A zest for drama, potboilers and brinksmanship appear innate in politicians, something they have deep down inside them that wants to come out and play!
Our political leaders don’t want to just win, they want to vanquish, score a triumph, a knockout, pull off a last-minute historic victory, like Tom Brady behind in the points, down to the wire throwing that miraculous touchdown pass to win another Super Bowl.
Reaching consensus, ironing out differences with opponents, exercising boring diplomacy. All that’s academic and so undramatic. Boring!
This is the drama we’re watching today in Washington as our country heads for yet another cliff, this one as steep as they get, called the debt ceiling.
Will it be lifted seconds before it’s reached? Will one side bow to the other in the nick of time, sparing millions of Americans from losing their social security payments they need to stay alive?
Military veterans their hard-earned benefits, millions of workers their jobs while markets crash and burn, destroying companies and people’s life savings?
Ah, it’s a delicious drama fit for Washington.
From where does this love of and fascination for drama come?
As many of our political leaders, from the President on down, are older folks, many have enjoyed dramatic movies like The Godfather, Batman Begins, Star Wars and Thor. Some even have seen King Kong beat his chest atop the Empire State Building, The Hunchback of Notre Dame clutching his beloved dangling in his arms, and the many dramatically victorious Robin Hoods, Knights of the Round Table, and the brave, undaunted Sir Lancelot’s rescuing their damsels in distress with the latest damsel being Speaker Pelosi.
This is drama fit for kings and queens, like King Biden, Queen Pelosi and their adversaries, sir knights McConnell and McCarthy and their emperor, his highness himself, their majesty Trump, whose election was dramatically stolen by Bonnie & Clyde.
So let the play resume. Bring on the drama kings and queens. The dramatic ending tis a consummation to be wished for in American politics. On that Washington stage, drama is everything. Without it you would have ordinary, dull, run-of-the-mill management of the country in accordance with a long, drawn-out script, The Constitution.
*From the title of one of my books: “Is there enough Brady in Trump to win the inSUPERable BOWL?
Besides an inveterate blogger, Tom Madden is an author of countless published articles and five books, including his latest, WORDSHINE MAN, available next month on Amazon. He is the founder and CEO of TransMedia Group, an award-winning public relations firm serving clients worldwide since 1981 and has conducted remarkably successful media campaigns and crisis management for America’s largest companies and organizations.