Barrett Kalellis
Tuesday, Apr. 06, 2004

Not one to underestimate the unseemliness of public taste, Trump and his producers concocted a program which pits youthful, would-be overachievers against each other in a struggle to remain standing over the course of the season.

Whoever survives gets to head one of the businesses in the Trump Empire at a yearly salary of $250,000, ostensibly by using his or her brains, beauty and competitiveness to advance Trump’s business interests.

Oh, yes — the “high point “of each show is when The Donald gets to grill two or three of the contestants, criticize their performance, then histrionically drop the well-rehearsed verbal bombshell, “You’re fired!” The thus-humiliated poor soul is followed by a hand-held camera as he or she decamps the premises into a cab waiting for the drive into oblivion.

Rather than being a theme for entertainment, this show rather cynically exploits the young people who are trying their best to perform their chosen tasks to impress Trump and to win the Grand Prize. Having some personal experience in the matter, it’s no laughing matter to be fired, and making this the dramatic focus of the program seems particularly cruel, and especially crushing to these earnest minions.

Trump is riding the show’s popularity to the hilt, complete with myriad TV interviews and documentaries, ostentatious signage on his properties, while hawking his most recent book to boot, predictably titled “How to Get Rich.”

Although one lesson that Trump trumpets in the book is “How to think big and live large,” one wag already has suggested that it should really be titled, “How I Shamefully Made a Few Bucks.”

Notwithstanding that he is a master of self-promotion, hype and deceptive appearances — his Taj Mahal casino in Atlantic City is losing money hand over fist and might go down the tubes, while his real estate holdings only sport his name (actual operating control is entrusted to others) — the ubiquitousness of Trump in the media is yet another example of the triumph of style over substance.

That major news organizations like NBC have seen fit to cover Trump’s scams by giving him hours of publicity on their network news shows is particularly disheartening, further testifying to the fact that hard news has now been almost entirely co-opted by the entertainment divisions of network corporate owners.

The myth that Trump and his devotees spin, of course, is that the lust for power and riches is admirable, and the quicker you can hustle, cut corners and demonstrate a clever opportunism, the faster you can get to the top. And “live large,” no doubt.

Most history and wise instruction suggest otherwise — that the pursuit of wealth as a primary goal in life is the dream of an adolescent rather than that of a mature person. It is a serious mistake for young people to be taught that unbridled yearning for materialistic pleasures in life is a positive thing.

Samuel Johnson offered a more balanced view: “The ultimate result of all ambition is to be happy at home,” a simple statement that captures the profound essence of a well-ordered life.

What can be more damning of American culture, and our poor educational system, than by witnessing the cheesy Trump held up as a role model, when examples of those who were truly great are generally not known? Why not learn about Benjamin Franklin, whose life was one of the great lives of all time?

Franklin was ambitious as Trump, but he strived rather to perfect his own character, and was no less busy in his efforts to improve the society in which he lived. While not yet 20, he resolved to be “frugal, industrious, strictly truthful, and to speak ill of nobody.” This self-discipline prepared him for the role that he would eventually play on wider stages.

We would be much better off as a society if we championed the values that Franklin represents, instead of the ultimately empty ones that Trump personifies. A recent biographer notes, “If wealth had been his objective, Franklin could probably have had it in as large a measure as anyone in America.”

But Franklin understood, as Poor Richard says, that “Content and Riches seldom meet together.”

Barrett Kalellis is a Michigan-based columnist and writer whose articles appear regularly in various local and national print and online publications. He can be reached at kalellis@newsmax.com.