medically diagnose her most volatile critics based on the specific conspiracy theories they believe. Even though we watched the Republican train wreck happen in slow motion over the last year, though, you might be wondering how it came to this. How did Trump conquer a proud, historic party that still likes to act like it stands for anything other than the interests of the moneyed elite?
Samantha Bee’s here to help. Watch the above clip from last night’s episode of Full Frontal for a brisk, hilarious run down of how Trump got the Republican nomination, and how all the GOP leaders who once excoriated and mocked Trump have now fallen in line to support the most embarrassing and frightening presidential candidate in recent memory. It’s sad but truthful and very funny, as you’d expect from Bee’s excellent show. Now we’re going to go lock ourselves in our panic room until January 2021.