By Don Hall

In 1931, Americans were completely in love with a couple who made their fame by knocking off banks, small mom & pop stores, and rural gas stations. These two were revered as celebrities despite (or because of) murdering nine police officers and several civilians in their three year crime spree.

Another criminal of those days escaped from prison by carving a gun out of wood, had a legendary giant cock, was a notorious womanizer, and robbed 24 banks. People called him a folk hero.

In film, we idolize Michael Corleone, The Man with No Name, Travis Bickle, Mad Max, Dirty Harry Callahan, and almost any version of Robin Hood. On the boob tube, we love Tony Soprano, Dexter, Tyrion Lannister, Omar Little, and Vic Mackey.

Plainly, we Americans love nothing more than a law-breaking anti-hero.

Take the billionaire who pretends to be one thing through lies and subterfuge and then breaks a list of laws to combat what he sees as crime and corruption. We love that guy. He’s a hero, right? 

Who doesn’t love Batman?

No one loves a meth dealer. These guys prey upon the weakest of our numbers, destroying lives, making money off of mental illness and addiction. Frequently violent out of necessity, meth dealers are the low-end version of the scumbags who target old people in insurance scams and Big Banks who con regular people out of their life’s savings. But we fucking love Walter White.

Why do we love these guys? It seems that Ayn Rand’s theme of selfishness as a positive trait is infecting the society at large. The focus on me and my empowerment and respect that I am owed and the end justifies the means Machiavellian ethos has taken over the extremes on both sides of the ideological fence. 

Is it centrist to recognize that the Far Ends of the Spectrum are hellbent on using the exact same strategies to destroy their enemies?

For slightly less than half the country (and, apparently, a lot of white women and Latinos) Donald Trump is their John Dillinger. He is rich (give or take the truth), he is outside the system, he breaks the rules, he does what he wants and doesn’t care what anybody says about it. He is Bruce Wayne if you (like so many in this country do) believe that Hillary Clinton is The Joker.

Keep in mind, these narratives of our real life criminal folk heroes come from one place: the media. There’s no question that the Russians helped Trump get elected but it was CNN that got him nominated in the first place.