At the last candidates’ debate before the South Carolina Republican primary, Jeb Bush made this remarkable comment:
While Donald Trump was building a reality TV show, my brother [George W. Bush] was building a security apparatus to keep us safe.
The “security apparatus” sounds like nothing but a euphemism for “security state” or “police state,” placing the Bush tribe unmistakably on the dark side and leaving Trump on the right one, a harmless entertainer of boredom-stricken masses.
However, as any sophisticated dictator should know by now, his power cannot be secure unless his subjects are totally immersed in a reality show. This stratagem goes beyond merely controlling television or streaming anesthetic visual content.
By the way, The Apprentice never quite made it in Russia. Survivor, on the other hand, was all the rage in Putin’s first term. But nothing could beat the interminable homemade crapola, Dom-2.