John Oliver Pleads with Donald Trump to Drop Out of the Presidential Race

By Emily Cutler | Last Week Tonight | August 22, 2016 |

By Emily Cutler | Last Week Tonight | August 22, 2016 |

I’m about to do something that’s going to make me feel really bad about myself the second I hit “Publish.” I’m going to ignore the main segment from yesterday’s episode of Last Week Tonight on charter schools in order to talk about Donald Trump. And I hate talking about Trump. I also think charter schools are a big issue that too many people have made foregone conclusions about. It’s something that we as a country should be focusing on, and that I individually now have a chance to talk about. But damnit if Oliver didn’t make his final segment until September 22nd too much fun to pass up.

So I’ll make a few generalized point on charter schools in order to assuage my guilt:
1) Government or government sponsored organizations that provide basic human services aren’t businesses, and should never be run as one.

2) Charter schools on the whole are neither good nor bad. Some schools do slightly better than public schools, some charter schools are wonderful, and some are garbage. Any decent educational reform will incorporate the positive aspects from charter schools, and prevent predatory schools before they ruin the lives of their students.

3) Never underestimate people’s ability to cheat the system for their own personal gain. This is in no way exclusive to charter schools, but they fact that any governmental official believed people managing charter schools wouldn’t exploit every loophole is hysterical, and possibly intentionally, naive.

OK, I ate my information vegetables. And for dessert?

I’m so sad that John will be leaving us for an entire month, but could kiss his nervous little face for finally, finally explaining Trump’s appeal to me. I still can’t stand anything about the walking embodiment of a meth addict ejaculating on a Nazi porn mag, but this is literally the first time I’ve ever had anybody explain his appeal to a larger audience. Despite the fact that Clinton’s win is a statistical inevitability, close to 45 percent of Americans say they’ll vote for Trump. And I might be out of touch, but I don’t believe 45 percent of Americans are openly and aggressively racist monsters.

With this explanation, I can finally feel comfortable assuming that’s true. People don’t like Trump because they’re racist. They like Trump because he’s playing out every coke fueled ’80s fantasy movie ever produced. He’s John Cusack saving the rec center, he’s Lambda Lambda Lambda beating Alpha Beta, he’s Allen Bauer finding his dream girl even if it turns out she has a little issue of being a mermaid. He’s every story that’s fun to pretend about because of it’s wild implausibility. It happens that he’s actually a total garbage person in addition to the fantasy escapism, but some people don’t like him for the garbage reasons. They like him because he’s Teen Witch. And loving Teen Witch is something I completely understand.