TJ Walker (host) comments on President-elect Donald Trump’s public reactions to media criticism in November 2016, citing two recent incidents: the Hamilton cast’s impromptu speech to Vice President-elect Mike Pence and Saturday Night Live’s Alec Baldwin portrayal. Walker contrasts Trump’s combative responses with conventional political advice to ignore or deflect jokes, suggests selectivity is important for someone of national stature, and offers general advice to individuals rising in stature to develop a thick skin.
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President elect Donald Trump dominating news once again this weekend, this time with his theater criticism. First, as I discussed in earlier posts, he was not happy at all about the cast of Hamilton giving an impromptu speech to his vice president elect Mike Pence. When Pence attended the show on on Friday night, Trump roundly criticized the cast of Hamilton, essentially calling for a boycott. Says that it was entirely inappropriate and most interestingly demanded that they apologize. I'm not quite sure what it's like when the most powerful person on the planet who demands retribution and has publicly said anyone who does you wrong, get them back 10 times worse. Not quite sure how you react to that when that person demands that you apologize. But that wasn't all that got his attention this weekend. Saturday Night Live with its actor Alec Baldwin, who portrays Trump, did not meet with satisfaction by Trump this weekend. The Alec Baldwin's Trump did. A character that just essentially said that Trump was way out of his league, unprepared, willing to backtrack on every single promise. And Trump trashed it, said it's not funny, wants to know when he has equal time. Now you can debate whether or not what Hamilton did was appropriate. You can debate whether or not Saturday Night Live was funny on any given Saturday. It does seem bizarre to be the President elect have such duties as selecting a cabinet, trying to figure out how to solve major problems around the world, isis, the economy, building walls to even have time obsessing over media criticism and what comedians say. Conventional wisdom is that if you're a politician at that level, at that stature, you simply ignore comedians making fun of you, or you laugh and say how is funny? Even if you don't really think it's funny. Now, Donald Trump has been quite successful doing the opposite of what traditional politicians have done. So time will tell. It may be that his followers like this, that they like him really roughing it up and thumbing his nose at the Hollywood elite and the NBC New York City Saturday Night Live elite. I just have to think at some point the strategy has to shift. Not that he has to change principles, but as president of the United States, anything you decide to put your spotlight on is going to get, if not hundreds, millions, tens of millions of people thinking about it, talking about it. At some point, it's no longer a challenge of getting media attention. You can get attention for anything you want, any time of day or night. It's a question of selectivity. I'm not sure Trump has figured that out yet, but then again, he's president and I'm not. What do you think in general, if you have reached a certain level of stature within any community, people are going to start making fun of you. You've got to make a decision. Do you laugh along with them? Do you. Do you attack all the time? Some of the time. My advice to you, as you rise in stature in your own career, get a thick skin. And just because somebody makes fun of you doesn't make them wrong, doesn't make them unfunny either.
