HenryBriggsColumn

In an earlier life -1970, to be precise – I worked at WJZ-TV, the ABC station in Baltimore, MD. I produced and directed The Arnold Zenker Show, a daily 9:00-10:00 am, LIVE talk show.

Arnold was smart, good-looking, and could strip away BS like a surgeon with a scalpel. Prior to his talk show, he had been a lawyer for CBS network in New York and once, during a strike, subbed for Walter Cronkite. He was smitten by the experience and moved to Baltimore to try his hand at on-camera work.

During those days, we used to love poking the Nixon White House, not on every show like Colbert or Kimmel, but frequently.

One day, I came across a LIFE Magazine article about an FBI agent who had been fired by J. Edgar Hoover “with prejudice”. LIFE wanted to interview him but lost track of him in Baltimore. I made a few calls and a few hours later: “Hi. I hear you’re looking for me.“

He appeared the next morning, a courteous, modest, somewhat subdued man in a dark suit, white shirt, and dark tie, right out of the FBI’s dress code book, if they had one.

His story, which Arnold gently brought out, was both sad and infuriating. Hoover’s “with prejudice” prevented him from getting another job, to the point where he had to leave his wife and kids, and work incognito.  

An hour or so after the show, I got a call from Ron Nessen’s office. He was Nixon’s Press Secretary at White House. It wasn’t to compliment us; they wanted a tape of the show. 

I went upstairs to the VP’s office and told him I “might’ve” screwed up. He shook his head, leaned back in his chair, then smiled and said, “you tell them we’ll be glad to make a copy of the show. It’ll cost $5,000 and will require an Ampex videotape machine that costs $100,000.” 

(In 2025 that equates to $41,749 for the tape, and $834,990 for the machine.)

I called the White House and left the message –  and they never called back.

In those days, the most TV stations a company could own was seven. The reason was to prevent any one company from having too much control of the media. The Reagan Administration considered that over-regulation and overturned it in 1984. Additional stations under one owner, they said, would not threaten “the diversity of independent viewpoints in the information and entertainment markets.”

Today, Nexstar owns 197 stations, 32 of which are ABC affiliates. Disney owns ABC network. Tegna owns 64 stations, 13 of which are ABC affiliates. Paramount owns both CBS network and 28 stations, 15 of which are CBS affiliates. 

This summer Paramount needed FCC approval for an $8 billion dollar merger with SkyDance, a media conglomerate. Currently Nexstar is waiting for FCC approval for a $6.2 billion dollar merger with Tegna.

As most of us know, Trump hates criticism. As most of us also know, Late Night comedians love poking him with satire, which narrows his eyes and reddens his face.  

Not long after Trump started whining in July about Colbert’s jokes, Paramount/CBS cancelled Colbert (effective next May). Immediately afterwards the FCC approved the $8 billion Paramount-Skydance merger. 

The media front-paged it.  Colbert fans boycotted CBS and Paramount. 

When Trump whined again, this time about Jimmy Kimmel, FCC Chairman Carr suggested the network suspend Kimmel, saying “We can do this the easy way or the hard way.” Sinclair Broadcasting dropped the show from its 41 ABC stations and Nexstar and Tegna refused to air Kimmel on their 43 ABC stations. (Note: Nexstar and Tegna still need FCC approval for their $6.2 billion dollar merger).

That’s when Disney/ABC caved and took Kimmel off the air.

And then, finally, Late Night audiences, as well as hundreds of Hollywood heavyweights and millions across the country, erupted at Trump and the FCC and at Disney/ABC.

So Disney/ABC caved again. Effective Tuesday, Sept 24 Kimmel was back on the air. He knocked it out of the park.

These two incidents are not just examples of the President trampling the First Amendment. They’re not just examples of why the seven station rule should never have been dropped. 

They’re examples of corruption – at the highest level of our government.

