Tucker Carlson is going to have a conversation at some point with St. Peter, the ultimate fact checker.
 
 

The Biden family was certainly not without drama. Highs and lows.
 
 

The Secret Service Do you remember the assassinatiion attempt against Donald Trump? What I'm getting at is there was an incident in Las Vegas in 2016 where a 20-year-old man tried to grab a gun from a cop to shoot Donald Trump.
The Secret Service liked Ivana Trump and Jared Kushner.
The dramatic Mike Pence situation.
To find out more about the Secret Service situatioin, look for anything with
 
 

Mike Pence. There will not be a film about Mike Pence. And yet
things got hairy and scary.
Was Mike Pence a hero, or not? The debate continues.
 
 

Jamie Raskin, originally a lawyer and professor specialising in constitutional law, was a congressman. On December 31, 2020 it was announced that his son had died. His son suffered from depression and committed suicide. He was buried on Jan. 5. Then on Jan. 6 Jan. 6 happened. For Jamie Raskin, who was in the building being attacked with an unknown result, it must have been .. well, ask him. After that his daughter didn't want to go to the Capitol. He became the lead manager for the second impeachment charging Mr. Trump with inciting an insurrection. In July '21 he became a key player in the Senate Committe investigating the Jan. 6 attack, with its public hearings July '22.

Later in '22 he got cancer (again).
 
 

Senator John McCain has a story, and a role. But he promptly died, so no film.
 
 

Somebody might decide that there is a story to tell about the evolving Lindsey Graham and his motivations. He was close to John McCain.
 
 

I believe there already was a television movie about James Comey.
 
 

Don McGahn was a White House counsel for U.S. President Donald Trump. No, not one of those lawyers. He was a counsel for the presidency, not for Donald Trump's personal crimes. What makes him special is he was in the thick of it, repeatedly.
 
 

Nobody wants a film about Steve Miller. But he certainly led to drama.
 
 

General Michael Flynn
screwy in the head, something went wrong
career blocked, bitter, mental breakdown reinforcing
But was a general. intelligence
tangled up with Russians, picture, communicating with Turkey during inauguration
down that pathetic Q rabbit hole.
 
 

Television gets my vote as a good character for a Trump-era film.

Casting a television show.
master manipulator of television
Joe Scarborough talking to the camera.
different information worlds
 
 
 

I think television is a good candidate as a character to focus on. Picture some of these scenes in a film.
 
 

Some notes about culture:
Around the time of the '16 election the talking heads on television would often say the unhelpful "I mean" and "Yeah, no"/"No, yes" over and over. When guests were introduced to discuss some scandalous issue, they would often be shaking their heads. That never happens on Canadian television.
 
 
 

I used to watch a lot of MSNBC, particularly Rachel Maddow. She did a good job of presenting how the two Americas lived in two different worlds in terms of perception. Television was very much part of that, with Fox News doing something other than journalism.

Fox/administration overlap

Mr. Trump, who has mental issues including narcissism, has a habit of making his own reality going back decades. The new government started on a weird note, as Press Secretary Sean Spicer testily insisted that the crowd size at the inauguration was misreported by journalists, even though the photographs shown on television showed smaller crowds. "This was the largest audience to ever witness an inauguration, period." On the Meet The Press television show, Kellyanne Conway claimed Mr. Spicer was using "alternative facts".

At the time I was impressed by how it was all about information, and the spread and perception of information. The scandal. The Steele dossier. The other scandal. The Robert Mueller investigation. The thing revealed on the Rachel Maddow show. The latest crazy statement or policy. The inside scoop.

There was one dramatic shock or revelation after another - Bam! Bam! Bam! - which made it hard to focus. Rachel Maddow used to have a whole show planned out, only to toss it in the trash because of some news event that happened.

After getting an inheritance from his rich father, Mr. Trump, who had questionable business skills, experienced a series of bankruptcies, famously losing money running a casino. He got a job as a game show host on NBC The Apprentice Opening (there's Omarosa). This was a scripted reality television show. At the same time he got money doing sleazy deals with sleazy Russians. People in America (maybe not New York) got the impression that Mr. Trump was a successful businessman.

Omarosa and, briefly, Anthony Scaramucci wound up on the Big Brother reality television show.
 
 

He liked his stunts. This was good for Trump, good for television, and good for the audience. After his dangerous bout with the covid virus, Mr. Trump planned to be wheeled out of the hospital, then stand up and remove his buttoned shirt to reveal a superman shirt. This did not happen. What did happen was the police clearing out the George Floyd protesters with tear gas so that he could cross Lafayette Square with white house people and hold up a bible at a church. See the wikipedia entry for details.
 
 

Mr. Trump had a thing about "ratings" during his time as president. That was something he valued. He thought like a television producer. People on television joked that he should be given his own show playing president and make him think he is president. "We'll see what happens." Stay tuned for the next episode.

Mr. Trump spent much of his time as president watching television (and posting, eating hamburgers, and phoning). He watched Fox to make himself feel good, and other channels to get the news. He marvelled at how he could post something controversial on Twitter, then see it on the news. He was also a big leaker.

President Trump was superficial. He chose members of his administration based on seeing them on television. William Barr for example. Somebody might have a look from "central casting". John Bolton's mustache was questionable.

The White House was chaotic. Various people in the role of chief of staff could not control access to the president. When members of the administration wanted to get something communicated to the president, they would go on Fox News and communicate to President Trump - through the television!

Joe Scarborough used to regularly complain about Mr. Trump on his Morning Joe show. Mr. Trump watched this show. At one point Mr. Scarborough was going on about some scandalous Trump issue. He stopped, and took off his glasses. He talked to the camera about the issue, directly and explicitly talking to Mr. Trump himself.

Donald Trump did a great job of controlling the attention of the media, going back decades, which was no doubt good for his ego. He had a love/hate relationship with the media. Like any politician he didn't like the criticism and perspectives of the media, but he liked the attention. He also thought he was his best representative.

On January 6 January 6 happened. A mob, egged on by the president and others, attacked the Capitol. This iconic event was just one of a number of schemes to illegally keep Mr. Trump as president. The mob attack happened live on television. The MSNBC people were frazzled. One could speculate about the reasons why. Joe Scarborough was swearing away. Ali Velshi, with a lot of work and little sleep, was perilously close to saying something regrettable. He said he was ordered not to call the insurrection an insurrection.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

The Generals also get my vote, with high drama, marred by the fact the generals were different people with different stories.
 
 
 
 

Other things happened during the Trump presidency era, not necessarilly connected to Donald Trump. Do you remember the clown craze / cnn of 2016?

What is a leppo?

eating paper

stopped pandemic preparedness

Moved troops to the border. See Generals.

imposed tariffs on aluminum from Canada for national security reasons

Played golf. Spent a lot of time in, summer

I forgot about the government shutdown.