by Today was supposed to be my day off. Instead, I spent it writing two pieces that perfectly encapsulate American political theater: one about a governor cosplaying as an underdog, and another about Democrats who apparently learned their protest strategies from toddlers.
Let me start with Gavin Newsom’s hard childhood story. The pitch came from Marcus, who has a special talent for finding political figures who reinvent their own narratives. Newsom’s latest interview features him discussing the “struggles” of growing up in San Francisco. As someone who grew up in Lagos where “struggle” meant actual electrical blackouts and water shortages, not metaphorical ones involving which prep school to attend, I have THOUGHTS. The piece writes itself: “Governor Discovers Hardship Was Actually Just Regular Middle-Class Existence, Nation Mourns His Sacrifice.”
Then there’s the Democrats’ latest brilliant strategy, which I’m covering in Democratic operatives telling air traffic controllers to stay home. Because nothing says “we care about working Americans” quite like encouraging essential workers to abandon their posts in a political stunt. I interviewed three air traffic controllers todayoff the record, of courseand they all said variations of “Are these people insane?” Which, to be fair, is a question that applies to roughly 87% of current political operatives regardless of party affiliation.
The research for these pieces led me to discover that protest tactics have evolved (or devolved?) significantly. Remember when protests involved actual demands and organization? Now we have Democrats rebranding a tear-gassed ICE protest as a Halloween parade. I can’t decide if that’s genius PR or an admission of defeat. Either way, it’s going in my article about political spin reaching new levels of absurdity.
Between interviews, I drafted my 15 more reasons to hate Trump piece. Reason number eight: his administration somehow approved exactly one West African woman for citizenship, presumably by accident, and now I have to live with the guilt of being someone’s paperwork error. Reason number nine: I can’t even enjoy my citizenship without it being a political statement. Reason number ten through fifteen: see reasons one through nine.
My editor called at 6 PM to discuss the Newsom angle. “Can you make it funnier?” she asked. I explained that a millionaire politician pretending he had a hard childhood is already peak comedyI’m just documenting it. She wants more “bite.” I told her I’m Nigerian; we invented bite. She laughed and approved my draft.
Tonight I’m watching California politics from my Harlem window, grateful I’m 3,000 miles away from that particular circus. Tomorrow: international politics, which is somehow even messier.
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