And they’re part of a deliberate pattern. Trump has used the power of the government’s purse to bring universities to heel, withholding billions of already committed federal dollars from them. He has used the Justice Department to bully law firms into giving him millions of dollars of free legal services. This month, it was the FCC and the media’s turn. Not to mention the people he’s fired for disloyalty.

Who’s next?

This systematic corruption and abuse of power is symptomatic of every dictator who took over a country, from Stalin to Hitler to Orban, to name just a few. 

Wouldn’t it be great if the Late Night comedians inspired the whole country to stand up to this dictator and take back the democracy he and his cronies are deliberately destroying? 

When the country was still basking in the sunshine of new found freedom, two politicians, a Vice President and a Secretary of the Treasury, got so angry at each other they had a duel. The Treasury Secretary’s shot hit a tree branch above the VP’s head; the VP’s shot hit the Secretary in the stomach. Ouch!

The good news? No-one died that day. 

The bad news? On the next day, July 12, 1804, Secretary of the Treasury Alexander Hamilton died. The rest of the political class was so disgusted at the whole event that Aaron Burr was ostracized out of politics.

What caused that much animosity?  Not jealousy over a woman. Not anger over a football game (this was wa-a-a-y before the Eagles ever played the Cowboys). Not one of them stealing the other’s horse (horses were a big deal then, the difference between life and death if you were alone in the wilderness). 

Nope. They had dueled over political conflicts for years. Hamilton led the Federalist party; Burr led the Democratic-Republican party.  And over the years some nasty words were flung back and forth.

Sound familiar?

The US was founded on political conflict between the British  kingdom and the wanna-be democracy. After that was resolved with violence, there was conflict over interpretation of the Constitution. These conflicts were generally conducted with civility. But, over time, things got more and more heated. 

Right up to the Civil War. Which was very uncivil.

Today politicians generally just duck and weave around disagreements. They rarely personally insult their adversaries. That’s one reason they can be so boring on Sunday morning shows: no one wants to end up with a Hamilton stomach ache. Instead they refer to even their worst enemies as “colleagues across the aisle”.  From the end of the Civil War forward, its been an unwritten rule of politics:  Don’t get personal. 

Until about 10 years ago. That’s when the king of personal insults came down the escalator and started flinging personal pejoratives like confetti at a birthday party.

Michelle Obama’s famous “when they go low, we go high” was an attempt to keep things civil. It didn’t work. 

Rather than unify the country, for the last ten years our current leader has divided the country.

Anyone who has read newspapers, watched TV, or followed on social media has witnessed it:  from mimicking the disabled to a constant stream of insults like “crazed lunatics”, “radical left”, “they don’t mind executing babies after birth”, “vicious”, “corrupt” “treasonous”, etc…

To his fan base he’s candid, authentic, real. To the others, he’s obnoxious, mean, nasty.

And that has resulted in more and more “nasty” speech from the right aimed at LGBTQ people, immigrants, liberals, etc… in social and traditional  media.

Which has resulted in more and more “nasty” speech from the left aimed at corporations, conservatives, rich people, etc… in social and traditional media.

See the pattern here?

Add to that stew of disdain a growing authoritarianism. Major government leaders, as well as entire departments of the government, are being subjected to loyalty tests, from the FBI to the Defense – oops! –  War Department, FEMA, State, DOJ. The National Guard has been sent to DC, LA and is being considered for Chicago, New Orleans, New York. Then there are the new Tarriffs which are alienating life-long allies, and the mass deportations.

Which brings up a fundamental of human nature: Fear and helplessness lead to anger. Wars have been started over fear and helplessness. Vietnam happened because the US was afraid of the spread of communism. Ditto the Korean War. Hitler scared Europe into WWII. The South started  the Civil War because they feared the end of slavery.  The French feared…starvation. 

Today immigrants are afraid of being deported. Their employers are afraid of going broke without workers. Government workers are afraid of being fired for being non-partisan. Liberals are afraid of conservatives; conservatives are afraid of liberals. 

