The New York City borough of Queens has two residents more famous than the rest-- Donald Trump and Archie Bunker. Donald Trump is real and Archie Bunker is a fictional character. Normal Lear, the groundbreaking television producer, named the show All in the Family and cast Carroll O'Connor as Archie.
Trump and Bunker resemble each other in many ways. Archie sits on his throne, a comfortable chair in the middle of his living room. He hurls insults and says the things others are thinking but are afraid to say. Archie has problems with racial diversity, homosexuality, longhairs, war protesters, etc. etc.. Each show ended with a positive message about healing and crossing barriers.
Tump's speeches do not end with that kind of uplifting message. Trump has his throne to the Oval Office. He shoots from the hip just like Archie. Neither man shrinks from controversy.
All in the Family (AITF) ran from 1971-1979 and helped heal some of the lingering pain of the Vietnam era. The show confronted American society's prejudices through the voice of a bigoted, white working-class guy. r
Archie's blunt language reminds us of Donald Trump. Both men have a natural, colorful speaking style. Their hate-filled rants have another thing in common, they attract a loyal following of fans. Both Archie Bunker and Donald Trump speak like guys not afraid to offend. Agree or disagree-- you cannot get Archie Bunker or Donald Trump out of your head. Both are born entertainers.
Trump and Bunker are colorful. They speak in the cadences of the man in the street. Trump has a wealthy background but does not feel elite. Archie comes from humbler stock. Archie feels fear about the future. He doesn't like change.
Trump also seems to want to long for the past. He's done everything possible to rollback the Obama year changes. He constantly inflames liberals and reporters from CNN and MSNBC.
Trump may be non-fictional but like Archie he is product of the media. Trump calls the media "the enemy of the people" but media is Trump's biggest friend. A true con man, Trump convinces us that the most outlandish ideas have validity. And foolishly the media underestimates Trump and calls him a fool. One of the conman's greatest gifts is to convince the other guy, the mark, that he is smarter than you.
The TV camera is Trump's real mistress, a gal more loyal than porn star Stormy Daniels and all the other female accusers. The media speak about Trump constantly, from both left and right, from Fox News to the The New York Times and Washington Post.
New Yorkers are famously abrasive. Usually that New York attitude does not play well in the flyover states. The American Heartland has affection for modest people, the "Aw shucks" attitude of a Gary Cooper, who rides into town on a white horse and takes care of problems like it was easy as pie.
Trump builds his own importance with the fever of a narcissist looking in the mirror. He loves to hear his name repeated. The Trump name resonates across the airwaves and social media with metronome regularity. The crude, colorful language
Despite all the odds against them, the two Queens products have hypnotized America to their way of thinking. Archie has bunked us and Trump has trumped us. And we like it!
Showing posts with label Queens. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Queens. Show all posts
Sunday, July 22, 2018
Wednesday, June 1, 2016
Summer Nights in Queens, New York (1959)
My parents told me we were moving to a "middle class housing project" in Queens. I guess they were right. The Arverne Houses, a series of 6-story red brick buildings, stood between the Atlantic Ocean and Jamaica Bay. The jets out of Idlewild Airport, later to be named JFK, flew overhead with great frequency. The noise didn't bother me. Actually it felt like freedom and power. Our family left crowded Manhattan for Far Rockaway and began a new life in these wide open spaces. The smell of sea air lingered all around.
On summer nights the kids would all gather around a grassy area, demarcated by chain link fences. Our building, 353 Beach 54th St., loomed nearby. My parent could summon me by shouting from the window of apartment 3E. The windows had steel frames. The utilitarian apartment buildings were built to last and they continue to last to the present day.
The kids, almost 90% Jewish, along with a few Catholic families and a sprinkling of African-American kids, found summer nights a good time for staging mock track meets. We had the animal strength of youth. We would circle that grassy patch, an asymmetrical oval, running and competing for stamina more than speed. Who could make the circle 10 times? 20 times? 30 times? We would walk the tops of the chain link fences like tightrope walkers, just to burn off energy and impress each other.
Ten years old and the pre-pubescent hormones had started to kick in. Who was out to impress? Myra, maybe Myrna or maybe Tina, all crushes from my sixth grade class. My best friends were three Jewish kids, Ira, the son of a bartender, and Larry, an Orthodox kid, and Joey, whose father had a tattoo signifying his survival of the concentration camps in Germany. The memory lingers, burned into my consciousness, a sold pillar of youth. Finally we would retreat back to our apartments. This was our America, red bricks, egalitarian, full of crazy kids games like Ringolevio and Johnny-On-The-Pony. One big kid named Eisenberg could not be brought down in Ringolevio-- maybe a future fullback for Far Rockaway High School?
We broke into teams for Johnny-On-The-Pony and the pony was a fire hydrant. The goal, pile as many teammates as possible on top of each other with the fire hydrant as a center of gravity to support all of us.
Feels like a Jack Kerouac vision before I knew about On The Road or had much of an inkling of west of the Mississippi. The innocence of youth, a Fifties America. I loved everything-- Mickey Mantle, the United Nations and the Disney TV show on Sunday nights. My frontier land stood just outside the apartment building.
On summer nights the kids would all gather around a grassy area, demarcated by chain link fences. Our building, 353 Beach 54th St., loomed nearby. My parent could summon me by shouting from the window of apartment 3E. The windows had steel frames. The utilitarian apartment buildings were built to last and they continue to last to the present day.
The kids, almost 90% Jewish, along with a few Catholic families and a sprinkling of African-American kids, found summer nights a good time for staging mock track meets. We had the animal strength of youth. We would circle that grassy patch, an asymmetrical oval, running and competing for stamina more than speed. Who could make the circle 10 times? 20 times? 30 times? We would walk the tops of the chain link fences like tightrope walkers, just to burn off energy and impress each other.
Ten years old and the pre-pubescent hormones had started to kick in. Who was out to impress? Myra, maybe Myrna or maybe Tina, all crushes from my sixth grade class. My best friends were three Jewish kids, Ira, the son of a bartender, and Larry, an Orthodox kid, and Joey, whose father had a tattoo signifying his survival of the concentration camps in Germany. The memory lingers, burned into my consciousness, a sold pillar of youth. Finally we would retreat back to our apartments. This was our America, red bricks, egalitarian, full of crazy kids games like Ringolevio and Johnny-On-The-Pony. One big kid named Eisenberg could not be brought down in Ringolevio-- maybe a future fullback for Far Rockaway High School?
We broke into teams for Johnny-On-The-Pony and the pony was a fire hydrant. The goal, pile as many teammates as possible on top of each other with the fire hydrant as a center of gravity to support all of us.
Feels like a Jack Kerouac vision before I knew about On The Road or had much of an inkling of west of the Mississippi. The innocence of youth, a Fifties America. I loved everything-- Mickey Mantle, the United Nations and the Disney TV show on Sunday nights. My frontier land stood just outside the apartment building.
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