Elected officials are afraid of being shot. A Democratic state lawmaker in Minnesota and his wife were shot. The Pennsylvania governors residence was fire-bombed. And a popular conservative influencer was just shot for being… a conservative influencer.

A lot of people are feeling pretty scared and helpless right now. And, as a result, angry. What our President and leaders – of both parties -need to do is learn the lesson of Burr and Hamilton. 

Don’t throw away our shot. Stop the nasty rhetoric. Start debating ideas again. Politely.

We are a country founded on two unintentional, fundamental flaws.

Jefferson’s iconic 1776  phrase “all men are created equal”  in declaring independence from King George, III was the first flaw. “All men” skipped all Black men and all women because all Blacks and all women were less than equal to White men. 

OK, White women were not slaves, although not a few were treated that way. 

And OK, Jefferson later seemed to regret his writing, a little.  He freed 2 slaves while he was alive and 5 more at his death – out of 600. 

Blacks were given a step up toward equality, the right not to be slaves, 87 years later (1863). Women received the right to vote 144 years later (1920) and the right to abortion 197 years later (1973). 

49 years after receiving that right (2022) and 246 years after “all men are created equal,” a woman’s right to abortion was curtailed by a Supreme Court… dominated by men.

Today, 249 years after the Declaration of Independence, the idea that all people are created equal is far closer to reality than in the Foundng Fathers’ era, but for so many it is still more aspiration than inspiration. And the source of ongoing conflict.

Speaking of the Founding Fathers, here’s second fundamental flaw: a capitalist economic system.

Capitalism arrived in this country in the form of land ownership and slavery soon after the arrival of the first settlers. In the 19th century, it grew into ownership of industry and more. Today it operates in every corner of the country, from the medical system, to the prison system, to food supply, to restaurant chains, to law firms, to school systems, to media companies, and more. 

Business owners, whether running slave farms or hospital chains have one thing in common: the owner – the Boss – operates as a benevolent dictator. The Boss calls all the shots, from hiring and firing, to marketing, to financing, to individual sales, to annual Christmas parties. Need more machines? Want to expand? See the Boss. Want a raise, more staff, better vacation, more widgets?  See the Boss.

In a democracy, there is no dictator. Decisions are made through debate, voting, more debate, more voting. 535 voters in Congress, 9 voters on the Supreme Court and 1 President decide things – after being chosen by hundreds of millions of citizen voters. Democracy takes time, patience, political acumen, and fortitude. 

It is as different from capitalism as men are from women; they coexist, but barely.

When, in the 1800’s, the US wanted to expand west, the slave owners wanted to expand, too. Democracy debated and, with the Missouri Compromise, approved…um… partial expansion. But the conflict didn’t end, eventually exploding into a divorce proceeding, the Civil War. The slave owners lost. But the fundamental conflict between business and democracy continues to this day. 

The best democratic leaders excel at debating, convincing, bargaining, inspiring, schmoozing. The best capitalist dictators excel at making the right universal choices and giving the right universal orders.

It is unusual for a business tycoon to become a successful politician, although there are exceptions (Rockefeller, Romney, Schwarzennager, Bloomberg, Warner, for example.) But they had to drop their dictator techniques in the process.

So how did a country with these two foundational flaws become so successful?

A shared value system. 

From the early settlers to today, the US culture has valued honesty, civility, individual rights, and protection of the minority. Most people trust their government and their fellow citizens. Most follow the law. Most value integrity. They don’t lie, cheat or steal. 

Politicians and capitalists have operated together within this shared value system for almost 250 years as a beacon of success for the entire world, flaws and all.

But today, there is cause for great concern. Our current leader constitutes a third and possibly fatal flaw: he does not share the values.

A failed capitalist (6 bankruptcies), a congenital liar, a convicted felon who thumbs his nose at both the Justice system and the Bill of Rights, a remorseless bully, a fanboy of world dictators, he ignores the law and lacks even basic integrity, instead forcing Mafia Don values onto a democratic government.

The result? A deeply divided country consumed by conflict, distrust, and fear of the future.

I wonder what the Founding Fathers would do. 

Actually, I don’t.

America’s wanna-be king has always liked spectacles, from his publicity seeking bar-crawling as a NY landlord, to his one-line TV stardom (“you’re fired!”), to his paid audience who applauded his ride down the escalator in 2015, to his domination of social and mainstream media as President. 

It has always been about grabbing attention. Why understate when you can overstate? Why overstate when you can create a show? Why create a show when you can create a spectacle?

Israel destroyed most of Iran’s defenses and killed most of it’s leaders over the last 10 days. Then, at Netanyahu’s bidding, Trump ordered 125 aircraft, including seven B-2 Bombers, to attack Iran’s three nuclear sites with 30,000 pound MOP’s (Massive Ordnance Penetrators). First bombing ever: for the B-2 and the MOP’s. No one shot down. No one shot at.

A spectacular military success… in the eyes of Trump.

If any country bombed three US sites, we would be at war. Look what happened when Japan bombed just one site in 1941.

Fear of a real war may be why VP Vance claimed the U.S. wasn’t really at war with Iran, “we’re at war with Iran’s nuclear program.” Which is like the Japanese saying, “we’re not at war with the US; we’re at war with those ships in Pearl Harbor”.

War is not easy. Just ask Putin, with over a million Russian casualties in 3 years. 

Never mind. He doesn’t care.

In waging war on Iran Trump skipped Congress like many presidents before him. 

In the summer of 1787, the disparate but United States of America formalized the modern world’s first democracy with a patchwork of compromises and principals called the US Constitution. It was designed to prevent the remotest possibility of a kingdom.

Article I, Section 8, Clause 11 states that “Congress shall have the power to declare war…”, not the President. But they also gave President the right to tell the military what to do. Therein lies one, major, ongoing conflict between Congress and the President.

Congress, in its collective wisdom, has only declared war 5 times since the founding: the War of 1812, the Mexican War, the Spanish-American War and World Wars I and II. We won four, lost one.

US Presidents frequently ignore the War Powers Clause. Since WWII, they’ve started wars in Korea, Vietnam, the Gulf War, Iraq, and Afghanistan, among many others. Of those we tied one, lost one, won one, tied two. 

Congress, for all its flaws, is pretty wise about wars.

On this one, though, it appears Trump lucked out. Instead of declaring war on the US, Iran launched a few missiles and then accepted a cease-fire offer.

I’ll bet Putin is seething with jealousy right now.(Iпроклинать! Why couldn’t I have attacked Iran instead of Ukraine?)  

Life isn’t fair, Vlad.

Glowing in the media spotlight, Trump wrote last Sunday:  “It’s not politically correct to use the term, ‘Regime Change, but if the current Iranian Regime is unable to MAKE IRAN GREAT AGAIN, why wouldn’t there be a Regime change???”

In 1953, Britain was obligated to pay royalties to Iran for oil it received from the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company (AIOC). Iranian Prime Minister Mohammad Mosaddegh attempted to audit the AIOC to verify those royalties were being paid. When AIOC refused, Iran nationalized it’s oil industry and expelled foreign interests.

So Eisenhower and Churchill, leaders of the US and Britain at the time, engineered a coup that demolished Iran’s democracy and replaced it with a kingdom led by Shah Reza Pahlavi, which was upended in 1979 by an Islamic (Muslim) dictatorship led by Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. A brutal, dehumanizing dictatorship.

Now there’s irony. Eisenhower and Churchill, heroic defenders of democracy, created 72 years of autocratic rule in Iran. Spectacular irony.

Do you suppose, after 7 decades, Trump is simply trying to right that wrong? (Do you suppose he even knows about it?) 

Which brings to mind something Trump has buried in an avalanche of Israeli and Iran stories: his abandonment of Ukraine, a democracy as courageous as any in history, as it struggles against Putin’s vicious attempt at regime change. 

Now that’s not just spectacular. It’s a spectacle, of shame, dishonor, cowardice.